AIS/VHF/Plotter question

[N.A.]

I need to update my (very old) electronics. I am thinking of something like an ICOM VHF / Vesper AIS transponder (like Watchmate 8000) with splitter / chartplotter; I dug through the back of my breaker panel today and decided there is room back there to cram it in, and maybe wouldn't be too hard to do myself, which would be nice in terms of cost reduction.

There are naturally an infinity of possible solutions; I am curious about simple "what would you get that works well together if you were doing it" so I have a decent starting point.

--> I would appreciate any suggestions; what would you do now (2022) for integrated VHF/AIS/plotter?

Especially useful is anything along the lines of "just go to an expert because..." or "I installed XYZ myself and X, Y, and Z are working great together".

Thanks in advance; perhaps the best thing about getting my Ericson (34-2 ish) is the amount of friendly assistance I have gotten from this forum, all of which has been incredibly appreciated.


PS: More details, if anyone wants them:

Is the redundancy of getting a VHF with AIS useful if I also have a Vesper? I would like to be able to make a DSC call without typing in MMSI's, by just clicking; unsure what degree of integration is required to get that. I also want the AIS to plot on a chartplotter, and am unsure if it matters that ICOM VHFs seem to be NMEA 0183 while presumably all new plotters are NMEA 2000, so maybe I have to choose which of the two the Vesper would communicate with.

Self-installation seems tractable to me (and more attractive since the local experts seem heavily overbooked and have little time to discuss it), but I would hate to make poor connections out of ignorance (wrong crimper technique?) and have it cost me when it matters. Curious about DIY success stories/warnings.

I will probably get a smaller plotter I can attach the the pedestal with a side-mount (as I currently have), mainly because doing a nav pod mount would require removing all my old instruments and having to replace them, since they are too old to integrate with an NMEA system. I hear good things about Raymarine, Axiom but am unsure if it would be friendly to mount in this configuration. I would probably just use an iPad when below -- the plotter would ideally have wifi so I could do that. What I have at the helm just has to enable me to get home when I am stuck at the helm, not lay out my whole trip.

Lastly, I am trying to avoid mast work -- so would like to leave the existing antenna and coax in there. I realize that should be attended to someday, but ideally not now... unless AIS/VHF cannot work without a new antenna (existing antenna is 24 years old, predating AIS.)

 

[Christian Williams]

Huge variables.

I can contribute merely this: I like my Vesper AIS screen at the nav station, next to the VHF radio. I don't even have the AIS function slaved to the chartplotter at the helm, because I would rather contemplate AIS data in the shade and relative quiet down below. And AIS targets clutter up a smallish chartplotter at the helm.

Personally, I 'd never turn this project over to a professional for advice/installation. It gets ridiculously complicated fast, and if you plan and install yourself you know how it works, and can keep it simple. We need very few of the available bells and whistles, and what we do need varies with the sort of sailing we do or aspire to. KISS ought to be a mandatory tattoo for most of us.

 

[goldenstate]

I used all Raymarine:

Axiom 9 at the helm - I can display AIS targets or not on the chart with a few clicks. I find it useful when outside the Gate.

Ais700 black box

i70 mini-MFD below decks shows simple radius plot of targets and will beep for an alarm

I also bought an external alarm that will wake the dead when triggered.

Everything is plug and play Raymarine SeatalkNG which is NMEA2k proprietary.

if I were going to the trouble of running wires to the helm, I think it would be worth removing all of the old instruments while you are at it. You were also contemplating an electronic autopilot I think? I decided to do it all in one go and added the EV 100.

You need not worry about the mast / antenna. That’s all upstream (downstream?) of the AIS.

I have yet to understand/be convinced of a compelling use case for DSC. Everyone monitors standard VHF channels. I have a Standard Horizon radio which is fine and the only non Raymarine part of my electronics. Never to date have I bothered to learn/use DSC.

 

[GrandpaSteve]

DSC let’s you do a radio check without asking for a radio check on 16. Otherwise, it is a great safety feature as designed, we need to get everyone to use it though.

 

[peaman]

One important point is this: you can have an AIS receiver which can show other vessels on a chart plotter, or you can have an AIS transceiver which can do the same. The difference is the transceiver will let other vessels see you.

