Conrad wrote:2bucks wrote:
I've been very happy with the Furuno 1834-C. It has radar, chartplotter on the screen. You can add a depth sounder/transducer to get that info on the screen. You can add an engine room camera to get that data, you can interface your autopilot. You can add Sirius weather, and AIS receiver. Or you can have the stand alone units you have and add them to the 1834 when the others go bad or as money is available.
I have only the charts and radar on mine currently. Other depth works fine and I'm not sold on AIS yet. This model is getting long in the tooth, but there are lots of them out there so support should be good for some time to come. And, the best part is you might be able to do most of it for the 5 boat units.
Ken
*We are in the process of replacing all of the old, non-working electronics on Dorian I, plus adding some stuff that wasn't on board before. Our thinking is that we will be keeping the boat for a minimum of 10 years so let's equip it once with reliable electronics so that we shouldn't have to address any of it again during ownership.
With that in mind we went with the Furuno 1834C & extras. The extras include a 7" display for the lower helm, depthsounder module, autopilot (two control displays) and a weather station.
I agree that this product suite is getting a bit long in the tooth but on the other hand it has been well proven and subtly improved upon since its introduction early in the last decade.
We also went with an icom 504 VHF c/w Command Mike III.
We too are not sold on AIS but I think that is a function of how much commercial traffic you have to deal with.
Our decision to go with these products was ultimately based on their reputation *for being bulletproof. It's hard to find any negative comments about Furuno. You can pay now or pay later.*
Because these products are networked, there is the risk of losing everything, although the chances are low. As long as you have some kind of redundancy you should be fine. In our case we have a stand alone depth sounder, paper charts, our old VHF, and three compasses, one hand bearing.*
Um, we were not under $5K.
*An update. This has been a very problematic install in that every major component shipped by Furuno was faulty.*
<ul>[*]The 10.4" (1834c NT) unit was not sunlight viewable and required - after many denials from Furuno - a software upgrade, which was an improvement but still not great.[*]The autopilot display (511) developed a blemish after being out in the sun for a few hours; a faceplate replacement didn't help so a complete display unit replacement is on its way.[*]The WS 200 unit failed intermittently and has now been replaced.*[*]While out cruising we have been plagued by charts dropping off, the radar ceasing to function, and the depth sounder going blank - once at a most inopportune time.The suspected culprit is the 7" display which has the chart chip and radome connected so it is acting as a server for itself and the upper 10.4" display. It will be replaced once they can find a new unit.[*]The depth number on the scrolling graphic display shows intermittently. This apparently was fixed a couple of versions ago but crept back in in subsequent versions apparently.[*]Along the way the hub & original C-Map chart card were replaced to see if they would fix the chart issues, which they did not.[/list]
Throughout all of this my dealer has been great but his dealings with Furuno have not been the best. And he is the one who has to absorb all of the costs of his techs spending huge amounts of time troubleshooting the problems, which all came back to faulty equipment, not faulty installation. Furuno has been quite snarky in fact to the tech folks here.
I turned the boat over to the dealer on May 16 for the installation; it is now August 30 and we're not done yet.