For years, I eagerly anticipated Apple’s fall event and news of the latest iPhone release. Back then, my purchasing latency was limited to locating the website’s “buy” button, as my incumbent phone was often struggling to keep pace with new apps and software updates. Then, starting around 2015 (the iPhone 6S), I was able to start squeezing extra years out of my phones. This trend accelerated, and as of today, I still rely on my iPhone 11 Pro from 2019. To be fair, I always buy the top-end model with maximum storage, but four and a half years on, I haven’t crashed (at least not hard) into this phone’s silicone ceiling.

Multifunction displays perform different tasks than smartphones, but most marine-electronics manufacturers build MFDs with off-the-shelf componentry and, sometimes, software from the mobile-device market. This sourcing gives manufacturers options for high-resolution touchscreen displays, processors, connectivity and operating-system architecture, and it means that today’s MFDs can have longer working lives.

How we got here, however, requires a small rewind. After all, MFDs circa 2010 were different animals than today’s big, powerful displays.

“Back then, most displays were 4 to 7 inches,” says Dave Dunn, Garmin’s senior director of marine and RV sales. “A big display was 9 to 10 inches, and a 12-inch display was enormous.”

These MFDs were controlled via tactile buttons and knobs, or early touchscreen or hybrid-touch interfaces. They only tackled marine-facing applications such as chart-plotting.

Today’s MFDs excel at traditional marine tasks, but they also boast bigger glass, full video integration, touchscreen interfaces, high-speed data networks, and four- or six-core processors, opening the door to expanded job descriptions.

“Processing power has indeed increased over time, bringing with it the ability to drive higher-resolution screens,” says Steve Thomas, Simrad’s product director for digital systems. “[This] also lends itself to better integration by providing the responsiveness consumers expect.”

It also enables MFDs to perform nontraditional tasks, including streaming video from daylight and thermal-imaging cameras, tackling onboard security, controlling digital switching and, sometimes, providing entertainment. Today’s flagship MFDs also sport larger high-resolution displays, multisignal connectivity (with ANT, Bluetooth, Ethernet and Wi-Fi), embedded sonar modules, GPS or GNSS receivers, data backbones, and NMEA 2000 and HTML5 compatibility.

“NMEA 2000 protocol provides the basis of communication and is the linchpin connecting everything together for the MFD to display and control,” says Eric Kunz, Furuno’s senior product manager. Kunz adds that HTML5 compatibility allows MFDs to display and control third-party equipment via web-browser windows, sans any heavy lifting from the MFD.

Technology moves in step changes, and MFDs, brand depending, have experienced two major evolutions since 2010.

“The first was the transition from a completely closed-software architecture to something open source,” says Jim McGowan, Raymarine’s Americas marketing manager, referring to the company’s shift from a walled-garden operating system to Linux and then Android.

Others, including Simrad and Furuno, took similar steps. Garmin remains a holdout.

“We use Android, but not for marine,” Dunn says. “Will we eventually go to Android? Maybe.”

The second evolution involved hardware, with all MFD manufacturers now using mobile-device componentry.

“Suddenly, the requirements for shock resistance, heat resistance, water resistance, bright visibility and fast processing became available on a wide scale,” McGowan says. “Instead of us having to source expensive industrial or semicustom hardware that was proven but old, suddenly our system architects had multiple options to choose from that were all state of the art.”

Sourcing components became easier, yielding better MFDs, but it placed a higher premium on software. Case in point: Raymarine has released more than 30 updates, including new features, for its 2017-era Axiom MFDs.

Likewise, there’s the importance of supporting hardware as it ages. “We don’t like to leave customers behind,” Dunn says, noting that Garmin supports products for five years after they’re discontinued.

This opens the door to the fine art of good enough. Given that modern MFDs are robust, the same display—like my iPhone—can last for years, provided that its sensor network remains static. While this works for buy-and-hold customers, new sensors can dangle carrots.

For example, Furuno and Garmin unveiled Doppler-enabled radars in 2016. While older MFDs could often display radar imagery from these sensors, some customers had to refit their displays to access the best features. One can imagine automation and AI presenting similar incentives.

“AI will combine multiple facets of different sensors to create a more sophisticated and enhanced navigation experience,” Kunz says. “Look for MFDs to take a larger and larger part in overall vessel control and automation.”

Avikus, for instance, is developing its NeuBoat autonomous navigation system with Raymarine. As for Garmin, Dunn says: “There’s nothing coming in the near future, but there’s some cool stuff coming with lidar and cameras.” He’s referring to the light-detection and ranging sensors that help enable automotive driver-assist features and autonomous driving.

Future hardware and capabilities aside, all experts agree on the importance of regularly updating a vessel’s MFD to keep the operating system current and to access the latest software features. While updates are free, all four companies have adopted subscription models for cartography.

“In some ways, the marine-electronics business model is changing in the same way it is happening in the consumer-electronics industry,” Kunz says. “This will most likely lead to more of a subscription-based model for certain aspects of the market.”

While subscription models make sense for a dynamic media like cartography, it’s harder to envision this business practice extending throughout the sensor ecosystem.

“We don’t want to get to the point where people have to pay for software updates,” Dunn says, pointing to BMW’s belly-flopped attempt to charge customers fees to use their existing heated steering wheels.

New hardware, however, is a different story. “More than anything, we’re a sensor company,” McGowan says of Raymarine. “We keep offering new and improved sensors.”

Given the adoption rates of Doppler-enabled radar, there’s little question that the recreational marine market stands ready to embrace step-change sensors, so long as they come bundled with newfound capabilities—say, auto-docking or autonomous navigation.

