The Marine iPad . . .

[canucksailor]

btw, for those of you who haven't cruised Cuba, Nigel Calder's charting and his work, are officially credited by the Cuban govenment on their charts. In fact, a lot of their charts ARE Nigel's work.
I'd say, having used those charts and Calder's books to cruise the north coast of Cuba, that I would trust such a source rather than some guy with no credentials, but a good internet connection so he can sound off.
Of course, some people do think that they know it ALL - and can't handle anyone else in the picture, so spend their time disparaging the work of others, no matter how well qualified they've proven themselves to be.
I think Don Street will enjoy hearing about this one when I see him next. And Nigel is a member of CF, perhaps he'll chime in on this. That ought to be entertaining.

[ActiveCaptain]

Originally Posted by capngeo

My iPad is my primary ELECTRONIC plotter. I have an OLD Garmin GPS126 for NEMA data, and leave it set to the course/speed/distance page, otherwise the iPad runs the show.

I don't have the guts to use mine outside. Do you really feel comfortable having the iPad out or are you using a case that you like?

What about the sunlight issue?

I'd really like to use my iPad and Android tab more but my real chartplotter has such great connectivity, auto-pilot support, radar, etc. that I wonder how long, if ever, it'll take for me to be able to use it in a "primary" way.

[capngeo]

Look at my avatar! I use an Otterbox Defender. If the WX goes to crap, 2 gallon zip locks are the Shiz!

Not much of an issue with daylight, but certainly not as bright as TFT etc. Still, plenty readable.

[Bruce626]

"I would not trust any soundings or GPS plots you gave to me" - Fair enough, and given my inexperience and my old sucky equipment, I am not in the least offended. But if my readings supplement other readings and interpolate reasonably with surveyed points, it seems like this would be better than less information. Also, I snorkel a lot and I have snorkeled over a large rock in the anchoring area at Boracay, PH - I could barely go over the top without touching and was surprised to find such a thing with boats anchored all around. I would think that information like this (properly documented) would give others much more data to work with. If you have more data, you can always choose to use only commercial charts - but, you have the choice.

The reason I was following this thread is that, yes, I will be living aboard my catamaran - where the cockpit is covered with a hard extension back from the salon so sunlight and weather is not the same concern that an offshore mono might have - so the iPad seems viable although still not cheap (especially here). This technology is enabling and not mandatory - and I am glad that there is some movement to using the massive amount of unused data being collected and used (trusted by the collector) and then discarded. Before I came to the PI, I was researching the cost of keeping a catamaran in the Marina del Rey vicinity (Los Angeles) - and I remember being stunned by the number of yachts, so many with radar domes and therefore likely to have depth sounders, chart plotters, GPS, magnetic storage, and internet access - all sitting unused, but wow, what a cumulative investment that could be put to use. I apologize for the thread drift, but i thought the information interesting.

[canucksailor]

So if I gave you a set of waypoints into a reef anchorage, your would believe me before waypoints from a reliable cruising guide that thousands of people have have used successfully. I guess we differ here.

Kiltym, I'm entirely in agreement with you on this. Writers such as Nigel Calder, whose work is used and acknowledged by the Cuban government on their charts; Don Street, who has been hugely influential in opening up the Caribbean for all of us, these are people whose material I'd trust my boat to - and have in fact.
Taking information from cruisers with unknown abilities and understanding of navigational issues, who post to online sites with no real knowledge of what they're doing - that is a recipe for disaster. I've seen way too many of these online 'navigational' posts that are just plain wrong.
Example:Calder did his work in 1996, publishing a revised edition in '99. I had the opportunity to sail the northeast coast of Cuba in 2009 and the northwest coast this past winter. Even despite hurricanes and other issues noted by other posters that can change the lay of the coast and underwater profiles, the charts were incredibly accurate even now. There was only one notable change and it was not significant.
Put that up against some of the online material you can find from recreational boaters, information that is wrong from the get go.
I'll go with the pros and a reliable cruising guide everytime, thank you.

