Category: Sailing & Racing

4

MIBS 2023 – B&G Zeus S

Last year at the Miami show, B&G’s Navico sister company, Simrad, was showing off NSX, the first MFD running Navico’s new Neon operating system. This year it’s B&G’s turn to show their Neon-based Zeus S. Neon on the Zeus S comes with a plethora of sailing-specific features and at least one new safety feature I’ve never seen on a recreational product.

21

The next-generation Orca Display 2 is now available for pre-order

Orca, the Norwegian marine tech startup, opens for pre-orders for Orca Display 2 today (18:00 CET, Thursday 30 March 2023). The new display delivers chartplotter-level brightness and operating temperature range combined with the portability and performance of a modern tablet. Deliveries will begin in late April 2023 for early pre-orders…

43

Airmar DST810 Multisensor, really smart

Airmar trail blazed the NMEA 2000 “smart” sensor about fifteen years ago, building a microprocessor right into a transducer so that a single rugged N2K cable can both power the sensor and deliver Depth, Speed, and Water Temperature to almost any display, regardless of brand. And while the company deservedly dominates the world of water-related smart sensors today, they were a tad slow to adopt the now-common technique of including a Bluetooth app for the detailed calibration that many of the display manufacturers fail to provide. But after initial testing, I think that the relatively new DST810 Smart Multisensor is a thoroughly modern N2K device…

11

Vakaros Atlas 2 RaceSense & the promise of dual-band GPS

RaceSense is such a novel concept that it’s hard to understand at a glance. While that screen looks like a virtual sail racing app that you play with your fingertips, what’s actually virtual are the folks normally needed to run a real event — plus their boats, the marks, the horn, etc. Instead, Vakaros Atlas 2 tablet-style instruments on each of the real sailboats form a meshed wireless network, and a built-in feature called RaceSense uses distributed artificial intelligence to create the course, call penalties, and name winners. Wow…

3

Hydrogen-fueled electric foiling chase boats at America’s Cup 37?

The next America’s Cup will be held in 2024 at a location still undecided, but the defender Emirates Team New Zealand and the official challenger INEOS Britannia just announced the Protocol which controls almost every other aspect of the race series. And while there are numerous changes that should make the actual sailing competition even more exciting, it also includes a rather amazing powerboat provision…

AP News Oct 18, 2021 4

Drug smuggling, the sailing feats we rarely hear about?

When I got serious about sailing and seamanship fifty years ago, I read all sorts of offshore cruising and racing accounts, particularly interested in the problems that came up and the solutions found. It seemed valuable to learn that, say, a well-found 46-foot ketch could pitchpole stern-over-bow in certain situations and how the crew survived. But eventually I realized that there was a whole niche of especially extreme ocean voyaging that was almost never discussed, except maybe quietly in remote harbors or jail cells…

0

New Product Release: The ATP2 Instrument Processor

A+T Instruments, the fast growing high-end instrumentation company, are now shipping the first full Ethernet network-based performance instrument system on the market. A single Ethernet cable around the boat links all components. The ATP2 processor is designed for distributed applications using an Ethernet bus. The processor is shown above and has…

8

SV Delos, much more than fun in the Pacific

“Another interesting bluewater cruising boat smartly visiting Camden in October,” I thought to myself, “but what’s up with that giant VSAT dome?” Yes, I failed to recognize one of the world’s most famous cruising boats until I ran into an excited passenger schooner captain/friend waiting for the Delos crew to come ashore. But many more boaters than I envision Delos perpetually adventuring to exotic Pacific locales; for example, check this 2014 Episode #22 video that’s drawn 4.3 million YouTube views…