As for my ancient iPhone, I’m again counting the days until Apple’s fall event. I just hope my next iPhone will last as long as today’s flagship MFDs.  

UI Options

Recent years have seen most manufacturers adopt touchscreen-only user interfaces for their flagship multifunction displays. This technology creates user-friendly interfaces in most conditions, but some users prefer tactile buttons when the weather sours. All manufacturers build optional external keypads or hard-button remote controls.

The post Future-Proofing Multifunction Displays appeared first on Yachting.

If you love nautical yarns, David Grann’s The Wager is a must-read. The nonfiction work details the account of The Wager, a sixth-rate Royal Navy square-rigger that carried 28 guns and 120 sailors. The 123-footer was part of an eight-vessel armada that, in 1741, sailed west around Cape Horn in winter, pursuing plunder. The Wager got separated. In a navigational blunder, the vessel turned north before it banked enough west. It didn’t go well.

Anyone interested in learning about how the great east-west navigation problem was finally solved should read Dava Sobel’s Longitude. Anyone interested in ensuring their own navigational accuracy, however, should cruise with a dedicated Global Navigation Satellite System sensor.

Satellite-based navigation began evolving in the 1960s. The US-built Global Positioning System—the first of its kind—went live in 1993. Today, the international Global Navigation Satellite System consists of four global satellite constellations (including GPS), plus two regional ones. While GPS continues to provide world-class service, GNSS receivers can capture this information along with data from other satellites. The best part? You probably already own several.

Navigational satellites work by broadcasting information about their identification, position, orbit and health status, along with a hyper-accurate time stamp. Receivers derive their position by triangulating with at least three satellites, with stronger (or more numerous) signals often equating to higher accuracy. Precision matters. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, if a clock aboard a GPS satellite is off by one-thousandth of a second, then the corresponding measurement error would be 1,616 nautical miles.

While there are differences between the various constellations, each system employs three distinct segments: control, user and space.

The control segment consists of one or more master land-based control stations and a global network of supporting stations. These stations monitor each satellite’s reported positions and compare reports with predictive models. If needed, operators can alter a satellite’s orbit to ensure baseline accuracy or avoid debris.

The user segment refers to any receivers listening for signals, while the space segment refers to orbiting assets.

Each of the GNSS’ four main navigation constellations contain different numbers of satellites that operate at different elevations and across different orbital planes. The US-built GPS constellation involves 31 satellites that operate at an elevation of 10,900 nautical miles above sea level. GPS satellites orbit on six different planes, and they maintain a 55-degree orbital inclination (relative to the equator).

Russia’s GLONASS constellation, which has been active since 1995, involves 24 satellites that operate at 10,315 nautical miles and orbit on three planes at 64.8 degrees of orbital inclination. China’s BeiDou constellation, which went live in 2011, consists of 35 satellites. Of these, eight are either geosynchronous or inclined geosynchronous satellites that operate at 19,325 nautical miles, while the other 27 operate at 11,625 nautical miles. BeiDou satellites orbit the planet on six planes, and they maintain an orbital inclination of 55.5 degrees.

Finally, the European Union’s Galileo constellation, which became operational in 2018, will (when complete) consist of 30 satellites that operate at 12,540 nautical miles. Galileo satellites orbit across three planes, and they maintain a 56-degree orbital inclination.

GNSS receivers are generally accurate from 6.5 feet to 13 feet globally; however, some countries use a satellite-based augmentation system (SBAS) that improves accuracy by broadcasting correction information. In the United States, this is called the wide-area augmentation system (WAAS). In early 2023, the European Union’s Galileo constellation began delivering free high-accuracy service information that’s precise to roughly 8 inches.

Celestial navigation, this is not.

Satellite-navigation receivers have existed in different forms for years. Depending on the manufacturer and design, these receivers (and their antennas) can be embedded into multifunction displays, or incorporated into abovedecks sensors that share satellite-navigation data with other networked equipment (or both).

Alternatively, yacht owners can sometimes buy an abovedecks listen-only antenna, which shares its improved signal strength and reception with a belowdecks GNSS-enabled multifunction display.

Some satellite-navigation receivers favor GPS signals, while others can also listen to data from some of the other GNSS constellations. Full GNSS receivers can access the four main constellations, plus the regional Japanese and Indian constellations. These receivers sometimes include nine-axis compasses or attitude-heading reference systems. These sensors, which don’t add much cost, provide accurate heading information in addition to GPS and GNSS data.

Finally, satellite compasses are the best option for serious navigation. Depending on their design, these instruments employ multiple GNSS receivers, which provide heading information that isn’t contingent on Earth’s magnetic field (read: high-latitude cruising). Eric Kunz, Furuno’s senior product manager, says the company’s SCX20/21 satellite compasses use four GNSS receivers, allowing them to achieve 1-degree heading accuracy.

While some people say GPS alone is plenty robust for their needs, many marine-electronics manufacturers have been quick to embrace GNSS. “With more satellites available to track and pull into calculations, the GNSS-enabled receivers offer enhanced accuracy,” says Jim McGowan, Raymarine’s Americas marketing manager.

He’s not alone in this assessment. “A GNSS antenna provides more redundancy and higher accuracy than GPS-only receivers,” says Dave Dunn, Garmin’s senior director of marine and RV sales. “Some parts of the world may have better coverage at certain times of day with some constellations than others.”

McGowan says GNSS is especially useful for high-latitude navigators because these receivers can track GLONASS satellites: “Those satellites are in a higher orbit inclination than GPS satellites, which allows the GNSS receiver to get a better tracking angle and duration on those satellites.”

Leigh Armstrong, Simrad’s product manager of digital systems, agrees: “This allows for better maintenance of accuracy in areas with less satellite coverage.”

