Issues with a refurb Raymarine C80 -- advice?

My boat came with a Raymarine C80, so when the video finally died on that unit (known problem with a connector) I bought a refurb off Ebay. The guy had a good rep and the unit arrived in working condition so I was fairly confident -- it behaved well on two week-long shakedown trips, so I set out on the major summer trip, about 6 weeks.

Well, about 5 days into the long trip it failed while under way -- sounded an alarm and then the screen went black, unit powered down spontaneously. While running down a fairly narrow channel in reduced viz (heavy rain), great timing. Fortunately I have TZ on my iPad so very quickly had another chartplotter screen in front of me. But the C80 also was my main helm station depth sounder. I feel blind without it.

When I tried to power the C80 up again, I got the Raymarine logo/splash screen for a few seconds, then the unit turned itself off. This behaviour is consistent -- it has never worked again, and always fails in exactly the same way.

So of course I unplugged all the cables and plugged them back in again. I did a factory reset. I read the manual (useless). So I now own one original broken C80 that boots OK but has scrambled video, and this new (refurb) C80 also broken, which seems to have OK video but won't power up. And cost me almost a grand.

If anyone out there knows a whole lot about older Raymarine combo (depth/radar/gps) units like the C80, and understands what this "turn self off" failure mode means, I would sure like to know what the problem is and whether it can be fixed. Or if anyone knows of a good, honest marine electronics repair outfit in BC (Canada) that can fix these things...

Gotta say I feel like I got ripped off -- and have written a pretty forthright email to the guy who sold it to me -- but who knows if that will get me anywhere (Ebay seller, and I already left good feedback because the unit worked on arrival).

Alternatively if I have to just write this off as a bad purchase (ouch!) and take a different approach, is it possible to adapt the Raymarine transducer to some other, fairly cheap, simple, very basic depth sounder? I could happily use the iPad for navigation (it's better than the Raymarine chart anyway) as long as I also have the depth sounder.

(by the way, there's also a chartplotter and depth sounder on the flybridge -- so don't worry, I didn't spend the last 5 weeks groping around the central BC coast with no depth sounder! -- just have to drive from "upstairs" to use it)

First off, the C80 is over 20 years old. Second, refurbished by who?

I have purchased three supposedly new A67's off of ebay and everyone of them has had a flaw. This doesn't really Suprise me. The A67 was discontinued over 10 years ago and any new old stock after 10 years is suspicious. Fortunately, I was able to make two good ones out of the 3 bad ones. I would upgrade to knew but I use these units on my dingy and the fit the current whole in the dash.

I find the circuit boards on Raymarine units to be very corrosive sensitive. Some times its real easy to spot the issue and some times you just have to mix and match boards until you get a working unit.

Move up to an E80

Your transducer will still probably work. There should be a tag on one end of the cable or the other. Take a picture of that tag. The 'ducer was probably made by Airmar. They can help you with the right connector for whichever chartplotter you end up with.

As for the C80, yeah, its time has come... and gone. A proper burial with full honors would be in order. Although if I had two, one which works but has a bad display, and another which doesn't work but has a good display, I'd be very tempted to cannibalize the dead one and try the display in the other. You have absolutely nothing to lose. But all you'll gain is an old unit which will no doubt die on you again, when you need it most.

OK, here is a longshot for you when you are ready and all else has failed.
Six months or more I reported my success with washing the circuit board of a failed Magnum 2000 inverter/charger that sat in a shop waiting for a new board. I am happy to say it still works 100%.
So give it a cleaning vinegar wash when all other hope is gone.
Caveat, my inverter got wet with seawater.
Otherwise, I have thrown out electronics that have failed when they are aged out.

Electronics have an undetermined lifespan. Marine environment is harsh so lifespan is going to be something less than forever. You are using obsolete electronics that may be at the very end of their lifespan. Buying old electronics on EBay is a known risk and you knew that at the time of purchase. Electronics either work or they don't so the seller had no magic ball knowing when the C80 was going to fail.

Simple solution is to install a Raymarine ST60 Depth Instrument as stand alone, but only available on EBay with unknown lifespan.

Thanks everyone for the interesting comments! The seller volunteered to fix or exchange the unit at no charge, so I'll try one round of that -- send it back to him to see if he can either make it work, or send me another one that does work.

Meanwhile I've been rehearsing the worst-case scenario and mentally preparing for replacing it with two standalone devices (chart plotter and depth sounder) ...which frankly I prefer over one multifunction device. But the plot thickens! as I read vintage installation manuals etc I find that the depth input to the display head does not come directly from the transducer. There is some active component in between, mounted elsewhere in the boat (under the flybridge dashboard, I think) and it looks like the output from that might be some proprietary Raymarine protocol... so yeah, can't just plug that cable into some other brand of depth sounder even with an adapter.

Anyway... the simplest short term solution is to get a C80 that works and keep it going for as long as I can... and put off facing a complete rethink of the main helm station electronics. I have other somewhat expensive stuff to fix this winter. Fortunately I do almost all my driving from upstairs

Some where on your boat is a DSM-30 or DSM-300.

Newer Raymarine units have the DSM built into them.

tiltrider1 said:

Some where on your boat is a DSM-30 or DSM-300.

Newer Raymarine units have the DSM built into them.

Click to expand...

I think I know where it is. There's a mystery box under the flybridge dashboard that iirc says "fishfinder" on it, and I've wondered idly now and then what the heck it is. I thought it might have been left over from some even earlier, more primitive sounder. That must be the box that "translates" the transducer signal into some databus or other going to the C80. Jeepers, could they have made the thing any more complicated? anyway, I'll keep it on life support a while longer...

The old DSMs had failure problems. Raymarine replaced one I had under warranty over 8 years after I bought it. They replaced it with the newer model. Gotta give them credit for that.

Comodave said:

The old DSMs had failure problems. Raymarine replaced one I had under warranty over 8 years after I bought it. They replaced it with the newer model. Gotta give them credit for that.

Click to expand...

Just checking -- could a DSM issue cause the symptoms I'm seeing -- display unit turns itself off before completing boot? it feels unlikely but what the heck do I know... I would expect a failed DSM to give you no depth reading and maybe some kind of error or alarm tone, but not prevent booting of the display head.

I doubt it. The issue I was having with the DSM was that the depth would lock up and you had to cycle power to get it working again. Simple thing to try is unplug the DSM and see if the MFD boots or not.