So, my 1989 Bayliner 3818 has an older green-screen Furuno radar, which seemed to work pretty well given it's age. However, it seems to have gone belly-up. A couple months ago, I powered it up and then it powered itself down after a few mins and wouldn't come back on until the next day. It did the same thing this weekend, but wouldn't power back on at all this time. (I'll do the obvious, and check power to it, if there's a fuse inline, etc.) That said, it's probably time to think about replacing it.
So...I generally do not venture offshore (we spend most of our time in the AICW and Cape Fear River in the Wilmington NC area), and although I usually have the radar on along with the GPS chartplotter and forward-looking sonar, the only time I can recall that I truly felt like I *needed* the radar was a weekend last year where we unintentionally got caught returning to our home port down the AICW at night. It was a very dark night (no moon lighting our way), and at that time I was quite happy to have working radar since it showed me the land masses clearly on either side of the boat (very narrow channel and it set to 0.25NM range). So, I probably don't need something all that advanced or expensive...I'm thinking just a basic radar package, preferably with it's own dedicated display (unless there are some big advantages to other arrangements...I have a Garmin EchoMap 94sv GPS chartplotter, it does NOT have the Garmin radar input, but IIRC it does have a NMEA input).
I'm not all that knowledgeable about marine radar (the 28 year old Furuno is the only radar I've used up to this point). This Furuno Model 1623 package (15" radome and 6" stand-alone display) seems to be the closest thing to the old system, although I'd guess probably better since it's not 28 years old...LOL. Here's the Furuno 1623...seems to be available for around $1300 street price:
What other brands/models should I be taking a look at for comparison? I'm looking for same or lower price, and same or better features, and good enough for light use like I described above. (If I'm not mistaken, none of the Garmin units have a stand-alone display and all expect to plug into a Garmin Multi-Function Display...that was the first brand I looked at since I'm most familiar with Garmin GPS Chartplotters.) However, I'm wondering if there might be other brands that can plug into the Garmin EchoMap 94dv's NMEA input...although I *think* I'd prefer just to have a separate display for the radar.
Thanks in advance!
Dave
So...I generally do not venture offshore (we spend most of our time in the AICW and Cape Fear River in the Wilmington NC area), and although I usually have the radar on along with the GPS chartplotter and forward-looking sonar, the only time I can recall that I truly felt like I *needed* the radar was a weekend last year where we unintentionally got caught returning to our home port down the AICW at night. It was a very dark night (no moon lighting our way), and at that time I was quite happy to have working radar since it showed me the land masses clearly on either side of the boat (very narrow channel and it set to 0.25NM range). So, I probably don't need something all that advanced or expensive...I'm thinking just a basic radar package, preferably with it's own dedicated display (unless there are some big advantages to other arrangements...I have a Garmin EchoMap 94sv GPS chartplotter, it does NOT have the Garmin radar input, but IIRC it does have a NMEA input).
I'm not all that knowledgeable about marine radar (the 28 year old Furuno is the only radar I've used up to this point). This Furuno Model 1623 package (15" radome and 6" stand-alone display) seems to be the closest thing to the old system, although I'd guess probably better since it's not 28 years old...LOL. Here's the Furuno 1623...seems to be available for around $1300 street price:
What other brands/models should I be taking a look at for comparison? I'm looking for same or lower price, and same or better features, and good enough for light use like I described above. (If I'm not mistaken, none of the Garmin units have a stand-alone display and all expect to plug into a Garmin Multi-Function Display...that was the first brand I looked at since I'm most familiar with Garmin GPS Chartplotters.) However, I'm wondering if there might be other brands that can plug into the Garmin EchoMap 94dv's NMEA input...although I *think* I'd prefer just to have a separate display for the radar.
Thanks in advance!
Dave
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