The inverse, of course, is that BeiDou, Galileo and GPS satellites likely provide better fixes closer to the equator.

While GNSS data is critical for navigation, it can also help bolster the accuracy of other networked devices. Here, Dunn points to automatic identification system (AIS) position and speed data, autopilot performance, and radar target-tracking features.

Looking ahead, autonomous docking systems and vessels need precise position, speed and other navigational information to negotiate harbors, follow autopilot-driven courses, and safely dock. It’s expected that GNSS (with SBAS) will fill this niche.

The Wager’s crew experienced unspeakable horrors, but GNSS receivers and satellite compasses likely mean none of today’s boaters will have to dodge scurvy.

Belts and Suspenders

While the ancient mariner would have paid handsomely for a chronometer, contemporary smartwatches carry GNSS sensors. Most smartphones have GNSS receivers, as do some handheld VHF radios. These are all important backups should a vessel experience low voltage or power loss. 

The post Global Navigation Satellite System Offers Waypoint Accuracy appeared first on Yachting.

Marine technology companies and brands continue to advance in the area of systems integration, combining features and functionalities in ways that are intended to make boating easier and safer. In just the past few weeks, Raymarine and Garmin—two of the biggest players in the marine electronics space—announced new developments around this type of integration.

Raymarine teamed up with ePropulsion to let boaters display their electric-motor engine data directly on Raymarine Axiom displays, without the need for additional gateways or add-on interface boxes. This blending of systems was accomplished by combining NMEA 2000 standards for electric engines with Raymarine’s LightHouse 4.6 operating system that supports electric motor PGN messages.

The Axiom engine dashboard now allows boaters to see the ePropulsion motor’s battery level, speed, gear and estimated range. A dynamic range ring overlays on the chartplotter display, helping boaters to visualize current cruising range and optimize energy consumption. 

“It has been incredible working alongside one of the most innovative electric engine manufacturers to bring industry-first functionality to a previously under-represented class of boater,” Grégoire Outters, general manager at Raymarine, stated in a press release. “We’re confident that those who’ve adopted electric propulsion will appreciate the forward thinking of ePropulsion and Raymarine.”

Meanwhile, Garmin used its April 2024 software release to add support for the FLIR Maritime Thermal Monitoring System.

Supported features now include live display of the video feed from the FLIR camera system; audible alarms and visual alerts on the Garmin chartplotter; thermal, visible and MSX thermal/visible blending; thermal color palette selection; and custom camera naming.

The FLIR Maritime Thermal Monitoring System can monitor machinery and equipment, identifying temperature anomalies in equipment such as gas and diesel engines, generators, bearings and electrical panels. The system can give boaters an early warning about problems that can lead to equipment failure.

FLIR’s system can be programmed to provide alerts based on high-, low- or delta-temperature factors.

“Garmin’s integration with this system allows users to deploy this solution seamlessly, without needing a separate display taking up valuable helm station real estate,” said Outters, who also serves as general manager at Teledyne FLIR Maritime. “The ease of installation and use, combined with the customizability of the system allows users to tailor it to their specific needs or mission.”

Where to learn more about Raymarine and ePropulsion: go to raymarine.com or epropulsion.com

Where to learn more about Garmin and FLIR: visit garmin.com and flir.com

The post Systems Integrations Abound appeared first on Yachting.

In 2018, I watched my buddy Allan engage the Mad Max autopilot mode on his Tesla Model S, cuing the car to switch lanes aggressively on Interstate 95. While the experience as a human was unnerving, the car leveraged cameras, sensors and artificial intelligence to maneuver safely.

Months later, I rode on a Boston Whaler 330 Outrage fitted with Mercury Marine’s Advanced Pilot Assist and Raymarine’s DockSense systems. As we approached the boat’s slip, the preproduction system used cameras, AI and the outboard engines to maintain a 3-foot safety buffer.

At the 2022 Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show, I saw these ideas meld in Avikus’ prototype NeuBoat autonomous operations system. The boat, with a human-in-the-loop operator, navigated itself out of its slip, up a river and around a lake before reversing course and docking itself.

Ready or not, autonomous technology is coming. This is likely good news for novice boaters—and for boaters who hate docking—because some of the marine industry’s smartest minds have been combining sensors and AI to smooth out boating’s rough corners. One example is NeuBoat (neuron plus boat), which Avikus is developing in partnership with Raymarine.

While experts say the sensors and software already exist to enable fully autonomous docking and navigation, Avikus and Raymarine foresee a road map to autonomy that earns trust with boaters while buying time for engine manufacturers to integrate the technology, and for agencies and organizations to create regulations.

“We’re intentionally paralleling the automotive market,” says Jamie Cox, Raymarine’s senior global product manager. “But I think we will beat automotive.”

Others agree. Sangwon Shin, Avikus’ director of strategic planning and business development, says: “In our view, the boating environment is less complicated than the car environment. So, we expect a little bit faster adoption rate.”

For boaters who are ready to start now, Avikus and Raymarine are releasing NeuBoat Dock this year. The assisted-docking system includes at least six self-calibrating, 360-degree cameras; a Raymarine multifunction display; an Avikus object-recognition unit; camera control boxes; and Avikus’ AI to provide bird’s-eye views and distance guides. (Garmin’s Surround View camera system provides similar capabilities.)

NeuBoat Dock is a level-one autonomous navigation system, which means it serves as a virtual assistant to human operators who remain in control. Level-two systems provide partial driving automation but still require a human operator. Level-three systems have conditional driving automation, requiring some human oversight, while level four has zero expectations of driver involvement. Level five is full driving automation.