I recently installed a Standard Horizon GX2400GPS VHF which has a small screen showing AIS targets. You can select a target to get information on it, or you can call that target with DSC. It puts AIS data on the Nmea2000 network for display at the chartplotter and radar screen.

After realizing the value of transmitting my own AIS data, I installed a Vesper Watchmate XB-8000 which also serves AIS data to the NMEA2000 network.

My masthead VHF antenna and cable were replaced recently, but mast work was not required for either the VHF/AIS or the Vesper unit. Vesper comes with a small antenna which can be mounted on a rail or any other exterior location.

I installed everything myself, but I have decent skills and would expect it to be a challenge for most others. Except for the items noted here, and my Raymarine wheel pilot, my electronics package is B&G. Raymarine has their own opinions on NMEA2000 protocol and cabling versus B&G and others, so I connected a Raymarine "subnet" to the end of my NMEA2000 backbone for simplicity.

 

[Loren Beach]

If sourcing a plotter/radar display for the helm position, keep in mind that a large number of the devices use a powerful permanent magnet to hold their chip door closed rather than a friction catch. The "compass-safe" distance is always buried deep in an on-line installation document, and is often about three (!) feet.
A specialist marine electronics store will inform you of this, for the asking. A large corporate chandler may not have anyone on premises to tell you anything that might possibly disrupt a transaction. I have found the later to have (some) staff who claimed not to know about magnetism at all.
Brand name is important, network type is important, understanding magnetism is much more important.

 

[toddster]

After having a multitude of separate boxes on the last boat, I thought I'd try to get as few gadgets as possible in the new setup. However, things haven't progressed as far as I thought they had. As far as I could find, the only single device that incorporates both VHF radio and AIS transceiver is the B&G/Simrad V60-B. It's also quite a bit cheaper than buying separate devices. However, I couldn't get one. Every place I tried said it was back ordered, more than 90 days.
Although I just checked and see that a couple of places now list it as "in stock." (And I still haven't received all the separate pieces that I ordered six weeks ago!)

FWIW, I was fairly happy with the old setup which was EM-Trak transceiver and splitter with Standard Horizon GX2000 and RAM remote mic. The GX2000 received the EM-Trak data and displayed it on both the fixed display and the tiny screen on the RAM, which worked surprisingly well, even before I had a chart plotter. However, they don't seem to have quite that functionality in the current line-up of NMEA2K compatible units. As noted above, they have one with an AIS receiver built-in but no transceiver. I couldn't see having two separate AIS units, just to have the built-in display.

Where all the VHF's have advanced since the last time I checked is in the remote mics. Many brands now offer wireless (WiFi) remote mics and even apps that let you use your smart phone for that. Reviews seem to be mixed so far, so I went with a wired remote again. Some units let you have both wired and wireless remotes.

 

[toddster]

If sourcing a plotter/radar display for the helm position, keep in mind that a large number of the devices use a powerful permanent magnet to hold their chip door closed rather than a friction catch. The "compass-safe" distance is always buried deep in an on-line installation document, and is often about three (!) feet.
A specialist marine electronics store will inform you of this, for the asking. A large corporate chandler may not have anyone on premises to tell you anything that might possibly disrupt a transaction. I have found the later to have (some) staff who claimed not to know about magnetism at all.
Brand name is important, network type is important, understanding magnetism is much more important.

FWIW, The (B&G) chartplotter I've recently bought has the smallest "compass safe distance" of any gadget in the collection: 1.7 feet. But it wants six feet from any radio or antenna wire. Kind of blows up my nav station plans.

 

[Loren Beach]

Our Lowrance 9" plotter/radar combo sits under a raised ss guard, and is compass-safe by virtue of having a friction catch chip door. And, by passing a real world test where we trial-fitted it and a couple of competitors with the magnets. The later showed a noticeable movement of the compass dial. Lucky for me the local electronics store let me "borrow" several new ones to verify this info. I carefully left them in their plastic wrappers so that they were still untouched by hands.
FWIW, being from the same parent company, the Lowrance, Simrad, and B&G products all seem to be very similar in function.

 

[Christian Williams]

Just for the record, here is what the Vesper screen shows so legibly. My 2015 model is B&W, new ones are color.

