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Random Quote: I wish I was born rich instead of good looking.
Misc:
I'm still not sure on SAT phone vs SSB? Comments?
Must go for the satellite radio....
And interface the IPOD
BackUp M502 in the cabin.
Also the boat Mfr offers only a 13" TV/DVD combo... there must be something out there with a 15 to 20" LCD Screen and DVD...plus stereo & CD player?
And after reading about Video camera's and recorders in Sport Fishing? or SaltWater Sportsman? ..... that sounds pretty cool, I could even run it thru the Video port on the 6000i.
Anyone have a good solution for internet access at sea?
Can't argue with that set up.Why do you like the new Northstar over the Furuno Nav Net.I saw them at the Ft. Laud.show,but not familiar with the pros and cons.
Can you view the lower station engine instruments from the tower? How are you going to sync the engines from above? Use remote oil/hot alarms. How about trim tab controls? top and bottom, or maybe get the auto tab controller. I like the networked chart/bottom/radar. That solves problems. The vhf in the tower, you will find very useful.
Don't underestimate wind noise on the tower and the inability to easily hear the vhf. A remote speaker works well on the dash, a speaker/mike or fixed unit in the box doesn't. You may elect to run the command mike into the cabin, and use the second independant unit up high.
Unless you island hop frequently, I vote for sat phone over ssb, although I do use ssb myself on longer, offshore trips. But if you need real help, there's nothing like picking up a phone and dialing someone. SSB is ok for slow email, broadcast wx, fun, and multi-party conversations.
OH, and don't forget a compass up high, lighted. I've gotten used to a combo handbearing type that's used for getting a fix on, lets' say a marlin jumping a 1/2 mile away, birds, a closing freighter, etc.
Faced the same issue chose to go with Furuno navnet perferred their radar and ff. I use 2 seperate GPS displays when running. The navnet has c-map and I do use a nav window when running on a large distance scale. Additionally I have a Garmin wass gps interfaced to my laptop running Nobletec Nav system and displayed through a bigbay High bright LCD display. the Nobletec uses NOAA charts and provides much greater detail than c-mapp especially on small scale. The resolution on provided by the PC based system can't be beat. THe other benefits are redundancy, and you can enter all your routes and waypoints at home.
As far as the TV went with a 17 inch lCD monitor with a built in TV tunner and s video input, used a indash dvd player with s-video out. the lcd monitor I mounted on a bulkhead it uses 12vdc, works great and is not nearly obtrusive as the 13 inch monitor.
You've got a nice list there. You might look at using a Furuno 1953C Nanvet radar (6kW open array with the new high power 3kW BBFF3 black box sounder. That will get you a sounder electronically equal to the stand-alone but give you a much better radar than the Sitex unit that Northstar packages. I would keep the Northstar 600i just as a plotter, however, because they are much faster than the Furuno. I don't see why you need the Northstar blackbox in that case. You also get a completely redundant plotter this way on your radar/sounder. At the upper station, you could mount a 7" Furuno Navnet on the upper station to get sounder and plotter displays up there (hope you don't run the radar from up top and microwave your privates).
I would go with Satphone. Much simpler, less bulky, and works well in all of the northeast canyons. You can call home, not just for help, and you get privacy. YUou can also take it with you in the liferaft if you ditch.
In the really cool option department, I would go for a night vision video camera that you could feed to the video card on the Northstar or the Furuno display for running at night. A friend has one and it is absolutely great for picking up stuff you can't see on radar.
Many good suggestions here so far. How about putting a couple of the inexpensive video cameras down in the engine room, and plug them into your video input on the plotter screen. That way, with the engineroom lights on, you can visually monitor the engines while running. I've seen whole systems advertised for under $300.
AC: Northstars 6000i's speed and ease of use was very impressive.
DD: Tower will have separate trim and sync switches, I like the command mic in the tower becuase it's removable... but I'll need to think about the "acoustics and clarity" while running. Yes, there is a compass on the tower.
Fin: I should go back to Consumers and play with the NavNet some more (Demo'd the N* first and everything after seemed to fall short) I found many LCD TV's and DVD players online... what Manufacturers and models did you install? I assume your very happy with them?
Salty: I like the idea of the Furuno radar... you can get a 6Kw for about the price ofa N* 4Kw... but I also like the N* Radar/chart overlay feature. Great Idea on the night vision camera... have you seen them "in action"?
Note: I purchased a lead blanket from my dentist to put on my lap so I could run my radar while I'm up in the tower
lawyerdawg
the monitor is a cornea ct1702t, the dvd player I used was indash auto system from e-bay for around $100. you can use your laptop instead.
marlin
I really think that the Nobletec Nav software provides much better resolution than dedicated chart plotters. The high bright lcd displays are made for a marine environment and are good in sunlight. I got the navnet for the ff and radar, the cp and overlay functions were relatively cheap and provided the redundancy that I wanted. I also installed a second ff.
Wait a second, what did I miss? What boat did you decide to purchase...what engine options, etc. Sounds like you're going to have one awesome boat. Congratulations!
Marlintin -- the Furuno Navnet unit also has chart overlay capability. You can get a Navionics unit and then interchange the chart cartridges with the Northstar. In either case, you need to get the J300X junction box for the autopilot to get the heading output for the radar/plotter so you have the overlay. Be sure to get the rate sensor compass upgrade for your Simrad, it makes a huge difference in steering performance. The 6kW open array Furuno radar blows away the dome units in performance and is a very well proven and reliable product.
Northstar still has teething pains with their integration software. The Furuno is basically an integrated radar unit and they have had four years to work out the bugs in their network software.
Forgot to mention that I have indeed seen one of those night vision video camera in operation. The boat has a waterproof camera mounted on the hardtop. The camera was pretty small (but the boat was big, a 55 Viking) and it was fed to a window on a Northstar 12" display.
It was a tremendous asset at night, especially in traffic. As I recall, my friend said it cost him about $2K, but that was a couple of years ago. It is made by Raytheon.
Dog...
I currently have a Simrad CA42 w/48" open array that works great... just slow redraw in the chart department.
And yes, I also upgraded to the rate compass... and will do again for the new boat.
Marlintini,
The new CA series from Simrad has alot faster re-draw than the 42 series. Also the rate sensor is now included in AP20,22 & 21 series. Send me e-mail, maybe I can help you out. Thanks Brent
Let's Rig a 35 Express 
