B&G vs. Garmin

[John Holbrook]

HyLyte someone in this thread wrote that something about stability being a positive point for Furuno. I questioned Furuno's stability given losses for three out of the last five years. The portion of their business that is commercial or recreational or other does not change their financial results. I never commented on the quality of Funuro gear, personally I have only owed a Furuno radar and it was fine.

Here is a link for you.

Financial Highlight | -Furuno Electric Co., Ltd.

I think this has now well and truly been beaten to death so maybe we can resurrect this thread in five years and see what happened : cheers.

Originally Posted by svHyLyte

John--

With due respect, considering the true extent of Furuno's business--of which the recreational marine segment is only a part--it would not seem that the Company's prospective longevity is an issue pertinent to the selection of one's electronics. One can find more information on the Company at (click on) Furuno. Note the industries/markets/products the company serves and then ponder whether this is a Company that's demise is on the horizon.

[zboss]

Ok.. so back to "who's got the best stuff these days"....

[DeepFrz]

I haven't seen anyone with personal experience with NKE provide insight into that brand. I do find getting information from their web site problematic but would like to hear of personal experience. I know they are often used on smaller race boats (smaller than IMOCA 60 I mean).

[nhschneider]

Before we left on our circumnavigation six years ago, we replaced all our B&G electronics with a complete Garmin system with the exception of the autopilot, which was not available from Garmin at the time (we installed a Simrad). Not only was the Garmin simple to install (I'm thankful to whoever invented N2K) but our electronics has been trouble-free for over 40,000 miles. In addition, we have found the Garmin easy to use and intuitive. The radar and AIS provide us with plenty of detail. I have sailed on many boats with other makes of electronics but I prefer the Garmin.

Fair winds and calm seas.

[Stumble]

Originally Posted by DeepFrz

I haven't seen anyone with personal experience with NKE provide insight into that brand. I do find getting information from their web site problematic but would like to hear of personal experience. I know they are often used on smaller race boats (smaller than IMOCA 60 I mean).

NKE is a French brand that pretty much owns the mini fleet except for the boats sponsored by other brands. Has almost the entire VOR fleet except the sponsored boats, and is installed on all of the maxi-Tri's. To my knowledge NKE is the only brand that specifically designs gear for sailboats as opposed to building primarily for motor boats or commercial ships.

The result of this is that the autopilot is by far the best driver, and currently drives about 99% of the time on the above mentioned fleets. as an example, the autopilot is smart enough to change the way I think drives based on the conditions. So where a Raymarine autopilot can only hold AWA or magnetic heading the NKE can be programmed to alter the gain and sensitivity based on wind speed, wind direction (beating, running, reaching), boat heel angle, wave action, or pretty much any other input. This allows the autopilot to react fa more like a good driver than anything else on the market.

On a multihull or plaining hull the autopilot is smart enough to automatically switch between AWA and COG settings itself if the aparent wind is building due to the boat speed climbing instead of a wind shift.

The downside of these abilities is that you have to program the head unit to take advantage of it all. Out of the box it's as dumb as a Garmin/Raymarine. It just stears to a waypoint. Add the time to make it work and it is almost always the best driver on board.

[Pelagic]

I think most of the new Auto Pilots today are what are called 'Adaptive Pilots '.

In other words they continually learn from their previous corrections to automatically maintain the desired course as dynamic conditions change.

This within the optimum design parameters they have learned from previous trends on the vessel, so they do not overwork in severe dynamic conditions

[Neptune's Gear]

The market leaders are NKE and B&G (Navico) for a sailboat. To say NKE is the only one that designs specifically for a sailing vessel is simply not correct. For example, the H5000 series by B&G is a sailboat system. It is a great instrument system, fantastic pilot, and allows such things as multi level mast twist input to help ensure instrument accuracy. If you want all this, then both NKE and B&G systems are pretty pricey, and hence normally only found on serious race yachts or super yachts. Most of us use the next level down stuff - like the B&G Triton series. Still great, and IMO way better than Garmin, but I'd have a H5000 system in a heartbeat if I could afford it. By the way, I install and service marine instruments for a living. Others have their own opinions of course. Oh, and B&G give free software updates etc as well....

[Exile]

Originally Posted by Neptune's Gear

The market leaders are NKE and B&G (Navico) for a sailboat. To say NKE is the only one that designs specifically for a sailing vessel is simply not correct. For example, the H5000 series by B&G is a sailboat system. It is a great instrument system, fantastic pilot, and allows such things as multi level mast twist input to help ensure instrument accuracy. If you want all this, then both NKE and B&G systems are pretty pricey, and hence normally only found on serious race yachts or super yachts. Most of us use the next level down stuff - like the B&G Triton series. Still great, and IMO way better than Garmin, but I'd have a H5000 system in a heartbeat if I could afford it. By the way, I install and service marine instruments for a living. Others have their own opinions of course. Oh, and B&G give free software updates etc as well....

