Watch out! If your VHF does not have mmsi number DSC does not work

jrudge

jrudge

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Had cause to read the manual the other day. No mmsi number in the set no DSC.

Googled it and this is correct for all VHF sets.

The mmsi is on the boat rt licence so the manufacture and dealer have no access to the number.

Mine was not programmed and I am willing to bet that half the boats out there with factory installed VHF are the same.

Take a look next time you are on the boat !
 
Umm, isn't that obvious? It's the mmsi that identifies you. A bit like saying a mobile phone will not work without a sim card.

Clearly explained on the VHF course
 
Not to me and clearly the previous owner and the prior two dealers the boat passed through.

DSC sends lat and long of a vessel in distress. MMSI simply identifies the vessel - which in my book is just a nice to have - but clearly not.

The VHF works very nicely without a MMSI number in all other regards so the SIM card parallel is not really valid.

If my boat is the only one with a factory ( as opposed to aftermarket where someone probably read the manual) fit VHF radio without an MMSI coded then that is fine and all I have wasted is 2 mins of my life typing into this forum. If this is not the case then it just might help someone when the push the big red button and the screen says "NO MMSI".

J
 
This is made very clear on the VHF course that you will have done to obtain your VHF licence. Maybe not an exact parallel with the mobile phone issue but similar enough. The idea of DSC is to identify the vessel in distress as well as pushing out Lat and Long, provided it is connected to a GPS unit or has one built in. It cannot identify the vessel without an MMSI number so QED cannot fulfil its function. Sorry if I came across as a bit abrupt but this is made clear both in the manual and on the course so should not be a surprise.
 
jrudge said:
DSC sends lat and long of a vessel in distress.
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Only if the DSC radio receives the lat/long info from your GPS, unless it is a really clever one with its own internal GPS receiver. I had to link mine to the Garmin on the previous Rafiki through NMEA. New Rafiki does not have a DSC VHF. I have not yet worked out if this is a real problem or not.
 
rafiki_ said:
. New Rafiki does not have a DSC VHF. I have not yet worked out if this is a real problem or not.
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It would be interesting to start a poll to ask if anyone takes any action on receiving a DSC distress other than stopping the annoying clackson sounding, especially irritating when the independent one on the flybridge goes off simultaneously with the lower station.


jrudge, its a good heads up post :)
 
rafiki_ said:
Only if the DSC radio receives the lat/long info from your GPS, unless it is a really clever one with its own internal GPS receiver. I had to link mine to the Garmin on the previous Rafiki through NMEA. New Rafiki does not have a DSC VHF. I have not yet worked out if this is a real problem or not.
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Not quite. You can physically enter a Lat/Long if no GPS connected.
 
It does but have you ever read the manual? I cannot really believe that any normal person would ever attempt to make a ship to ship DSC call. The instructions to my Ray 230 were just mind boggling. If you have a small fleet of boats you might bother to program it but entering a load of 10 digit MMSI numbers (and indeed getting hold of them) via their dreadful and cryptic interface seems unlikely for most users. Ch 16, 14 and 9 ( Mallorca maybe different elsewhere) account for pretty much 100% of my usage and selecting these fortunately requires nil knowledge!

Best

Jeremy
 
rafiki_ said:
In the middle of a Mayday panic? I'm not sure I would have the dexterity to do so on the VHF!
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I suspect the original plan was to update your position on the VHF everytime you marked your position on the chart.
N.B. The position remains valid for 4 hours (even if you are now somewhere else.)
 
jrudge said:
It does but have you ever read the manual? I cannot really believe that any normal person would ever attempt to make a ship to ship DSC call. The instructions to my Ray 230 were just mind boggling.
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I actually didn't need to read the instructions, just pressed the button for the DSC menu and went from there. No harder than using an early-2000s-era mobile phone. Maybe your Raymarine is badly designed? It wouldn't surprise me.

You do have a point about finding MMSI numbers. I have my various local Coastguard stations programmed in, plus some forumites I've met on Scuttlebutt cruises. An organiser generally puts together a list of attendees, and some people put their MMSIs in among the contact details. If it's someone I might want to meet up with again, I make a note of their number.

In a couple of weeks I'm going to be cruising the Channel Islands, with another boat in the vicinity and planning to meet up but not strictly cruising together. I know that at least one of the people on that boat is not a techno-numpty, so I can imagine we will both make use of the "position poll" function.

I'd also have a go at using DSC if I needed to call a commercial ship. I don't use the radio for normal AIS work, but it does know about AIS and has the facility to select a target from those currently in range and press "Call".

EDIT: Here's someone routinely using the routine functions: http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?371572-Odd-DSC-behaviour-with-US-Icom-M604-VHF

Pete
 
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jrudge said:
It does but have you ever read the manual? I cannot really believe that any normal person would ever attempt to make a ship to ship DSC call.
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I have to disagree too - maybe I'm not normal ;). I think the ship to ship dsc option is an important safety asset and I have used both position request and dsc calling a number of times. Admittedly I cruise with people who have similar equipment and I have AIS, but the comfort it gives me knowing I could call up an unknown vessel showing on my plotter with a couple of button presses is very reassuring. Like a lot of modern marine technology it might not be much use or additional help on its own, but plumbed into a smart plotter and with AIS it is fantastic. I would also question why anyone would buy a bit of technical kit and not read the manual to understand the features available.
 
jrudge said:
Not to me and clearly the previous owner and the prior two dealers the boat passed through.

DSC sends lat and long of a vessel in distress. MMSI simply identifies the vessel - which in my book is just a nice to have - but clearly not.

The VHF works very nicely without a MMSI number in all other regards so the SIM card parallel is not really valid.

If my boat is the only one with a factory ( as opposed to aftermarket where someone probably read the manual) fit VHF radio without an MMSI coded then that is fine and all I have wasted is 2 mins of my life typing into this forum. If this is not the case then it just might help someone when the push the big red button and the screen says "NO MMSI".

J
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Well, you are certainly not the only one around with a DSC radio that has not been configured - there have been several luddites that have posted here over recent years saying that they cannot see any point in it and have not bothered to configure theirs - maybe one of the previous owners of your boat thought the same way. Have you applied for a Ship's Radio Licence for the boat? That would have asked you to enter your MMSI number and should have prompted you to look!
 
jrudge said:
It does but have you ever read the manual? I cannot really believe that any normal person would ever attempt to make a ship to ship DSC call. The instructions to my Ray 230 were just mind boggling. If you have a small fleet of boats you might bother to program it but entering a load of 10 digit MMSI numbers (and indeed getting hold of them) via their dreadful and cryptic interface seems unlikely for most users. Ch 16, 14 and 9 ( Mallorca maybe different elsewhere) account for pretty much 100% of my usage and selecting these fortunately requires nil knowledge!

Best

Jeremy
Click to expand...

I use ship-to-ship MMSI and went out of my way to choose a DSC radio that includes a full numeric keypad so that calling by MMSI is no more difficult than it is to dial a number on my phone.
 
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