State of Panbo: new classifieds, logos & more

Eventually Panbo's new Classifieds section will look more like the other sections, but it's already been tested a fair bit and we're declaring today the official opening of the public beta (Google style). Please check it out!  It may be a little rough around the edges -- don't hesitate with constructive criticism -- but I'm hopeful that it will grow into something useful to everyone involved with marine electronics. Individuals and businesses can easily place ads there and right now they're all FREE...

Vessel Vanguard, world's largest boat systems database?

When I first met Don Hyde, founder of Vessel Vanguard, and his business development guy Gordon Ramseier at IBEX, I may have been a little hard on them. That's because a similar plan to put all of a boat's system information into the cloud had gotten me excited last summer, but then seemed to stall. I'd realized that doing this right meant arduously creating a huge yet flexible database of specs, manuals, parts lists, bulletins, maintenance recommendations etc. for thousands of different bilge pumps, AC units, marine toilets, etc. etc. So I came at Don and Gordon with something like "Show me your database!" and, by golly, they did...

Android marine apps: Memory-Map is in, who else?

It's still in public Beta, but Memory-Map has an Android version of its charting app. I've tested it with both my Verizon Incredible phone and also with the 7-inch Galaxy Tab seen above, thanks to a loan from Memory-Map developer Richard Stephen, who I profiled way back in 2005. Even then Stephens was writing good PC and PDA charting software, and the experience shows...

BriarTek Cerberus, the DeLorme inReach alternative?

The photo above is meant to compliment the one I took when first testing the DeLorme inReach satellite communicator. It shows how Briartek's CerberLink is thinner in the depth dimension and also how it uses a USB-chargeable 2000mAh Lithium Polymer battery instead of a two AA Lithiums. And that's important. In fact it's pretty amazing how different the CerberLink and inReach are even though they're both based on the same Iridium 9602 SBD (small-burst data) modem and both aim to revolutionize two-way messaging, tracking, and safety beyond cellular coverage...

AC34 San Diego, some good photos

I spent some time recently looking through the wonderful photography AC34 is making available to the media (the public can browse large thumbnails). Most of the images were taken by the superb shooter Gilles Martin-Raget, and I thank him for taking some that illustrate my story obessions with the underlying technology and the support fleet. Like the one above which frames the intense racing with the AC45's space-age boomkin. As described in November that gray disk most aft is a NovAtel high-precision GPS which works along with inertial motion sensors and a high speed wireless data network so that the entire AC system knows exactly where this boat is...

Wow: Raymarine e9, e12, c9, c12, ClearPulse & VoyagePlanner, all new

I'm surprised because I thought Raymarine was holding off a slew of new products for the Miami show in mid-February, but today we learned that Ray's UK site has put details on the e9 and e12 big brothers of the e7 launched last summer, as well as new c9 and c12 MFDs that are very like similar to the e Series but without the touch control. Which is a lot, but not all...

Costa Concordia: "Vada a bordo, cazzo!"

The wrecking of the Costa Concordia is of course a dreadful and criminally unnecessary disaster. It's hard to find anything positive about what happened, unless perhaps you're another captain whose life became defined by a single major screw up, like, say, Joe Hazelwood. The Monitor did a good job delineating Capt. Francesco Schettino's Top 4 'deceptions' today and that was before Schettino made the claim that he abandoned ship because he tripped and fell into a lifeboat! I suspect that it will be a long time before anyone beats Schettino in the disgraced ship captain department...

High-bright marine LED lights, from Rigid Industries

Want more LED light at less cost to illuminate your deck or the water beyond? Rigid Industries may be new to the marine industry but the company claims patented optic systems that have already made it "the pioneer of forward projecting high intensity LED light bars" for uses like long-distance racing in souped-up dune buggies (on a course that may be booby-trapped). You can glimpse the unusual reflectors (for LED fixtures) in this photo from IBEX and I can tell you that even those small and inexpensive "four bulb" cubes closest to the camera are blindingly bright...

AC34, on board the committee boat

Almost two months later and I'm still excited about what I saw of America's Cup 34 in San Diego. If I had a megayacht I might well dispatch it to Naples or Venice for the spring World Series events, and I'll certainly be tuning in to AC's YouTube channel. But I'm convinced that understanding the incredible technology behind the scenes helps you appreciate how pure the racing is, and I've got several more entries to write on the subject, as well as an April Yachting feature in the works. Today we're going to peek at what goes on aboard the AC 34 committee boat, a sturdy power cat named Regardless...

DMK box hand's-on #1, developers needed!

Even if it only happened in my basement lab, it really is wonderful to see a boat's sensor data arrive wirelessly into an iPad app, where it could be used and displayed in so many ways. The instrument screen shown above was developed by the same DMK Yacht Instruments folks who build the WiFi box that got the data there (first discussed here in December). The wind, depth, and speed numbers went into the DMK bridge in NMEA 2000 format, but they could been in NMEA 0183 or SeaTalk, or a mix of all three. In fact, I've tried all three source formats with some success so far, but I'm frustrated because the DMK app -- meant mainly for configuring the box, I think -- can only interpret the values shown, and no other app I know of yet takes full advantage of what the box can do. Lets hope some developers start paying attention to what's possible here!

Navico GoFree, a WiFi & apps strategy partially revealed
I think of the beautiful and very powerful iPad navigation screen above as a bit of a tease. Yes, that's Furuno UHD radar overlaid on Nobeltec TimeZero Trident and, yes, I could even control it from the pad as...

Wireless data appliances: Comar NMEA-2-WiFi & DY AIS LifeGuard
The London Boat Show opened today and so far I've learned of two products being introduced there. It's somewhat odd that while both say "AIS" on the box neither is an AIS receiver or transponder. Certainly the Comar NMEA-2-WiFi...

Compass Marine: Installing a battery monitor & much, much more

I've long been meaning to give a hearty shout out to a slightly odd site called Compass Marine. What's odd is that the author -- RC Collins, an ABYC certified marine electrical technician and sailor -- is using an online database designed for photographers to create excellent how-to articles on subjects like Installing a Battery Monitor. But once you get used to the captioned illustration format, I think you'll be amazed. As suggested in the screen shot above, RC built a demo 12v power system so he could photo illustrate the Victron BMV-602S installation to near perfection, and he even annotates some of his photos to further make his points. This amount of work is not trivial. Collins could use a copy editor (me too!), but he really knows his stuff and he goes to extraordinary lengths to explain what he knows...

Dometic IBEX 2011, BVFD & WhisperFan
Winter will not be slow on Panbo largely because I still have lots to cover from my summer cruising and fall travels, and more time to do it in. At IBEX, for instance, I learned about a couple of...

Most popular Panbo 2011 entries, themes for 2012?

Looking back at Panbo statistics for 2011, the iPad was undeniably a major topic. The February entry "iPad cases for the boat, & some interesting apps" was the most read of the year, by far, and the next up was the "The damn iPad: iNavX, X-Traverse, Navimatics & AC" entry written back in May, 2010 (when I was lusting for one). In addition, March's "Accessory GPS for iPads..." came in at #5, and May's "iPad GRIB viewers..." at 12. So should Panbo become iPanbo? Well, certainly a major goal here is to report on and discuss important trends in marine electronics, but understanding statistics like these involves a lot of nuance...