The approaching ship bears 085. It's 13.5 miles away.
The Closest Point of Approach (CPA) is .69 miles (!). The CPA will occur in 44:18 minutes. (Time to CPA)
The ship's course is 280m, its speed (SOG) is 14.8 knots.
It's bound for Port of Chiba, Japan (jPCHB), and so on.

A CPA of less than a mile would cause my ship alarm to go off when five miles away. But at this distance, given the 10 degree plus and minus course of a sailboat, it will likely change a lot. But at closer range, a CPA of .69 means get out of the way--fast.

 

[toddster]

Still wrestling with whether to put the main MFD at the Nav Station and mirrored iPad at the helm, or vice verse.
Could just spring for a second MFD, but wow, they're not cheap. Maybe I'll just run a wire for that future purpose, while all the panels are opened up.

 

[N.A.]

Thanks for all the replies so far; this is very helpful.

toddster
- The Vesper Cortex also seems to have both AIS transceiver and VHF. Pricey: with two handsets (one in cabin, one on deck) it'd be $2700 or so. A Vesper Watchmate with new VHF and spare handset is maybe $2k.

- I suspect the requirement to keep the plotter distanced from the radio/antennas has nothing to do with the magnet (which is a DC effect) but with electronic noise from the computer clock coupling to the (very low level) antenna signal. Which is to say, I expect this problem would be an issue for an iPad or any other computer device, and maybe worse for a cellphone which has a high transmit power. It also raises an interesting question about how the Vesper Wifi-enabled units do when positioned near the VHF...

--> Has anyone here put a Vesper wifi unit near their VHF, and was that problem-free? (I was going to stuff it back there behind the breaker panel, right near my VHF...)

Christian and goldenstate : the image of your Vesper is very helpful; the newer units seem to expect you to use your phone to see the information, which I guess is OK; I have less chart-table real estate for displays than an E38 (and loath to mount stuff on the side of the locker the table is up against, since wet foulies presumably get stored in there in bad weather). I want (eventual) display on a pedestal plotter since I especially want to keep an eye on big ships in/around the Golden Gate, where I am likely to be at the helm and not below.

--> Has anyone here connected a Vesper to a Raymarine (or other) plotter? How well did that work?
(peaman: it sounded like your plotter was B&G, and worked fine with the Vesper? I guess the option is to stay fully in the Raymarine ecosystem, which seemed to work well for goldenstate, but lots of folks seem to like the Vesper units)

Loren : I had seen your earlier post re: the magnets, but it is good to be reminded. I will say I literally never use my compass... the only time I can imagine using it would be if the chartplotter was not working (since it gives heading) and the windvane/autopilot was not working (so I had to hand-steer; else I could set course using my hand-bearing one). I agree you don't want a magnet that completely disables it, of course, but some significant added deviation doesn't sound so problematic.

Lastly, re DSC:
I don't need it for calling (though AIS might change that); rather, I think that, given the chaos that presumably can precede a mayday, having the handy red button that effectively calls mayday and automatically gives your position, all in one quick move, and/or even if you are the sole untrained crewmember left on board after the skipper becomes incapacitated, seems like a safety feature worth having (enough for me to buy a new VHF to get it). Having once heard one go off, I now also have a strong desire for that info to show immediately on my chartplotter too. Everyone has their preferences, of course.

 

[Tin Kicker]

It doesn't need to be too expensive or difficult and NMEA allows mixing brands but first you need the NMEA2000 backbone and power. Mine is supporting the:
Vulcan 7 chart plotter with depth cable into the back,
GX6000 VHF,
wind sensor - B&G WS320
GPS/inertial - B&G ZG100

I went with a Standard Horizon GX6000 VHF and Vulcan 7 chart plotter mounted at the nav station, then mirrored to an iPad Pro at the helm. The GX6000 was $390 at the GPS Store and the Vulcan was on the discount shelf at a West Marine for $499, so it took some watching.

The iPad Pro is easily visible because of shade under the bimini and is in a waterproof case when it's wet out. I haven't put a USB outlet at the helm yet but then the iPad battery has been good for nearly 11 hours.

