Vesper Cortex V1 VHF

I've been hearing mixed comments on the VHF, which is now owned by Garmin. Please comment on your experiences with this radio.
I'm considering installing a tethered and a wireless VI on my new boat.
Thank you.

Just installed ours. No issues. Handset display works well.
No actual cruising experience yet.

You may also consider:
An external speaker
A hailer.
Connection to your NMEA2000 network

FYI: tethered handset is wireless as well. Only gets it's power from the cord.

Good friend has had many issues with his Cortex VHF radio. Transmit button has gone bad twice and replaced with rebuilt units. He has also suffered multiple dropped wireless connections (on a 50' sloop). I would never rely on a wireless connection for a critical safety component. Hand set does not have the solid build feel of a typical ICOM. It does offer some very nice unique features, and I'd consider it as a back up radio, but not as my primary VHF. My boats have always had redundant VHF radios, one with a dedicated 12V battery placed high above water line. It's nice to monitor 2 radios without using the scan function and have a little piece of mind. Nice concept, but many early model teething problems.

We installed in 2023 Spring, and used it all summer, and on a recent trip this year. The majority of software issues seen on forums were resolved before we installed, and they are still improving it (had some updates this season when we prepped the boat). A few thought and things I like:

1. We have a handheld ICOM as backup, handy for Dinghy and 'just in case', but have never needed it, had no dropouts,.

2. Love the Anchor Drag feature built in. It's really good! I have two helms, but I installed the wired handset at the main helm and a second wireless in our Berth that I can carry up to the Fly if needed. Then I can monitor the anchor drag while in bed.

3. Also Love the auto squelch now - only problem is that I almost think the VHF is off it's so silent most of the time, but then crystal clear when a relevant call comes in.

4. We use the Cortex on the boat network, so it shares heading, speed, and AIS with my iPad, iPhone in Navionics and Aquamaps. I like that a lot. Our older chart plotters don;t share that over wifi...

5. Remote monitoring is available, but extra cost. If you wire up sensors (bilge pump) you can see if things are running etc, battery voltage - whatever. We haven't done that (we have a Victron system and use VRM) but it's something to consider investigating if it's interesting to you.

6. Another great feature is the ability to auto-record so you can playback a call on 16 if you didn't quite make it (no need to ask someone to repeat) and it can also scan and record multiple channels at once - so at it's simplest you can listen to 16 but also haver it watch 78 and record anything to the buffer so you can play that back. I believe it can scan all channels, but I've never done that.

7. I agree it doesn't feel as rugged as our previous Raymarine VHF, but the benefits for me outweigh that. I haven't had any damage, repairs etc yet, but it's also all under cover, or below decks. Dogs haven't chewed on it yet either, but no promises there.

I would get it again in a new boat if it didn't have it. I love the functionality, and I haven't even leveraged everything it can do yet. I would get it for the anchor watch alone imho.

cheers!

Chris

Really good summary. Did they add loudspeaker and intercomm features yet? They were on the 'to release in the future' list last I looked. The Cortex unique features are really an interesting standout. The color screen with MFD like display is very cool. My preference would still be to have a hard-wired radio like my ICOM M605 or M510 as my primary and count of the Cortex for its extensive features.

Hi All - I just installed my Vesper Cortex V1 (M1 hub with handset). Plugged it into my N2K backbone and everything shows up on my PC in the TimeZero app perfectly. However - TimeZero will not allow me to filter out sentences from any particular device upon the same bus. This is problematic because I have a beautiful and accurate new Furuno SCX20 satellite compass that I would like to be my only source of position/heading data.

Does anyone know how I can suppress the GPS data coming from the Cortex? I would like it to send me only AIS data.

I do have a workaround using the NMEA 0183 output from the Cortex but would rather keep everything in the N2K realm if possible. Thanks in advance for any tips!

Nordlund Xpress said:

Good friend has had many issues with his Cortex VHF radio. Transmit button has gone bad twice and replaced with rebuilt units. He has also suffered multiple dropped wireless connections (on a 50' sloop). I would never rely on a wireless connection for a critical safety component. Hand set does not have the solid build feel of a typical ICOM. It does offer some very nice unique features, and I'd consider it as a back up radio, but not as my primary VHF. My boats have always had redundant VHF radios, one with a dedicated 12V battery placed high above water line. It's nice to monitor 2 radios without using the scan function and have a little piece of mind. Nice concept, but many early model teething problems.

Click to expand...

Agreed on the transmit button. I don’t use it as a vhs as I prefer my icon and find the handset not great. It is an amazing anchor alarm though which I did use it for. (After I figured out how to keep those collision alerts permanently turned off which was oddly hard to figure out)

One morning anchored in a cove by myself, at 1am I heard a deep throbbing diesel sound off my boat, followed by a spot light through the port windows. It was a dark gray hull of a larger boat just off me maybe 20’. It turns out it was a Canadian boat searching for someone with a stuck mike on channel 16. Yup, that was my vesper that I only used as an anchor alarm which must have gotten the broadcast button pushed (and stuck) when placed back into the charging cradle. I was completely embarrassed as they said they had been searching for several hours. Enough so, I now use my furuno anchor alarm as I am nervous about another stuck mike incident. Perhaps I can listen in first on my icon to check but what a hassle. And I had to buy one new handset as it stopped charging as well.

