Hi David,

I just ordered several myself in the last few months. 2 years ago, I ordered from Fugawi, and they were great to work with. They are definitely no longer involved in selling the Capteurs products as you determined. 

The last two I ordered I got directly from LCJ Capteurs directly. It did take a little longer to get them, but they were super helpful and polite, and made sure that customs and other things were all taken care of. Even with Fugawi, customs and such were still a challenge in small ways.

If you go to LCJ Capteurs website and use their contact form/page, they will respond pretty quickly.

I did a lot of research myself on alternatives, but I really didn't like the price and features of some of the other manufacturers out there. I loved the LCJ Capteurs product on my previous boat, and love it even more on the new one.

Steve, thanks for the quick feedback i might try contacting directly. I take it you're a sailor but I'd be putting this on a semi-displacement trawler that typically cruises at only about 10 kts. If you don't mind my asking a few questions since you have experience with Capteurs: Its not clear to me which version I would need, looks like a CV3 or a CV7 are options. I'd like basic windspeed data, and Baro would be a nice bonus. Also do you think i could position it out on a wing of my radar mast, i'd prefer not to mount anything higher than my current anchor light due to maintaining my current air draft. Thanks in advance for any inputs.

I also thought about the wireless Calypso, but then I would need a NMEA 2000 gateway of some sort....

Hi David, 

I actually moved from a sailboat last year to a 46' semi-displacement trawler. My cruising speed is between 9-11 knots, and I have the LCJ on that boat. Prior to that, I was a sailor for 20+ years and had ultrasonic instruments on those boats as well. It works very well.

The CV7 is the one I would recommend. I chose the CV7-V-WindyPlug version which is the base CV7 sensor with a vertical mounting mast, and the WindyPlug 0183->NMEA 2000 converter. The WindyPlug takes the nice small 4 wire bundle from the sensor and converts it into a NMEA 2000 plug/data, and also has a barometer in it as well.

I mounted mine on my arch, slightly lower than my anchor light as well. I have a radar mast nearby and there is some swirling / shading effect but not much in terms of the wind. Combined with a STW/SOG sensor/data, I get very accurate apparent/true/ground wind data on various devices, and it has helped immensely in dealing with windage while docking.

Thanks Steve, I'll look into the CV7.

Posted by: Steve Mitchell

Hi David,

I just ordered several myself in the last few months. 2 years ago, I ordered from Fugawi, and they were great to work with. They are definitely no longer involved in selling the Capteurs products as you determined. 

The last two I ordered I got directly from LCJ Capteurs directly. It did take a little longer to get them, but they were super helpful and polite, and made sure that customs and other things were all taken care of. Even with Fugawi, customs and such were still a challenge in small ways.

If you go to LCJ Capteurs website and use their contact form/page, they will respond pretty quickly.

I did a lot of research myself on alternatives, but I really didn't like the price and features of some of the other manufacturers out there. I loved the LCJ Capteurs product on my previous boat, and love it even more on the new one.

I use it on my old boat. He is really good, but delivery is a separate story. At the time of delivery, my package was lost along the way, as is unknown. The company repaid my time and sent a new one again, but it was a shame, I needed to receive it in a certain period.

Just a follow-up on this thread. I did reach out to Capteurs directly and finally got an email back two weeks later (a bit slow for email right?)... anyway it was a very courteous email, confirming that it is true they no longer have a USA distributor but they would be happy to sell direct.

He quotes CV-7-V-Windyplug (vertical arm for mounting on a trawler mast) for "695 Euros Ex Vat; Ex Works".  Unfortunately this translates to about $800 and not sure if it includes shipping....  the point is I was trying to save some money but this essentially puts me right back up into the Airmar price range so there does not seem to be any cost benefit going with Capteurs, plus Airmar of course has plenty of USA distributors...

I guess I'll keep searching; i was hoping to get some type of wind speed sensor with no moving parts, in the $500 range......

Thanks for the update David. That sounds about the same price that I paid, maybe slightly more, for the same thing about 6 or so months ago.  What sold me on the LCJ vs Airmar was the accuracy of the instrument itself. If you look at the specs, they are quite a bit different on the wind side. Of course, Airmar has all of the other sensors including GPS and such (which I did not need) so it is not an apples to apples comparison by any means. 

Hope you find a solution at that price point - I haven't seen anything around $500 that is ultrasonic yet.