The Marine Technology Hub
It’s been just over six months since Ian ravaged Southwest Florida and, with it, the life my family and I built in Fort Myers. Ian sunk our home on the water, Have Another Day, and destroyed the marina we’d called home for three and a half years. Our lives have continued. We are settled in our house, we’ve found a place to keep our center console, Panbo(at), and overall we don’t have much to complain about, but boy do we miss living on the water.
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.
Since I started paying attention to marine electronics , I’ve heard that Furuno radars are the class of the industry. My own experiences on boats have shown that rumor to be accurate. So, I was awfully disappointed when I couldn’t get my hands on an eval unit when I did my radar comparisons (part II here). I have some good news! Furuno was able to provide a unit for comparison and I’ve had (just a little) bit of time on the water with it.
Hallelujah! ACR recently began shipping its ResQLink AIS PLB to customers in the U.S. and the Americas. Meanwhile, the company’s sibling UK brand Ocean Signal has been offering the same remarkable technology to the rest of the world since November as the RescueMe PLB3. The beacons are exactly the same except for color — as shown in my METS demo photo above — and regardless of the possibly confusing dual branding, I call them a huge advance in marine safety…
My recent reviews of LiFePO4 batteries have focused on fully featured batteries with heating, Bluetooth, and CANBus communications, and even supercapacitors for engine starting. This time, I’m focusing on a battery that delivers raw value and no frills. Li Time batteries are all about delivering maximum energy storage for the smallest price. Although their batteries may lack the features of fancier batteries, they deliver the most amp hours for the fewest dollars. But how do they perform? Let’s find out.
Starlink, like all Elon Musk-backed companies, seems to operate by a different set of rules than what we might expect. The rules change often, generally without notice, and sometimes in highly impactful ways. A recent series of announcements changed the rules, options, and pricing for subscribers. Especially for those who use Starlink on the move. So, what’s the current state of Starlink, and is it a good option for boaters? Read on, and I’ll try to break it down for you.
Raymarine announced several new products either at or just before MIBS this year. The list includes updates to their Axiom Pro and Axiom XL MFDs, a new sonar sounder, and a new camera. Additionally, Raymarine showed off a pre-release version of their latest software update, including an attractive new icon set for the core applications.
The Miami International Boat Show (MIBS) is the first major show of the year. As a result, it’s frequently where we see manufacturers showing off their latest products. This year was no exception. I walked the show floor, finding the latest and greatest offerings in the marine technology space. I’m going to do a series of posts on what I found. The first up is Icom’s M510BB black box VHF radio.
Good design matters, even for a product you probably won’t spend much time admiring. Epoch batteries’ line of LiFePO4 has design covered and an attractive list of features. But the big question is, are these batteries more than just a pretty face? I’ve been putting a couple of their 100 amp-hour, 12-volt batteries to the test, and it sure looks like they have the goods to back up the design.
Panbo(at) spent much of this week at Seakeeper’s Fort Myers operation while they installed a Seakeeper Ride system. After only a few hours on the water with the system, and most of that spent gathering performance data, I think it’s safe to say Seakeeper has another game changer on its hands.
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