What's happened to PBO chart corrections?

[vyv_cox]

Horses for courses, then? When we lived and sailed in Holland we bought new charts almost every year for some of the reasons you suggest. In Greece almost no changes occur to anything. Garmin digital charts for 2012 are identical to the ones for 2000, and neither of them particularly good. The paper folios are slightly better for the islands but still leave a lot to be desired.

 

[JohnBo]

I found the PBO Chart Updates really useful and a good reminder every month to check that nothing significant had changed in my sailing areas. It also saved me the hassle of going through the Admiralty Notices to Mariners (when I remembered to). I do have a chart plotter but the digital chart is now 4 years old.

I complained to PBO about the removal of the chart updates and this was the reply I received from the editor David Pugh:

‘Thank you very much for your considered reply regarding chart updates. The decision to remove them was made after much discussion just before I started as Editor, but we were unsure at the time whether it was a wise thing to do.
Responses so far have been sparse, but all the replies received have been well thought out and to the point, with the result that I am seriously considering reintroducing chart updates from the January issue.
Could I take this opportunity to ask whether you find the selection we published until recently appropriate (UK, France, Irish and North Sea coasts), or would you be content with just the updates for the UK coast?
I will pass on your comments about the 13 issues to the publisher, who is responsible for introducing the extra issue.’

 

[prv]

Pete,

may I ask how much your navionics card / subscription was and where you got it ?

I bought it from JGTech, but the emails I have don't say what I paid. I know that the plotter and charts together were under £400.

The current price is shown as £179 - see "New Navionics Plus on SD and MicroSD card" at http://www.jgtech.com/charts.htm

This gets you an empty card and a USB card reader - the package you buy is the same wherever you want charts for. The first time you plug it into a computer, it asks you to nominate one of about half a dozen areas (in my case, Europe) and it then becomes permanently locked to that region. Within the region, you then drag a rectangle across a chart to select how much you want to copy down onto the card. Frankly this step seems a little silly since I have the whole of the UK, Ireland, and nearby Continent stored on mine - it would have made more sense when storage capacities were smaller and you had to choose what to carry. The point, though, is that you can do this dragging-copying bit as often as you like within your subscription period - so you could update daily if you really wanted to. I don't know what the price is to continue the subscription for subsequent years (I'm still in my first) - I hope it's not the £89 "Update" card shown on JGTech. Unfortunately Navionics are pretty rubbish at explaining their various options.

It does, however, appear that you might be able to upgrade to the new system for €99: http://www.navionics.com/en/navionicsupdates

Pete

 

[Dazedkipper]

I found the PBO Chart Updates really useful and a good reminder every month to check that nothing significant had changed in my sailing areas. It also saved me the hassle of going through the Admiralty Notices to Mariners (when I remembered to). I do have a chart plotter but the digital chart is now 4 years old.

I complained to PBO about the removal of the chart updates and this was the reply I received from the editor David Pugh:

‘Thank you very much for your considered reply regarding chart updates. The decision to remove them was made after much discussion just before I started as Editor, but we were unsure at the time whether it was a wise thing to do.
Responses so far have been sparse, but all the replies received have been well thought out and to the point, with the result that I am seriously considering reintroducing chart updates from the January issue.
Could I take this opportunity to ask whether you find the selection we published until recently appropriate (UK, France, Irish and North Sea coasts), or would you be content with just the updates for the UK coast?
I will pass on your comments about the 13 issues to the publisher, who is responsible for introducing the extra issue.’

I guess they've decided not to.

 

[Leighb]

I did usually look through the PBO ones out of interest to see if anything was of local relevance, however as I use Imray charts I download their list of corrections for the charts I use and add the corrections at the start of the season, I also have 2 plotters with a card for each. I update one each year, and have the latest one in the cockpit plotter.

I also rely heavily on Tillergirl's site for local pilotage detail, for which many thanks.

I have not really missed the PBO ones.