Avikus, which is a spin-off of HD Hyundai, began developing NeuBoat in 2019. The resulting level-three-plus black-box prototype, which I got aboard in 2022, used the global navigation satellite system and vector cartography to establish position. The local device didn’t require internet connectivity. Instead, it employed daylight cameras and lidar (light detection and ranging) sensors to detect objects, measure distances, and scan and map berths. It also used Avikus’ AI to detect and classify nearby objects and vessels, assist with route planning, and suggest navigable courses.

This latter information was presented as screen views showing vector cartography with recommended courses, head-up displays and live camera views with augmented-reality data tags.

While impressive, the prototype didn’t use radar or the automatic identification system, so its range of object detection was limited to lidar’s 400-foot-range capacity. This range worked at our 6-knot speed, giving us 39 seconds of reaction time, but it wouldn’t work at 25 knots, only allowing for nine seconds.

Enter Raymarine, which integrated its own radar technology with Avikus’ AI. This combination extended NeuBoat’s detection range from 400 feet to 1.5 nautical miles. Shin says Avikus plans to integrate radar, sonar and infrared cameras within five years.

While extra range is important for recreational users, it’s critical for letting Avikus develop autonomous systems on large ships. “We use the same technology and the same algorithms for commercial and recreational, but the hardware specs are different,” Shin says.

In addition to radar expertise, Raymarine has amassed experience using computer vision from its DockSense and ClearCruise AR products. The latter places augmented-reality tags atop a video feed. Computer vision is a branch of AI that lets computers recognize, categorize and identify objects and people in digital images or video feeds; as such, it is critical to autonomous operations.

Looking ahead, Shin says, commercial ships and recreational vessels will first use autonomous navigation with human-in-the-loop operators, followed by autonomous operations. This isn’t a hypothetical; in 2022, Avikus’ commercial version of NeuBoat autonomously guided an LNG tanker across an ocean with human-in-the-loop oversight.

“The technology is there today,” Cox says. “We need to make sure that people are ready to use the technology responsibly and that regulations are there.”

When asked what milestones need to be met for autonomous operations aboard recreational yachts, Cox and Shin made clear they aren’t talking about distant horizons. “None are 10 years out,” Cox says, adding that by mid-2024, Avikus and Raymarine expect to have achieved sensor fusion, where the system can combine data from the vessel’s AIS, cameras, GNSS, lidar and radar. “In two years, on the control side, boats will be docking and driving themselves.”

Shin agrees: “In five years, we’re expecting lots of the boating community to accept the possibility of autonomous navigation or partial assistance on their boat.”

Before this can happen, however, Cox and Shin point to two technical complexities: networking with autopilots and engines. As with radars, Raymarine has decades of experience manufacturing autopilots, so engine interfaces could prove to be the sticky wicket. “Engine manufacturers need to become more progressive,” Shin says. “They are the powerful guys.” Cox says the goal is to integrate NeuBoat with every major engine manufacturer.

Cox and Shin also point to a need for regulations to govern autonomous vessels. This is already happening; in 2022, the American Bureau of Shipping published a white paper that detailed 10 points—from maintaining propulsion to maintaining communications—intended to create a structure for autonomous-vessel design and operations. The US Coast Guard also published guidelines on testing remote- and autonomously controlled vessels.

Convincing experienced boaters that autonomous technology is the path forward could be a hard sell for some, but this is where Avikus and Raymarine plan to parallel the automotive world. Most contemporary cars have adaptive cruise control, making these types of assistance features feel familiar. Many boaters also own cars with an autopilot feature.

But driving to work is different than taking the boat out for a spin. Here, Cox says NeuBoat isn’t going to take away boating’s joys. Instead, the idea is to reduce stress. For example, Cox describes allowing the boat to navigate autonomously to the fishing grounds or home from a cruise.

Cox also says autopilots have served boaters for decades, and that autonomous navigation is an extension of this capability, combined with the ability to avoid collisions autonomously.

For newer boaters, autonomous technology is an easier proposition. “I’m a new boater, and I get nervous a lot,” Shin says. “We target new boaters. We want more people to enjoy boating.”

Then there is boating’s greatest equalizer. “People don’t like docking,” Cox says. “We’re never going to stop you from driving your boat, but it might be nice, if you’re coming into a dock and are getting stressed out, to switch it on.”

The wait won’t be long, either. While Avikus is paralleling the automotive sector, Cox and Shin expect NeuBoat technology to navigate and dock recreational vessels sooner than cars. “People will be surprised with how quickly we will get to market,” Cox says.

Having experienced Tesla’s Mad Max mode and Avikus’ level-three-plus sea trials,

I can say that far less adrenaline is involved watching a demonstration boat dock itself than when I pawed for a nonexistent passenger-side brake pedal in my buddy Allan’s Tesla.

Better Optics

While NeuBoat Dock uses six 360-degree cameras, they only work for daytime operations. The obvious move is to add thermal-imaging cameras, and Raymarine’s parent company, Teledyne, owns FLIR. Thermal-imaging cameras would add cost, but Cox says these sophisticated optical sensors could be included aboard higher-end NeuBoat installations.

The post AI-Assisted Piloting Is Coming appeared first on Yachting.

The fall and winter boat shows mean that an armada of technology is being launched to make everyone’s time on the water safer and more fun. Without further ado, here is some of the top tech to put on your radar for the new year’s boating season.

Garmin 

Innovations in marine electronics hail from two places: hardware and software. In recent years, hardware advances have slowed compared with a decade ago. Case in point: While Garmin has long pushed the software envelope, the company’s flagship multifunction display—the GPSMap 8400/8600—premiered in 2016. Garmin’s newest flagship display, the GPSMap 9000 series ($9,900 to $17,000), brings significant hardware advances.