 

[Kalia]

My Vesper 8000 is on a bulkhead within 8" of the fixed mount VHF. No issues with this proximity in the past year of use. The woven sliding cabinet door fronts on the E34-2 are semi transparent so I can see the reassuring green light from the Vesper unit through them. This basically means that your AIS is working correctly both broadcasting and receiving without resorting to another screen to confirm this important function.

Navionics charts on a tablet or phone connect through Bluetooth to the Vesper unit. Very handy in the cockpit once the audible alarm sounds. Dispenses with the dash down the companionway to check the fixed mount chart plotter screen.

The Vesper unit interfaces through NMEA 2000 with most modern chart plotters which means you don't need a dedicated AIS screen.

 

[bgary]

I have a Garmin chartplotter and the Raymarine auto-pilot control head at the helm, and a Vesper AIS (plus DSC-capable VHF) at the nav station below.

Getting the AIS to show targets on the chartplotter was relatively straightforward (I used NMEA-0183 rather than 2000, to avoid having to run a backbone). I like being able to click on a target while at the helm and see all the AIS info (course, speed, name, closest point of approach) without going below. I prefer staying on deck while crossing the VTS lanes in (often crowded) Puget Sound. More than a few times I've hailed a target on VHF to make them aware of me and tell them my intentions. ("this is the small sailboat on your port bow, I will be maintaining my course to pass you port-to-port...")

I also have an iPad at the chart-table, running iSailor and picking up AIS targets through the Vesper's built-in wifi. So everything I can see on the chartplotter display on deck, I can also see on the iPad down below.

One (maybe two) concerns I had were about the station-VHF being directly above the AIS transponder, both with built-in GPS antennas, and the potential that they would either interfere with each other, or (one or both) would not able to receive a decent signal through the deck. Both turned out to be non-issues.

$.02
Bruce

 

[brianb00]

AIS and DSC I have found are most useful offshore (my sailing grounds are SF Bay). In shore there are too many targets passing within a 1/4 mile of where ever I may be, pretty much fly VFR in the Bay. DSC has been tremendous offshore. Ships at sea seem to rarely respond to calls on Ch 13 when I have made attempts, but always respond to a DSC call. On passages to/from Hawaii it has been useful many times to alert traffic of my location. Also, the ships crew has always been helpful with any info I requested. The radios I have used all had a push button DSC call capability - point the target and it rings up their wheel house.

 

[GrandpaSteve]

These cables are useful because the only difference between Raymarine SeaTalk NG and NMEA 2000 is the connector. My hub is SeaTalk NG because I started with Autohelm. I send heading from Autohelm to the Garmin chart plotter, and depth from chart plotter to Autohelm. AIS from Standard Horizon radio to chart plotter. It all works great. https://www.thegpsstore.com/Marine-...wh00-8kExouYk3bLQ6sMhKgaMXqv8wzxoCKucQAvD_BwE

 

[N.A.]

Many thanks all for the helpful comments!

I got myself a Standard Horizon GX2400GPS with AIS, and a Vesper Watchmate 8000 with the Vesper active antenna splitter, which seemed like a good idea.

1. If I should have gotten something else, don't tell me now

2. Installation: A couple of questions, though any random thoughts also appreciated:

- It looks like NMEA 2000 also supplies power? So maybe only the splitter (which has no NMEA) requires power, and the VHF, Vesper8000 get it from the backbone? Or is that a bad idea (I assume I _absolutely do not_ want to be powering these things twice, once through red/black 12V wires and once through NMEA, since sensitive electronics usually hate "ground loops", which that would seem to create... but maybe I am wrong, hence this post.)

- If powered from NMEA backbone, is it bad form to connect the NMEA power and active splitter to the same panel breaker, so I can turn it all on with a single switch throw?

- I am planning to connect the AIS to the VHF... even though the VHF has an AIS receievr and internal GPS... unless that is crazy talk. My main reason is I figured the external GPS antenna on the Vesper would be better than the built-in in the VHF... but maybe these systems should be kept separate for redundancy?

- If I connect, I was going to do it via NMEA 2000 (rather than @bgary 's 0183 approach, though I definitely see the attraction if the plotter is nearby) since whenever I get that chart plotter, that will probably connect the same way (if I have to run cable to the pedestal, it's going to be NMEA 200 cable). Opinions invited.

