Panbo

The Marine Electronics Hub

Category: NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

Smörgåsboat 2: More tasty test electronics southbound on Gizmo 2

Cabin & deck gear / Communications / What's on board... / Zany / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

Smörgåsboat 2: More tasty test electronics southbound on Gizmo

Passagemaker_Who_is_Ben_Ellison_article_opening_spread.jpgThe jury is still out. Brian Lind may have written a blushingly laudatory profile of Panbo and me for PassageMaker magazine — and you can now check out “Who is Ben Ellison?” online — but I agree with regular readers who may rightfully doubt my ‘authoritative’ ‘expertise’! This site is not the “arbitrator of marine electronics” — no such thing exists — and evidence is building that I’ve become a bumbling old boat guy barely in command of all the gear he’s installed, plus very darn slow to write about it…

IBEX Winners: Lumitec PLI and Power-Pole Vision 3

Network & control / The future / Green Boating / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

IBEX Winners: Lumitec PLI and Power-Pole Vision

IBEX_winner_Lumitec_Power_Line_Instructions_cPanbo.jpgWhat’s amazing and IBEX award worthy about the Lumitec demo board above is that while all those light fixtures are only connected to the same simple two-wire 12v power circuit, each can be switched, dimmed, strobed, color-changed and more, individually or as virtual groups. Lumitec calls the protocol Power Line Instructions (PLI), and, as innovative as it is, it had to share top honors in the electronics category with another new-protocol-based product, and we judges wished we could give out more awards. The boats of the future may be emerging from the fog…

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Cabin & deck gear / Network & control / Navigation / PC & peripheral / Communications / Entertainment / AIS / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K / Monitoring & Tracking

Smörgåsboat: The tasty testing buffet installed on Gizmo for 2017

While I do think that Gizmo offers a bountiful spread of delicious marine electronics these days, a more serious title for this entry might read: “Guilt: All the darn gear I’ve borrowed but haven’t...

NMEA to WiFi gateways: TeamSurv’s & FloatHub 14

Wireless & Apps / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

NMEA to WiFi gateways: TeamSurv’s & FloatHub

TeamSurv_NMEA_Tools_NMEA0183-WiFi_bridge_collage_cPanbo.jpgWhen it rains, it pours (particularly at Panbo HQ this “spring”). NMEA-to-WiFi bridges are quite useful — mainly for getting basic boat data like depth, GPS, and wind into the wonderful world of marine mobile apps — and there have been numerous choices for a while. But yesterday TeamSurv started offering an interesting and notably inexpensive new bridge on KickStarter, and the intriguing FloatHub bridge and monitoring system will join it there soon…

News+: Victron Venus, CruzPro SOG2, DY WindSense, Vaavud Ultrasonic, & Panbo “News+” 3

Wireless & Apps / Electrical & Engines / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K / Monitoring & Tracking

News+: Victron Venus, CruzPro SOG2, DY WindSense, Vaavud Ultrasonic, & Panbo “News+”

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Victron’s new Venus GX is a dauntingly complicated looking blue box, but it could beautifully simplify and improve the monitoring and control of a boat’s electrical power system. Essentially, Venus is a Color Control GX without the screen, which makes it less expensive, and it also has extra goodies like 3 tank level and 2 temperature inputs, built-in WiFi, and yet more I/O that hasn’t been enabled yet. The Color Control has evolved (and been used) a lot since I wrote about it in 2014, and Venus can do more…

Sabre 66: excellence in digital switching and control 22

Network & control / Electrical & Engines / The future / The Trade / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

Sabre 66: excellence in digital switching and control

Sabre_Dirigo_66_hull_1_courtesy_Sabre_Billy_Black.jpg

Frankly, there’s no plan behind the Panbo trend of more detailed entries posted less often, but sometimes it does seem like a feature rather than a bug. For instance, Sabre gave me a long and impressive systems tour of their first Dirigo 66 while she beautifully occupied this slip at Yachts Miami Beach 2016, and while I didn’t intend to delay the write-up this long, last week I got aboard just-launched hull #3 the day before heading from Maine to Florida at about 25 knots. So I have additional detail on how well the original system design has worked out – also impressive…

MV Dirona: deep cruising, deeply shared 5

Network & control / How-to / What's on board... / Electrical & Engines / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K / Monitoring & Tracking

MV Dirona: deep cruising, deeply shared

MV_Dirona_with_Jen_and_James_cPanbo.jpgIf there were a lifetime award for cruising excellence, I think that Jennifer and James Hamilton would deserve at least a nomination. I mean excellence at the core practical cruising skills — seamanship and boat care — plus inspirational levels of curiosity about the vast world cruising makes accessible, and perhaps at the top of my imagined award criteria: distinction at sharing all of the above with the rest of us. Visiting M/V Dirona in Belfast, Maine, last October was a treat, but you too can ride along as this Nordhavn heads to Ireland and beyond…

MIBS 2017: Furuno standalone 1815 radar, DFF-3D multimodal sonar & more 9

Fishing & Sonar / Navigation / Electrical & Engines / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

MIBS 2017: Furuno standalone 1815 radar, DFF-3D multimodal sonar & more

MIBS17_Furuno_1815_standalone_radar_cPanbo.jpgWhile Furuno USA had a lot to show off at the Miami Boat Show, let’s start with the new 815 standalone radar. Recent Panbo entries about Raymarine’s sleek new Axiom Series multifunction displays and Navico’s ambitious systems integration strategy drew some keep-it-simple skeptics. But it is still possible to find single function marine electronics if that’s your preference, and the 1815 may be an excellent small radar choice packing a whole lot of performance for the price…

METS 2016: Navico, Fusion, Airmar and Signal K 24

Navigation / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

METS 2016: Navico, Fusion, Airmar and Signal K

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This year’s annual Marine Equipment Trade Show (METS) in Amsterdam seemed busier than ever. It’s good to see that the marine industry has largely recovered, although the sailboat business still seems to lag behind behind motorboats. The super yacht halls were very busy too. I saw some exciting new developments from Navico, who were showing the brand new NSS evo3 and B&G Zeus3 as well as their recently announced instrument displays. Fusion had a new high-end speaker, and Airmar showed me their brand new electromagnetic DX900+ multifunction speed sensor.

WilhelmSK app shows what Signal K, good boat WiFi, and smart DIY coding can do 18

Wireless & Apps / NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

WilhelmSK app shows what Signal K, good boat WiFi, and smart DIY coding can do

testing_WilhelmSK_app_and_solid-state_radars_on_Gizmo_cPanbo.jpg

Hey, those are all solid-state radomes showing on the 7-inch displays at Gizmo’s lower helm, and you’d see a fourth one running on the flybridge. Comparative testing is underway, but today I’m going to write about the rather amazing WilhelmSK app running on the iPad above. It is not only mirroring the Raymarine a77 screen, touch control included, but also neatly displaying lots of NMEA sensor data that’s been converted to the app-friendly Signal K protocol, thanks to Digital Yacht’s iKommunicate gateway. In my opinion, WilhelmSK is a terrific early example of Signal K’s potential and also a testament to Raymarine’s powerful WiFi strategy…