These advances include edge-to-edge 4K displays, processors that purportedly deliver seven times the speed of Garmin’s previous offerings, and a faster local network (Garmin BlueNet gigabit network, which can hustle data at up to 1 gigabit per second to and from peripherals, including radar and sonar modules).

GPSMap 9000-series displays are available in 19-, 22-, 24-, and 27-inch screens that ship with Navionics+ cartography and AutoGuidance+ routing. The displays also support engine-room monitoring, Garmin’s OneHelm integrated digital switching, and Garmin’s Surround View Camera System, which eases the challenges of docking. Users can control these IPX7-rated displays via a touchscreen interface, with voice commands using a headset (sold separately) or with a paired Garmin smartwatch (also sold separately).

Speaking of peripherals, Garmin also unveiled its GSD 28 sonar module, which is a dual-channel Xchirp-enabled black-box sonar that can probe depths to 10,000 feet. The GSD 28 ($3,000) can be networked to Airmar- or Garmin-built transducers, and can transmit at 300 watts to 3 kilowatts. The sonar has Garmin’s Rapidreturn, which delivers two to six times faster ping rates than previous-generation black-box sonar. Boaters who cruise with Garmin’s MSC 10 satellite compasses can also leverage the GSD 28’s Heave Compensation feature, which removes vessel motion from its returns.

Furuno 

Integration has long been a marine-electronics buzzword, but Furuno took a different tack with its FCV-600 and FCV-800 stand-alone fish finders. The sounders (call for pricing) have chirp and dual-frequency (50/200 kilohertz) capabilities, and they can explore depths to 3,937 feet.

The FCV-600 has 5.7 inches of screen real estate and transmits at 600 watts, while the FCV-800 has 8.4 inches of glass and transmits at 1 kilowatt. Additionally, the FCV-800 cooperates with NMEA 2000 and NMEA 0183 networks, while the FCV-600 uses only N2K networks.

Both fish finders are compatible with a range of transducers, and both support Furuno’s proprietary fish-finding technologies, including RezBoost signal processing, Bottom Discrimination and TruEcho Chirp, which yields better image resolution and onscreen target separation than traditional 50/200 kHz sounders. Also, both fish finders are Wi-Fi-enabled, which lets one fish finder communicate wirelessly with another identical sounder. In other words, two FCV-600s can talk, or one can communicate with select third-party apps and smartphones.

Raymarine

Sailors love wind information. Raymarine’s Alpha Series Displays and RSW Series Wind Sensors capture and present data that is user-customizable.

Alpha displays ($1,200 to $2,000) come in 7- and 9-inch screens that can be mounted vertically or horizontally at the mast or the helm. Users can customize screen views, and they can control the displays via the individual touchscreens or through networked Raymarine-built Axiom multifunction displays.

RSW Series Wind Sensors ($850) are self-calibrating, with embedded attitude-heading-reference-system sensors that measure pitch, roll and yaw. This combination allows the system to calculate true-wind metrics and present them on an Alpha Series Display.

VoltSafe

From a distance, the smartest thing about VoltSafe is the magnetic connection between an ordinary 30-amp shore-power cable and VoltSafe’s proprietary charging station. Should someone forget to disconnect before engaging the boat’s throttles, 40 pounds of load breaks the magnetic connection.

Better still, VoltSafe’s shoreside chargers use an electronic vetting process (think electric-car chargers) with the reciprocal magnetic connector. If the connection doesn’t pass muster, electricity stops (or never starts) flowing. This feature adds a significant safety margin, especially given the presence of water.

While VoltSafe systems are currently a marina-facing product, in time, users will be able to communicate with the system via VoltSafe’s app. This feature should be useful for tracking bills, tracing low-voltage issues, and receiving power-outage alerts.

OceanLED

Lighting can help set a mood, but controlling belowdecks, topside and undercarriage illuminators can be challenging. OceanLED’s OceanBridge (call for pricing) is a multizone control system that can be driven from a networked multifunction display via an NMEA 2000 or Ethernet connection, or from a smart device using OceanBridge’s built-in Wi-Fi connectivity.

OceanBridge systems can control all OceanLED lights, plus most third-party DC-powered lights. In total, the system can control 64 lights (this can be expanded to 150-plus with splitters), including color and brightness, color fades and transitions. There’s also music sync and OceanLED’s proprietary movement-to-color feature across 10 zones.

Digital Yacht

Devices enabled for the internet are handy, but they can open the door to hackers. Digital Yacht’s N2K Protect ($350) stops onboard cyberthreats by validating all equipment on an NMEA 2000 network.

After that, N2K Protect creates a baseline network map, which it stores locally. N2K Protect locks down and monitors the network 24/7/365. Users can configure the system to generate an alarm (N2K network alerts or SMS messages via a Digital Yacht 4G/5G cellular modem) if unscrupulous activity or poor N2K performance is detected. And N2K Protect is updatable via an embedded web interface.

Digital Yacht also recently unveiled its CO Alert carbon-monoxide detection and alarm system. CO Alert ($330) is a two-piece system consisting of a white-box detection sensor and a black box that tackles power supply and network connectivity. The low-draw system constantly monitors its self-test feature to ensure safety and performance. If tripped, the system generates audio and visual alarms on NMEA 2000-networked multifunction displays.

Actisense

NMEA 2000 networks move a lot of information. Actisense’s NGX-1 gateway helps boaters access this data.