- Of course, I need to study up on how to do the connections... I have a crimper (nice one), but not sure it has the right jaws for these tiny gauge 12V wires. Or do people solder these little ones?

Open to opinions/advice, and thanks again.

 

[Christian Williams]

I'd connect the VHF to the Vesper antenna, it must increase line-of-sight transmission. I see ships 100 miles away.

Regarding very small wires. I did buy the D sub crimp die (see link below). But everything is so small as to be ridiculous and I doubt I'll ever use them again. An electrician suggested mini-wire screw connectors, and showed me one from his kit, but I've never been able to find one on line. You see them in computers.

From a blog entry:

I turned an adjacent space into the Realm of Very Small Wires. I was adding a new Watchmate 850 dedicated AIS, and with it an antenna splitter that required independent power. Those two gizmos, like my GPS, Blue Tooth stereo and DSC VHF radio, are little Rapunzels who let down hair-sized sub 22-gauge NMEA 0183 wires that seem more like fuzz. The Raymarine wheel pilot has its own miniature communications world of 2000NG, all of it proprietary and cursed.

The photo below shows the connector strip for Preposterously Small Wires finally ready for business. It's now a real fairyland in that compartment. Why, you expect to see Tinkerbell fly in through one of the opening ports, land on one of those delicate little threads and start chattering away in NMEA sentences.

These DSC, GPS and AIS wires make 22-gauge seem big. They obviously aren't designed for a standard ring connector. Some say to double the wire over to make it thicker. Some say solder. Some say "D-sub crimp die" . But why should the manufacturer of a $150 marine VHF radio expect a boat owner to deal with 26 gauge wires? OK, got it. We're just customers.

There is a workaround, even for these tiny connections, and that's to use Clear Seal 18-22 gauge heat shrink ring terminals. For some reason the barrel of this brand is smaller than the same-size nylon connectors in my kit. If you use the "insulated" jaw of the crimper, which neatly flattens the barrel around the stripped wire-end, no dice--they still won't pass the tug test. But if you crimp with the "non-insulated" jaw, which makes a dimple in the barrel, the connection is sound. Of course the dimple usually punctures the heat shrink. But at least they won't come apart, and the glue in the shrink helps reinforce the mechanical bond. Not saying it's right, but it worked for me.

 

[Kalia]

- It looks like NMEA 2000 also supplies power? So maybe only the splitter (which has no NMEA) requires power, and the VHF, Vesper8000 get it from the backbone? Or is that a bad idea (I assume I _absolutely do not_ want to be powering these things twice, once through red/black 12V wires and once through NMEA, since sensitive electronics usually hate "ground loops", which that would seem to create... but maybe I am wrong, hence this post.)

The Vesper 8000 needs its own power supply via the red and black wires in the power/data cable. This will also power the external alarm for the AIS if you are installing one (highly recommended, low cost safety feature). The Vesper 8000 installation manual is very helpful. Definitely read it twice before starting your project.

- If powered from NMEA backbone, is it bad form to connect the NMEA power and active splitter to the same panel breaker, so I can turn it all on with a single switch throw?

The NMEA 2000 network uses very little power, so wiring to the same switch as the antenna splitter would be OK. I wired the VHF and antenna splitter to the same switch since they function together with the AIS. In my case, I have my Raymarine autopilot on the same circuit as the NMEA 2000 network.

- I am planning to connect the AIS to the VHF... even though the VHF has an AIS receievr and internal GPS... unless that is crazy talk. My main reason is I figured the external GPS antenna on the Vesper would be better than the built-in in the VHF... but maybe these systems should be kept separate for redundancy?

Connecting the AIS to the VHF through the NMEA network is fine. Even though both will output AIS data, usually other devices like newer chart plotters will ask you which device to use as the source of AIS data.

- If I connect, I was going to do it via NMEA 2000 (rather than @bgary 's 0183 approach, though I definitely see the attraction if the plotter is nearby) since whenever I get that chart plotter, that will probably connect the same way (if I have to run cable to the pedestal, it's going to be NMEA 200 cable). Opinions invited.

- Of course, I need to study up on how to do the connections... I have a crimper (nice one), but not sure it has the right jaws for these tiny gauge 12V wires. Or do people solder these little ones?

I found that folding the small wires in two and using a 16/18 gauge crimp joint worked well.