Thanks for the input Matt. Always nice hearing opinions from those in the field doing the installing & servicing, especially when so many of the reviews are necessarily anecdotal. To the extent one can generalize, I have also gotten the impression that B&G may be a step up from Garmin when it comes to pure sailing functions (e.g. Sailsteer, etc.). But Garmin seems to enjoy a growing rep for ruggedness, durability and customer (phone) support. I actually have both on my boat, namely Garmin plotters synced with older B&G Hydra 2000/HydraPilot, and it has all worked pretty seamlessly. Is my impression consistent with your experience working in the field?

Nice website, btw. A lot of useful items that could save a long-distance cruiser a lot of research & frustration. Thanks again for weighing in.

[donradcliffe]

I did 2000 miles this year on a boat with a higher end Garmin install. My experience was that Garmin was not as user friendly as the other systems, and the radar did not work nearly as well as Furuno. I'm not a big fan of B&G or Raymarine either.

[Exile]

This may be changing, but one frequent complaint I hear about Garmin is that their charting is proprietary and you cannot load other charts on their plotters. Also not sure how well their radars play with non-Garmin plotters, MFD's, or even PC-based charting systems/displays.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I did 2000 miles this year on a boat with a higher end Garmin install. My experience was that Garmin was not as user friendly as the other systems, and the radar did not work nearly as well as Furuno. I'm not a big fan of B&G or Raymarine either.

You recall any specifics on your negative impression of the Garmin radar vs. the Furuno? I only ask because my older Furuno (model 1832) with a helm repeater probably needs a magnetron or other significant ($$) work. To replace with another Furuno I'm looking at also buying new displays and so big boat bucks. Instead I can, with far less expense, buy a new 24" Garmin radome and use my existing plotters for displays. But then I've been told my Furuno was an excellent, commercial-grade unit for it's time (probably circa yr. 2000 or so), and I like the redundancy of separate displays.

It's the old boat quandary of repair vs. replace. Although I enjoy the new electronics being offered these days as much as anyone, as a cruising sailor I think it's also all too easy to get carried away and wind up unnecessarily spending more than what is really necessary.

[donradcliffe]

When we got up to Maine, I had two separate experiences where lobster boats came out of the fog at less than 50 yards which were completely invisible on the radar. The radar range was on 3 miles, the gain was properly adjusted and the sea clutter setting was not overly high. Very disconcerting,

The radar could pick up channel markers at about 3 miles, compared to the 6 miles I'm used to from Furunos. It was a 24 inch HD model, and I told the owner if he was going to keep the Garmin on the boat in Maine he would probably have to upgrade to an open array.

The radar overlay function was useless, as the MFD kept picking up a boat heading which was up to 40 degrees off. I went through the menus, disabled compasses, and the best I could do was a mode which worked correctly for about 10 seconds, then went off by 30 degrees for about 10 seconds, and back and forth. I hear that an instrument tech got things working right this summer, but I haven't been back on the boat.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

When we got up to Maine, I had two separate experiences where lobster boats came out of the fog at less than 50 yards which were completely invisible on the radar. The radar range was on 3 miles, the gain was properly adjusted and the sea clutter setting was not overly high. Very disconcerting,

The radar could pick up channel markers at about 3 miles, compared to the 6 miles I'm used to from Furunos. It was a 24 inch HD model, and I told the owner if he was going to keep the Garmin on the boat in Maine he would probably have to upgrade to an open array.

The radar overlay function was useless, as the MFD kept picking up a boat heading which was up to 40 degrees off. I went through the menus, disabled compasses, and the best I could do was a mode which worked correctly for about 10 seconds, then went off by 30 degrees for about 10 seconds, and back and forth. I hear that an instrument tech got things working right this summer, but I haven't been back on the boat.

Interesting, thanks for that. Since it sounds like a new set-up maybe just an installation issue. Let's hope, for the owner's sake anyway. I've always wondered if Garmin makes their own radars or whether they're outsourced. The overlay feature is probably useful (when working correctly) but then you lose redundancy. Everything's a compromise.

My old Furuno is losing it's range it seems, so maybe needs a magnetron. Either way I'll have to send the main unit and radome into the shop and so can decide after I get a diagnosis. Before it started getting tired it seemed flawless, although I always opted to manually set gain & filters over using the auto functions. The new Garmin's claim their auto settings work well but haven't seen any first-hand reports on that.

[Neptune's Gear]

Originally Posted by Exile

Thanks for the input Matt. Always nice hearing opinions from those in the field doing the installing & servicing, especially when so many of the reviews are necessarily anecdotal. To the extent one can generalize, I have also gotten the impression that B&G may be a step up from Garmin when it comes to pure sailing functions (e.g. Sailsteer, etc.). But Garmin seems to enjoy a growing rep for ruggedness, durability and customer (phone) support. I actually have both on my boat, namely Garmin plotters synced with older B&G Hydra 2000/HydraPilot, and it has all worked pretty seamlessly. Is my impression consistent with your experience working in the field?



Nice website, btw. A lot of useful items that could save a long-distance cruiser a lot of research & frustration. Thanks again for weighing in.

Yes, pretty much. Support for Garmin not so great here in NZ though.

[Pacey16]

Yes Garmin service was not good in Australasia region, I had a Plotter and Sonar that should have been compatible but after sending this equipment back to Garmin 3 times they eventualy told me to just buy something else!
I did but it wasnt Garmin.