Actisense makes two versions of the device: the NGX-1-USB ($280) and the NGX-1-ISO ($260). Both allow all major PC-based chart plotters to communicate with networked instrumentation, and both provide a firewall between the computer and the N2K network. The NGX-1-USB plugs into PCs, while the NGX-1-ISO is wired to an NMEA 0183 device or a serial port.

The post Top Helm Technology For 2024 appeared first on Yachting.

The skies darkened fast. Capt. Art Sapp was runnng home to Lighthouse Point, Florida, from the Bahamas aboard Native Son, his SeaVeei 39, when he saw the storm wall. “I ran 30 miles to get around the thunder and lightning,” he said, adding that he used dual 16-inch Raymarine Axiom 2 XL multifunction displays, and networked radar and satellite weather, to pick a less-awful route. “It’s got a fluidlike feeling on the screens. It’s wild,” Sapp said of the Axiom 2 XL. “It makes it so accurate, there’s no missed touch.”

While screen-tap accuracy matters, there’s more going on with Raymarine’s latest displays than screen coatings. And it’s been developing for years.

In 2017, Raymarine unveiled its Axiom displays with quad-core processors, RealVision 3D sonar and the Android-based Lighthouse 3 operating system. Lighthouse 3 was Raymarine’s all-new operating-system architecture, and it made the company an early Android adopter within the marine space. Raymarine’s Axiom 2 displays come in three models with screen sizes ranging from 9 to 24 inc hes. All of them have six-core processors, global navigation satellite system receivers, 64 gigabytes of solid-state storage, the latest version of Raymarine’s Lighthouse 4 operating system and next-generation screen coatings. The resulting displays, which include angling- and cruising-specific versions, can give boaters better speed, power and improved user interfaces.

The Axiom 2 family starts with Axiom 2 Pro S (from $3,050), which is available in 9-, 12- and 16-inch screens. It comes with a single-channel, chirp-enabled sonar.

“The Axiom 2 Pro S is targeted at cruising boats,” says Jim McGowan, Raymarine’s Americas marketing manager. “It’s got our HydroTough coating on the glass. It’s a nano coating that bonds with the glass on a molecular level. Your fingers just glide smoothly over it, which enhances the functionality.”

In addition, the Axiom 2 Pro S, along with the fishing-specific Axiom 2 Pro RVM, uses Raymarine’s HybridTouch user interface, which employs a touchscreen as well as hard-button-and-knob keypads. Those can be helpful when the seaway starts sloshing the coffee.

RVM stands for RealVision Max sonar. Axiom 2 Pro RVM displays are identical to the Axiom 2 Pro S, save for their sonars. While the Axiom 2 Pro S has a conical chirp-enabled sonar, RVM models (from $2,750) are built with a 10 kW, dual-channel chirp sounder and a 600-watt RealVision Max high multibeam chirp sonar.

“It’s definitely targeted at the hard-core fishermen,” McGowan says, adding that RVM displays deliver chirp DownVision, SideVision, RealVision 3D and high-chirp-sonar perspectives, plus the traditional dual-channel 1 kW chirp sonar.

Given that there are three bands of chirp—low, medium and high—anglers can cover all three bands with an Axiom 2 Pro RVM that’s networked to a Raymarine RVM transducer and to an Airmar low- and medium-frequency chirp transducer.

Axiom 2 displays employ different transducers (sold separately) than previous-generation Axiom offerings. These transducers have piezoceramic elements inside that are larger, McGowan says. Larger ceramic elements equate to greater acoustic sensitivity and better beam-shaping capability. While those features are beneficial, the reality is that boaters need to add the new transducers in order to realize the system’s full acoustic capabilities.

Axiom 2 XL is the most recent addition to Raymarine’s display family. As the name portends, the premium-level XL models (from $7,800) are designed for use in an all-glass bridge aboard large yachts or high-end center-consoles. The touchscreen displays are available in 16-, 19-, 22- and 24-inch glass. While they don’t include an embedded sonar or hard-button controls (owners can add a Raymarine RMK-10 keyboard), they do have HDMI input and output capabilities.

“They have a pretty robust video input and output,” McGowan says. “It’s unique to that level of Axiom. The standard Axioms don’t have it.”

This functionality allows Axiom 2 XL owners to add a Raymarine RVM1600 black-box sonar ($2,000), creating a setup that gives Axiom 2 XLs the same fish-stalking capabilities as Axiom 2 Pro RVMs, just with more-spacious glass.

These HDMI capabilities also allow Axiom 2 XL owners to network a touchscreen-compatible personal computer to their display via a USB connection, and to drive their computer using Axiom 2 XL’s touchscreen pass-through interface. Additionally, the HDMI input and XL-size glass can be used to stream satellite TV or other content.

While each Axiom 2 model has its sweet spot of capabilities, all three models share important DNA. “Because of the six-core processors, the ability to pan across a chart or to zoom in or zoom out, it is very, very snappy,” McGowan says. “The pinch-to-zoom feature is immediate. You’re never waiting for anything to load.”

And the latest version of Raymarine’s Android-based Lighthouse 4 operating system lets third-party software developers create vetted apps that run on Axiom 2 displays.

“We curate the apps that we allow. They have to be largely navigation-focused,” McGowan says, adding that some apps are validated by Raymarine, while others are developed with a partner agreement. “The Android platform gives us the flexibility to do that because there are so many marine devices that are built on or around Android.”

Another benefit of Lighthouse 4’s Android-based architecture, McGowan says, is that navigation software isn’t a heavy lift for the processors: “You’re not really pushing the limits of the hardware out of the box, so that gives us the ability to keep developing new features and new innovations and adding more stuff into the code. We still haven’t even begun to stress the limits of the processor and memory.”

