snotnosetommy wrote:This is just what I need. I would have thought the VHF manufacturers would have made it easy. I guess they'd rather you bought their integrated instrumentation.
Now just need to get used to running Seaclear, good to go. I figured the Garmin would make a great backup. I think "Seaclear Unleashed" will save me a lot of aggravation.
Great to be able to talk to those who've been there, done that.
As I think I've stated, we run SeaClear and love it. The only thing missing is that we can't see it at the helm, especially with the Endeavour. With the Mac and to some extent with the Endeavour I can sit at the companionway and direct Ruth if we are in a really tight spot. Other than that if we have a couple hundred feet to work with and can be off that much from where we really are she just watches the handheld 76 and goes from waypoint to waypoint. They are downloaded into the 76 at any time via the serial cable between it and the computer with SeaClear running on it.
I've looked for a "cheap" way to have a screen with SeaClear on it in the cockpit at the helm and I think for us at least I have it solved. The trick was finding something that could be seen in daylight conditions and that didn't cost an arm and a leg. What we now have and that I've only tried out at home is a....
.... RCA 7 inch indoor/outdoor TV that has a screen meant to be viewed outside. It runs on 12 volts, and you can send a picture to it with an ordinary coax cable over a long distance.
The parts I have are the TV which was $80 at Walmart...
http://www.walmart.com/ip/RCA-7-Portabl ... 3/15042277
...$60 online
.
I have a $30 converter box that has VGA in and a VGA output so you run a VGA cable from the computer to the box and plug the computer's monitor into the box. Then the box also has S video and RCA video outputs. I go from that box with a short S video cable to another box that cost $16 at Walmart. It takes the S video or RCA and converts it into an output that you can hook a coax cable to that can run to an older TV.
The RCA 7 inch TV will either receive the newer digital signals with an antenna that comes with it or it will receive the older signals via a coax cable. So I run the coax cable from the last box to the TV that will be in the cockpit. I've run over 50 feet of cable with a good picture.
Now how good is the picture? Well the picture is a composite picture so no where as good as say a VGA monitor. I'm not home now, but think it is about 480+ X 240 or about the same or better than the 4 inch chart plotters on down. With SeaClear if I have it zoomed so that I can see the chart about 3-4 miles wide and about 2 miles high on the 7 inch screen I can clearly read all of the depths and other text. If I zoom out further then things become fuzzy.
If you try and run the SeaClear menu items you had better have them memorized as they don't zoom in like the chart does and are quite small depending on how you have the computer monitor screen set.
The real plus with this is that with SeaClear running so that it updates the boat's position all of the time we will be able to see depth's and where we are within about a 2 mile radius of the boat at all times and still have the option of really zooming the screen in and seeing exactly where we are in tight situations. All on a screen that can be seen in direct sunlight and really well under the bimini.
It also has a battery that runs it 3 hours or so which leaves the option of just pluging in the coax cable. We won't leave it out all of the time, but I'll make a somewhat weatherproof box that it will fit into and will have a 12 volt plug and the coax in it.
If there is interest I'll put it on our web site. To get to a chart plotter with a 7 inch screen you would have to spend over $1000 and all of this is less than $150, with SeaClear being free and the NOAA charts being free, but you do need a computer to run it on.
The box that coverts the VGA to S video runs on 5 volts using a USB cable that is plugged into the computer. The $16 converter box runs on 9 volts, so I'm using one of those cheap DC/DC converters that plugs into a 12 volt cigarette outlet and has a switch on it that lets you set it at different DC voltages (usually around $15). I'd like to find a converter that just runs on 12 volts or I'll figure out what this 9 volt one needs and just put a dropping resistor in a line to it from a 12 volt source.
One final benefit from this is that we will now have a TV on board. We are up by Provo, UT right now and I picked up about 6 stations last night in the motel room. The picture is good, but it needs a better antenna,
Sum
Our Endeavour 37
Our Trips to Utah, Idaho, Canada, Florida
Our MacGregor S Pages
More and more betterer. Cockpit display would be really cool in unfamiliar waters, as I am always single handed. May have to augment my basic 12v power supply, tho.
. I kind of promised Ruth that it really was her's 
. Also down in Florida in unknow waters having the chart plotter is invaluable. In the west it hasn't been that way. If it is the day time you can see where you are and figure it out with a chart/map, even someplace like the canyons of Lake Powell. In Florida everything looks the same and you just can't see cuts going in that do so at an angle as they just blend in. Access to weather can be vital any time you are out and a couple days go by and you want to know what is coming, but down there having the wind direction and the wave height along with the tides is really vital to your safety, so the Internet sure helps to fill that void. Here is a link to what a guy has done....
. We also don't have a monthly contract except for Net10. Our problem is that we only use the cell on trips, so go months at home where we don't need one, so don't want monthly plans. I'm hoping the $35 monthly plan with Virgin with data takes care of us for the couple months we are out on the boat.