Category: NMEA 2000, 0183 & Signal K

9

Fusion Apollo and Signature Series, a boatload of audio goodness

A day on the water is better with good tunes, and the rise of streaming has changed how we get music on board a lot.  For the last decade, Fusion has lead the way with stereos that use the latest technology to deliver audio on boats.  I’ve just finished a complete install of the company’s current gear aboard Have Another Day and as you will read, Fusion continues to leverage the latest tech and deliver great sound.

15

Heat shrink solder sleeve butt connectors, great for skinny boat wires

The small gauge wire connections usually required when installing NMEA 0183 data sharing often fail because normal boat wiring techniques don’t work well at this scale — or at least not in my clumsy DIY hands. So I was intrigued at first sight with this relatively new type of heat shrink butt connector that uses low-temperature solder instead of a crimping sleeve, and so far I’m quite impressed with the results.

15

Actisense NMEA 2000 cables & connectors, plus network design tips

If you need a small NMEA 2000 network, Actisense’s all-in-one 4 Way at upper left is an especially simple and rugged way to go… there’s lots more you can do with a short N2K backbone and drop cables than many people realize, and that’s a small portion of what I’ll detail below. I had fun mocking up various network designs, and they will hopefully illustrate what you can and can’t do within the NMEA 2000 standard, plus some techniques that are simply good practice…

15

Aqua Map Master adds AIS, WiFi instrument data, USACE surveys and route explorer

Aqua Map has added a premium tier called Aqua Map Master that adds AIS overlays, data via NMEA-0183 and SignalK over WiFi, US Army Corp of Engineers survey data overlayed over charts and a new route explorer.   With Master, Aqua Map adds several features I haven’t seen on any other mobile app that I’m excited to try out.

8

Raymarine adds easy STng-to-N2K adapter plugs and a SeaTalk NG alarm

With the introduction of the Axiom MFD line Raymarine moved away from their proprietary SeaTalk NG cable/connector system and joined most other manufacturers offering standard DeviceNet cabling for NMEA 2000 networking.  Now they’ve introduced a helpful line of adapters to make that transition easier, and the little adapters above can solve a lot of installation headaches…

4

FLIR Launches Next Generation Raymarine VHF Radios

FLIR is excited to announce the launch of its next-generation Raymarine VHF radios. The compact Ray53, full-sized Ray63 and the multifunction Ray73 with AIS are all full-function VHF marine radios with Class D Digital Selective Calling (DSC). Each new VHF model is equipped with a built-in GPS receiver and connection point for…

1

Digital Yacht iKommunicate Gateway Adds Full Coastal Explorer Integration

With the new iKommunicate update, just plug its network cable into a wireless router, connect the PC wirelessly (or wired) to the same router and within seconds the two devices will auto-discover each other and start sharing data.  All information on the iKommunicate’s NMEA 2000 interface or any one of its three NMEA0183 interfaces, will come streaming through in Coastal Explorer protocol…