[tartansail]

Originally Posted by canucksailor

Kiltym, I'm entirely in agreement with you on this. Writers such as Nigel Calder, whose work is used and acknowledged by the Cuban government on their charts; Don Street, who has been hugely influential in opening up the Caribbean for all of us, these are people whose material I'd trust my boat to - and have in fact.
Taking information from cruisers with unknown abilities and understanding of navigational issues, who post to online sites with no real knowledge of what they're doing - that is a recipe for disaster. I've seen way too many of these online 'navigational' posts that are just plain wrong.
Example:Calder did his work in 1996, publishing a revised edition in '99. I had the opportunity to sail the northeast coast of Cuba in 2009 and the northwest coast this past winter. Even despite hurricanes and other issues noted by other posters that can change the lay of the coast and underwater profiles, the charts were incredibly accurate even now. There was only one notable change and it was not significant.
Put that up against some of the online material you can find from recreational boaters, information that is wrong from the get go.
I'll go with the pros and a reliable cruising guide everytime, thank you.

This is an interesting thread diversion given an experience I had two days ago. I was in the outer harbor at Cuttyhunk Island in the Elizabeth Islands off southern Massachusetts. The inner harbor was full and thunderstorms were forecast so I decided to pick up a mooring in the relatively exposed outer harbor. As I turned to windward in the mooring field between charted soundings of 6.5 and 9 feet to come up to the mooring, my 5 foot deep rudder struck a rock bending the post. None of the charts of the region show the rock. None of the cruising guides mention it (though some mention rocks further East). All the surrounding boats heard us hit and came by to offer assistance. They had all been in the area several times (as had we) and had no idea that there was a rock to hit.

My comment relative to this thread is that the prudent mariner should consider all available information sources. Those of you who only rely on the experts should avoid this area at low tide unless your draft is shallow. Those who include sources like Active Captain will be alerted that there is an unmarked hazard at 41 deg 25.48'N 070 deg 54.83'W and, appropriately discounting the precision of the measurement, use caution if they draw 5' or more.

[taildragerdrive]

I'm interested in getting my boat set up for iPad use as a backup navigation system, including AIS etc. I have an older Raymarine system on the boat. It has a pretty minimal chart plotter.

A. In one of the earlier posts on this thread the way described to do this is to wire Raymarine SeaTalk to something like the Brookhouse iMux with a Digital Yacht AIS wired to the iMux.

B. I'm wondering if anybody can tell me if the Raymarine D153 NMEA Interface Box which I have could just be wired to a Digital Yacht "iAIS digital AIS Reliever" with a wifi output to the ipad.

As I read the thread "option A" can pass AIS and Raymarine data to the iPad with the proper apps installed.

As I read the Raymarine manual the Raymarine D153 NMEA Interface Box it is to pass data to Windows XP based Raymarine software. I'm wandering if anybody has tried something like my "option B" ? It seems perfectly logical that it would work and would be quit a bit cheaper in my case. The only issue I could see is if Raymarine has blocked or somehow cooped the NMEA 183 like Microsoft sometimes dose to stuff like Java, etc.

Thanks for the help.

Taildraggerdriver

[GPSNavX]

The DigitalYacht iAIS will combine any NMEA-0183 input with the AIS NMEA it provides and broadcast it over WiFi and it's own USB cable. There would be no filtering or removal of any NMEA data on the iAIS side so all should be good.

[hoppy]

Originally Posted by hoppy

Ohhh, what a waste of money this was

On sunny and bright overcast days this set-up was pretty much unusable. Coming in and out of harbours I found myself spending way too much time shading the ipad to see it and not enough time keeping an eye on the surroundings. I lost track of the number of times I took the ipad into the cabin to see the display as even the shade of the boats spray hood offered little assistance.

Quite frankly, I would have spent less time trying to study the GPS mapping by bypassing the iPad and going straight to the nav table and looking at the Garmin mounted there.