I've installed the Cortex on our last 2 boats, though I was really on the fence about goung the Cortex route for our current boat. Ultimately, what made up my mind to go with it again was their anchoring app. As far as I'm concerned, it's about the most useful & user-friendly anchor app available.
I use this one the same as I used the last; Wifi for data to our phones for the anchor app and to an ipad for an additional navigation program and nmea2000 on the buss for position,navigation & AIS data on the flybridge and lower helm MFD's. I use the Vesper nmea 0183 output for position data to the (4) vhf radios. It's handy to know I have horn signal capability on the Vesper but currently use the ICOM radios for signals.
My biggest gripe, and I can't believe this hasn't been brought up by other Cortex users, is their damn internal compass. On our Albin, I relocated the thing 3 times trying to find a magnetic-friendly location so that the charts on our plotters weren't skewed and just as importantly, our AIS heading wasn't depicted as showing us "crabbing" through the water on other ships plotters. Garmin finally sen' me a nmea2000 heading sensor to mount remotely ,which I did and it remedied the problem. On our current boat, the underside if the bridge is cavernous compared to the last boat and I was free to mount the Cortex right in the middle of the boat, under the helm with seemingly nothing of any magnetic consequence anywhere near it. I just knew it was going to be a good area but after completing the compass calibration, it *the Cortex) still had an onboard deviation that was skewing my charts. I was really hoping Garmin would have incorporated a feature in the latest software to simply turn off the "hdg" output sentence but they did not. I'm not too concerned about it though, since I have a precision 9 compass that needs to be installed on the nmea buss and the Vesper will revert to it once online.

Keith7WA said:

Hi All - I just installed my Vesper Cortex V1 (M1 hub with handset). Plugged it into my N2K backbone and everything shows up on my PC in the TimeZero app perfectly. However - TimeZero will not allow me to filter out sentences from any particular device upon the same bus. This is problematic because I have a beautiful and accurate new Furuno SCX20 satellite compass that I would like to be my only source of position/heading data.

Does anyone know how I can suppress the GPS data coming from the Cortex? I would like it to send me only AIS data.

I do have a workaround using the NMEA 0183 output from the Cortex but would rather keep everything in the N2K realm if possible. Thanks in advance for any tips!

Click to expand...

How does your PC get N2K data? Some devices pick N2K data sources themselves and always send only the chosen source to the PC, often as 0183 data so they are really just an N2K to 0183 converter. Others will make the actual N2K data available to the PC, and the app can then choose its data source. I haven’t run time zero in a decade or more, but think it can choose data sources if the N2K data stream is available to it. I think the Actisense N2K to USB device is supported for this

boomerang said:

I've installed the Cortex on our last 2 boats, though I was really on the fence about goung the Cortex route for our current boat. Ultimately, what made up my mind to go with it again was their anchoring app. As far as I'm concerned, it's about the most useful & user-friendly anchor app available.
I use this one the same as I used the last; Wifi for data to our phones for the anchor app and to an ipad for an additional navigation program and nmea2000 on the buss for position,navigation & AIS data on the flybridge and lower helm MFD's. I use the Vesper nmea 0183 output for position data to the (4) vhf radios. It's handy to know I have horn signal capability on the Vesper but currently use the ICOM radios for signals.
My biggest gripe, and I can't believe this hasn't been brought up by other Cortex users, is their damn internal compass. On our Albin, I relocated the thing 3 times trying to find a magnetic-friendly location so that the charts on our plotters weren't skewed and just as importantly, our AIS heading wasn't depicted as showing us "crabbing" through the water on other ships plotters. Garmin finally sen' me a nmea2000 heading sensor to mount remotely ,which I did and it remedied the problem. On our current boat, the underside if the bridge is cavernous compared to the last boat and I was free to mount the Cortex right in the middle of the boat, under the helm with seemingly nothing of any magnetic consequence anywhere near it. I just knew it was going to be a good area but after completing the compass calibration, it *the Cortex) still had an onboard deviation that was skewing my charts. I was really hoping Garmin would have incorporated a feature in the latest software to simply turn off the "hdg" output sentence but they did not. I'm not too concerned about it though, since I have a precision 9 compass that needs to be installed on the nmea buss and the Vesper will revert to it once online.

Click to expand...

You can choose your source of heading info. If you have another, more accurate piece of equipment feeding your NMEA2000, choose I within the app or handset.

I've had a Cortex aboard 3 different boats continuously in the last 4 years since it initially came out. I wrote about my initial impressions here.

About a year ago, maybe less, they finally added some of the features that were promised for years that makes the VHF usable now. That was a disappointment not having that functionality for 3+ years. There have also been other features added that really make it hard to use an older radio anymore.

My concerns have to do with the longevity of the hardware. I've had 2x handsets die with no notice, and the replacement process is expensive and not fast. My wired handsets cables at both ends are coming apart, and the PTT button is wearing out.

I also have had one wireless handset in the flybridge of 2 of those 3 boats, and it has failed miserably in general usage. You can't leave it charging in a cradle outside if there is even the thought of condensation or water in it. It fried several cradles, and all of the replacement ones are corroding.

I've talked with a lot of other folks who have had the Cortex for multiple years and they have similar complaints. Hard to overlook how easy it is to use as a VHF, listening to 8 channels at the same time, for instruments, and an excellent anchor watch. But the hardware clearly is v1 - my only hope is Garmin puts some money behind a v2 version of the handsets at least...