Tried and True

By Dan Fales

SHIP AVOIDANCE: AIS will track a ship's progress in relation to your route.

To participate in NAR, Goleen had to travel 6,500 miles to Ft. Lauderdale from its homeport in Seattle. During that journey, the crew was concerned about being run down by a ship with an inadequate lookout. "On a few occasions, we tried to speak on VHF with ships bearing down on us, but not one vessel ever responded," says Christopher Samuelson, the boat's owner. "Each time, we took evasive action and the commercial ship maintained her course." These experiences persuaded Samuelson to fit AIS just prior to the ocean crossing. He installed a Furuno FA 100 AIS unit, which was interfaced with the boat's PC chartplotter and Nobeltec's Admiral software.

On all three legs of the crossing, Goleen encountered three or four ships each day and used the information from its AIS to call the bridge of each ship. AIS reported the name, tonnage, type, shipping line, destination, speed and heading of each vessel, along with the critical Marine Mobile Service Identity (MMSI) number. When Samuelson wanted to contact a ship, he would put its number in his VHF radio, which was equipped with Digital Selective Calling (DSC). "We received a response every time. In 40 years of boating, I have never been able to talk to the bridge of a ship."

After making contact, Goleen would identify itself and ask if the ship's crew had seen the boat. According to Samuelson, 50 percent of the watch officers asked Goleen to wait for a response while radar got turned on. After Samuelson informed the watch officers that Goleen was traveling with a group of motoryachts, each officer volunteered to alter course to give the boats sea room.

Traffic really picked up as the fleet approached the Straits of Gibraltar, where ships were heading into and out of the Mediterranean. There, Goleen's chartplotter screen had as many as 40 targets displayed at one time. "Not one ship failed to respond to our call," says Samuelson. In the meantime, skippers on the other 17 boats in the NAR fleet listened to this stream of communications. After the fleet was tied up in Gibraltar, they thanked Samuelson for his help. "Each one told me he would be fitting an AIS soon. They shared my opinion that AIS is as important and beneficial as radar and GPS."

ABCs of AIS

Class B systems, which will be available at the end of this year, are the next generation of Class A. They both send and receive information, but Class B systems will be priced lower, which means you'll be seeing more AIS units on recreational boats in the future. A Class A system costs from $3,500 to $6,000, while a Class B unit will fall near $1,000. Class B systems will not have Class A features like IMO number reporting and ship turn rates.

There are also receive-only AIS units. These sets transmit nothing, but they do receive signals from vessels with Class A systems. Though receive-only sets have significantly fewer features than Class A units, they do provide ship names, MMSI numbers, course and speed. Receive-only units include McMurdo's SLR 200 ($1,495), Nobeltec's SLR-200 ($1,150), the RadarPlus SL161R from SeaLinks ($999) and the new Si-Tex AIS Radar ($600), which has a dedicated display. The Nobeltec, McMurdo and SeaLink units plug directly into a computer with a navigation program that's AIS-ready.

When selecting an AIS system, it's important to note that not every manufacturer's chartplotter will accept AIS information. C-Map, however, has introduced AIS acceptability in a number of C-Map-based chartplotters. These include hardware from Si-Tex and Furuno. When looking to enhance PC chartplotter systems, navigation programs from Fugawi, MaxSea, Nobeltec, Transas and The Capn are all AIS-ready.

Effiicency Expert
The development of the new plug-and-play NMEA 2000 network has prompted Maretron to introduce a new GPS sensor antenna. It provides position data for any unit that's NMEA-2000 ready. This stand-alone GPS sensor can provide 10 fixes per second, calculate boat speeds four times every second and report precision timing once per second. The GPS 100 also decodes differential signals from WAAS, EGNOS and MSAS. Price: $309. Maretron, www.maretron.com.

Dialing for Weather
Now, you can get a local weather update on your cell phone as you walk the dock toward your boat. You can call the Weather Channel for a text message that costs only 75 cents. No subscription contract is necessary; you need only a text message cell phone. Each message request is billed separately, provided your cell phone server participates in this program. To use the service, simply create a new text message and type the word SEA, followed by a space, and then your city or zip code. Then, send the message to 4CAST (42278). A response will include current conditions, wind speed and direction, seawater temperature and surf conditions. Severe weather alerts are not included. Weather Channel Marine, www.weather.com.

Rugged Handheld
Icom's new M-90 is a commercial-grade, heavy-duty, handheld VHF radio with a unique feature. It's both a marine VHF and—with the flick of a switch—a land mobile transceiver with voice scrambler and 100 programmable channels. This submersible radio is easy to operate, too. Suggested retail price is $499. Icom, www.icomamerica.com.

Other New Electronics featured this month:

• The Benefits of Integrated Navigation Suites
• Now Playing
• Sound Machines
• Big Easy
• In the Wind

Electronics Archive

• More Electronics from past issues.