When I can figure out how to mount it under the cockpit table, I'm going to get a Raymarine C90W or E90W. I assume that their screens are just as good as the Garmin screen I had on my old Searay which only needed a little "hand shade" to cure the direct sunlight viewing problem.

I think I will relegate the ipad to internal use only.

Ok, i have now spent 5 weeks on board using my ipad as my main nav tool. I have given the waterproof cover another go and i am less disapproving of the experience. I think the first time i was using it the conditions were bright and overcast which made it hard to cast a shaddow and see the screen. For the 5 weeks there have been no clouds.

I have also only used the cover when conditions dictated and the rest of the time just risked it.

On many nights i have taken the ipad to bed with the anchor drift alarm set which wad handy. Sometimes in the middle of the night i would check the position & track just to check that i was where i expected to be and the compass heading gave me an idea whether the wind direction had changed and if i shoud go topside

I have setup a ram mount at my nav table where the ipad will reside next season when i have hopefully added a mfd at the helm

If apple were not so annoying and did not exclude fash, then perhaps i could leave my macbook at home. Still for general surfing onboard the ipad is a good solution not requiring too much effort to keep chargec

[Katiusha]

I was under the impression that iPad GPS accuracy was not as good as GPS rated for marine use. Plus, GPS antennas must always be located with a clear view of the sky to get the best reception from the most satellites. Similar iPad positioning is advised on Apple's website for iPad GPS usage: iPad: Understanding Location Services (at the bottom). Looks like iPad's GPS works the best when there're cell towers around, as it relies on them to get GPS satellite info. When cell networks are not available, GPS accuracy/responsiveness slows down as I understand it.

You can check the accuracy by opening Google Maps and checking your position in it: the accuracy is inversely proportional to the size of the blue circle around you... Maybe checking the accuracy is a good thing to do before setting your anchor watch?

I am reluctant to rely solely on iPad as a navigational/positional tool. We do use it as a secondary source, instead of computer nav. But we keep marine instruments as primary sources (well, coupled with our eyesight)...

[hoppy]

I've found that the best way to check the ipads accuracy was to check it when tied up at a dock. No question about where i should be sometimes the ipad is pretty close, other time off by a bit.

My garmin is mounted in the cabin which is zero use to me when solo coming into a port or bay, so having the ipad on deck even if it is less accurate is a better option. Obviously i look at the surrounding landscape and keep one eye on the depth to double check the position.

I have noticed that some places in greece are not surveyed in great detail so i have to take the mapping with a grain of salt one place i anchored had a rock just below the surface mark in the wrong position off by 100 meters. It was the mapping and not the gps accuracy that caused that difference.

Anyway, if my ipad goes overboard, dies an early death or runs out of juice, my garmin and iphone are there as backup

[David M]

iPads are cool in a lot of ways but for marine navigation you want something that is specifically designed for marine navigation. An iPad is not a half-bad backup if your primary GPS navigation system goes down.

[SeaKing]

Check out the new Raymarine E7 MFD(multi function display). It has a cool feature that broadcast the screen image to an iPad or iPhone with the FREE app. Also you can control your iPhone's iPod from the E7 through bluetooth. It is only a 7 inch screen but I think I'll be getting one for next season.

[hoppy]

The E7 looks quite good. I like te way you can stream to the ipad which means i could check the radar or gps on the ipad in the cabin whilst tbe E7 is up by the helm.

[tartansail]

Originally Posted by hoppy

The E7 looks quite good. I like te way you can stream to the ipad which means i could check the radar or gps on the ipad in the cabin whilst tbe E7 is up by the helm.

The E7 and its integration with the iPad looks great. In the Panbo review (Panbo: The Marine Electronics Weblog: Raymarine e7, hand's on #1) there's also mention that controlling the E7 from the iPad is on the development roadmap. Building routes on the iPad and transferring them to the MFD would be a big step forward.