As far as Axiom 2’s pros and cons, the positives are plural, while the drawbacks are largely limited to costs (including installing the larger transducers) and the fact that Raymarine no longer allows owners to pilot DJI Mavic drones from Axiom displays.

But if you’re more concerned with cruising, fishing or creating a premium-level all-glass bridge, then Axiom 2 could be the logical next addition to your yacht’s helm.

Pro Moves

Raymarine’s RVM1600 sonar module can be networked with an Axiom 2 XL to yield the same sonic capabilities as an Axiom 2 Pro RVM.

Sky-Talker

Axiom 2s are agnostic about satellite-communications connections. They play nicely with mazu’s M2500 ($1,100), which uses Iridium’s global, short-burst data service to provide weather, email, SMS messaging and an optional sport-fishing app. It appears as an app, so users can see it on Axiom’s sunlight-readable screen.

The post Raymarine’s Axiom 2 Multifunction Displays Explained appeared first on Yachting.

Raymarine has inked a deal with Rhode Island-based NorthCoast Boats to provide navigation equipment and YachtSense digital switching for the builder’s full line of 2024 model-year boats, including the flagship NorthCoast 415HT that is expected to become available this fall.

“We are very excited to be able to provide NorthCoast with every component for its flagship 415HT’s electronics suite, as well as for all future builds across their product line,” Grégoire Outters, general manager of Raymarine, stated in a press release. “NorthCoast has long been regarded as a premium yacht manufacturer, and their 415HT is going to go above and beyond by offering the smartest boating experience ever.”

The NorthCoast 415HT will have a helm with two Axiom 2XL 19-inch multifunction displays and a RMK10 remote; RealVision MAX 3D sonar with CHIRP DownVision and SideVision sonar; a Cyclone 110-watt, 4-foot open-array radar with CHIRP pulse compression and beam-sharpening technology; and an AR200 that supplies GPS position, compass heading, pitch and roll data to Axiom chartplotters. It can also (when combined with the onboard FLIR M364C multispectral marine camera and CAM300) use video-stabilization capabilities to enable ClearCruise Augmented Reality features.

What does Raymarine’s YachtSense digital switching do? It’s a modular backbone that supports control of the vessel’s systems, with lighting, pumps, hydraulics and HVAC all integrated for touchscreen control.

Take the next step: go to raymarine.com

The post Raymarine Partners with NorthCoast Boats appeared first on Yachting.

Black cables of different lengths hang from tines, awaiting testing. Each cable is fitted with connectors that align with hardware from all the marine-electronics manufacturers. If all goes well with the tests, then packaging and shipping are next.

While it’s odd to see just-minted cabling for Furuno, Garmin, Humminbird, Raymarine and Simrad on the same factory floor, that’s how this place works. Since its founding in 1982, Airmar Technology Corp. has ensured that its transducers play nicely with third-party fish finders, sonars and multifunction displays. As Craig Cushman, Airmar’s director of marketing, explains by analogy: “We don’t build marine electronics. We build high-end speakers.”

In 1982, engineer Steve Boucher founded Airmar in Milford, New Hampshire, with the goal of innovating and manufacturing better acoustic-sensing transducers. The company’s first product was a transom-mounted transducer that worked with a variety of fish finders. Today, Airmar makes everything from proximity sensors to acoustic rain sensors to flow sensors to high-end chirp transducers. The common denominator in all this product diversity is Airmar’s expertise in sonar and ultrasonic-sensing technologies. The company is the leading global manufacturer of high-end transducers.

Since its founding, Airmar has produced both branded and white-label products for third-party companies. This arrangement has freed marine-electronics manufacturers to pursue their own areas of expertise, and has let Airmar form close-knit partnerships to produce transducers that are critical to many big players’ products.

Just as Airmar grew its product portfolio from a humble, transom-hung transducer to sensors that now govern bottling plants and Chicago city buses, the business has also grown to include multiple other companies. These include Marport, which manufactures sensors, echo sounders, current profilers and sonars for the commercial-fishing market; Gemeco and Airmar EMEA, both distribution companies; and a defense-contracting operation. Roughly 60 percent of Airmar’s annual revenue flows from the recreational-marine market; the other 40 percent, including some defense contracting, provides stability in other markets. Airmar is supported by 435 global employees, including some who report to offices in France, Iceland and South Africa, while 275 to 300 employees work at (or remotely from) the company’s New Hampshire headquarters.

I visited that headquarters, which is sizable with three buildings. Cushman and Susan Leuci, Airmar’s media-relations specialist, started my tour by showing me a few pieces of Airmar-built equipment, including two small paddle wheels.

“That’s our new Gen2 paddle wheel,” Cushman says, adding that it delivers accurate speed-over-water metrics at boat speeds as skinny as 0.3 knots. “A young engineer and University of New Hampshire graduate spent three years perfecting that design.”

The wheel has a precise, asymmetrical shape, and a large surface area relative to its size. There’s little room for marine growth to accumulate compared with previous offerings.

“We made that here,” Cushman says, adding that while Airmar’s injection-molding machines can rapidly fabricate components, manufacturing here is still largely a manual process. “We’re not feeding components into a machine. It’s a manual, hands-on job. A lot of craftsmanship goes into these transducers.”

Downstairs on the factory floor, in the engineering lab, new designs are being fabricated before testing commences in the adjoining research-and-development room, which is populated with racks of testing equipment and multiple freshwater tanks. Inside one tank, a wooden structure hangs vertically in the water column. The wood is cut at different and diverging angles, which allows Airmar to test for sonar-wave reflexivity. Nearby, there’s a bench with fish finders from all the major brands. Cushman explains that Airmar tests new transducers on all platforms, just like a high-end speaker company might test its creations on receivers from all the major brands.

“We’re a technology-development company, not a boating company,” Cushman says. “We attract people because of the technology, not necessarily because it goes on a boat.”

Around the R&D room, there’s equipment for hot-and-cold cycling, drop testing and atmospheric-pressure testing. No amount of pounding into offshore seaways will approximate the level of torture that Airmar conjures here.

On the main factory floor are more tank-testing facilities and multishelf wheeled carts full of transducers ready for packaging and shipping. Their housings might be bronze, molded plastic, stainless steel or urethane, but inside, each contains at least one carefully potted piezoceramic element.

“Everything is 100 percent American-manufactured,” Cushman says. “We have some circuit boards made in Canada, but everything is assembled here, in the USA, in New Hampshire.”

Cushman leads me past the area where employees batch-test incoming componentry, before taking me into the room where other employees pour encapsulating material into transducer bodies. He says that while all Airmar employees receive months of instruction and on-the-job training, encapsulation work requires special experience to ensure that air bubbles and other contaminants don’t become suspended in the matrix.

“We have decades of research into materials that perform better in certain ways,” Cushman says, adding that a big part of Airmar’s quality comes from knowing which materials will direct the highest percentage of acoustic energy into the water column by eliminating unwanted noise.

We pass keg-like barrels filled with water and through-hull transducers, clamps and wires (and occasional rubber duckies). Rows of three-story carts hold bronze through-hull transducers, their pipe stems forming a miniature copper-colored forest.

At the ultrasonic-weather-station department, several wind tunnels occupy an end of the factory floor. They can produce winds up to 100 knots. The fans are silent as we walk by, but an engineer is preparing to test an Airmar-built weather station with an ultrasonic anemometer.

Across the street, in Airmar’s newer building, the company produces high-volume, lower-cost transducers and plastic parts, and assembles wire kits. Entire pallets of wire, wound around massive wooden spools, are ready to be cut and fitted with Airmar-built third-party connectors. “Every transducer build needs miles of cables,” Cushman says.

I couldn’t help but notice, in Cushman’s office, a half-hull of Reliance, the Nathanael Greene Herreshoff-designed behemoth that successfully defended the 1903 America’s Cup. Equipment from different marine-electronics companies is on a nearby bookshelf. Much like how Reliance dominated its field of play in its day, Airmar dominates the high-end transducer business.

The real winners, of course, are yachtsmen worldwide.

Military Service

While Airmar’s transducers detect fish, the U.S. Navy stalks submarines. MSI Transducers builds bespoke and semi-bespoke transducers for commercial and defense use. Airmar acquired MSI in 2016 and introduced high-volume manufacturing. This arrangement helps MSI be cost-competitive and gives Airmar access to next-generation technologies.

The post Behind the Scenes with Airmar Technology Corp. appeared first on Yachting.

Raymarine has unveiled new products, including the Axiom 2 Pro and Axiom 2 XL multifunction displays, a new suite of sonar products and an advanced marine camera system.

The Axiom 2 Pro is the most powerful all-in-one Axiom system ever developed, according to Raymarine. It has a fast six-core processor and an intuitive LightHouse 4 operating system. It’s available in 9-, 12- and 16-inch sizes in two variations.

The Axiom 2 Pro S includes embedded high-chirp sonar for premium cruising and sailing vessels, while the Axiom 2 Pro RVM is engineered for anglers.

Axiom 2 Pro RVM models come standard with new RealVision MAX 3D sonar, which combines chirp DownVision, SideVision and RealVision MAX 3D channels. The high-frequency chirp sonar channel also has 600 watts of output power, significantly expanding the depth range to 1,200 feet and greatly improving the clarity of fish targets detected throughout the water column.

The flagship Axiom 2 XL is designed for sportfishing yachts, offshore battlewagons and luxury cruisers, and is available in 16-, 19-, 22- and 24-inch sizes, with enhanced networking and extended multimedia capabilities. Features include HDMI input and output, and touchscreen pass-through. Axiom 2 XL screens are also built on the new six-core platform with LightHouse 4 operating system.

“Whether you are a professional offshore angler or a long-distance cruiser, Axiom 2 Pro promises the clearest sonar pictures at the greatest ranges in a display that is built to withstand the harshest conditions thrown at you,” Grégoire Outters, general manager of Raymarine, stated in a press release.

What else is new at Raymarine? The company also added the new CAM300 Marine Camera, which is slightly larger than a golf ball, with high-definition resolution and a 160-degree field of view.

Where to learn more: go to raymarine.com

The post New Product Lines from Raymarine appeared first on Yachting.

Avikus, HD Hyundai’s autonomous navigation in-house startup, has signed a memorandum of understanding with Raymarine to cooperate on what’s being billed as the world’s first autonomous leisure boat, the Avikus NeuBoat.

The boat will have Raymarine’s navigational products on board, and the two companies say they will explore “the future of autonomous leisure boating,” hinting at other projects to come.

“Raymarine brings world-leading expertise in marine electronics and navigational equipment for leisure boats to the project, while Avikus is known for the most advanced autonomous leisure-boat technology available, coupled with vast experience from the world’s largest order book of autonomous commercial marine navigation systems,” according to a press release.

What Raymarine’s general manager, Gregoire Outters, says about the deal: “Raymarine strives to provide the most innovative, user-friendly and reliable electronics to make boating accessible and safe for everyone. With Avikus’ proven solution in autonomous commercial marine, the signing of this MOU will pave the way for our engineers to work closely together, to deliver this exciting new technology to our leisure boat customers.”

Take the next step: go to raymarine.com

The post Raymarine Is Working on an Autonomous Boat appeared first on Yachting.