On 3/23/15 5:38 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 4:46 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 13:25:27 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 3/23/2015 12:48 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 11:02:47 -0400, wrote:

As for the question at hand, I think a tablet would do most of your
navigation needs in a boat and the main issue would be the packaging.
If you are running a dry cruising boat like Wayne it should be fine
but in a CC fishing boat you want something tougher.

===

Navionics on a large smartphone in a ziploc baggie works pretty well,
even in the dinghy.


Future boat plans are for something in the 36'-38' range that will have
an enclosed helm station so I don't think salt spray, etc, will be an
issue. If I ever get a smaller, outboard type boat a cheap, dedicated
Garmin or whatever would suffice. I wouldn't be going cruising in it.


What ever happened to the days when local knowledge was all you
needed? I know people who can't seem to find their way to the Publix
without the nav system in their car and they have lived here 20 years.
I am still not sure why you need electronics if you are not going
offshore.
I certainly would not trust the NOAA charts in the bays around here..



Local knowledge is fine if you have local knowledge.

You don't have to be off-shore to benefit from a chartplotter.
I found it to be invaluable on certain parts of the ICW as well. You
don't necessarily need it but at least for me there were parts that were
confusing the first time through. The chartplotter confirmed or
corrected what visual markers I was watching for and interpreting. Even
then, I still took a wrong turn once or twice.

Another part that stuck in my mind was transiting the Palmico Sound in
North Carolina. You think you are out in the middle of the ocean but in
fact the water can be very shallow. There's a channel you follow
but unless you are constantly looking back at the last channel marker
you passed and then looking for the next one coming up, it's easy to
find your depth alarm going off as you move out of the channel. Again,
the chartplotter helped a lot.


There are plenty of places even in Chesapeake Bay where water depth
suddenly disappears even if you are a significant ways offshore. That
was also true in the ICW in northern Florida, where the deep part of the
channel was very narrow, narrow enough to put you on the mud if a pusher
barge was coming your way and you had to move to avoid it. A
chartplotter and depth finder are necessities. Now, to get from one
point to another in Chesapeake Bay, well, it's pretty easy without any
electronics.

--
Proud to be a Liberal.

On 3/23/2015 5:43 PM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 5:38 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 4:46 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 13:25:27 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 3/23/2015 12:48 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 11:02:47 -0400, wrote:

As for the question at hand, I think a tablet would do most of your
navigation needs in a boat and the main issue would be the packaging.
If you are running a dry cruising boat like Wayne it should be fine
but in a CC fishing boat you want something tougher.

===

Navionics on a large smartphone in a ziploc baggie works pretty well,
even in the dinghy.


Future boat plans are for something in the 36'-38' range that will have
an enclosed helm station so I don't think salt spray, etc, will be an
issue. If I ever get a smaller, outboard type boat a cheap, dedicated
Garmin or whatever would suffice. I wouldn't be going cruising in it.


What ever happened to the days when local knowledge was all you
needed? I know people who can't seem to find their way to the Publix
without the nav system in their car and they have lived here 20 years.
I am still not sure why you need electronics if you are not going
offshore.
I certainly would not trust the NOAA charts in the bays around here..



Local knowledge is fine if you have local knowledge.

You don't have to be off-shore to benefit from a chartplotter.
I found it to be invaluable on certain parts of the ICW as well. You
don't necessarily need it but at least for me there were parts that were
confusing the first time through. The chartplotter confirmed or
corrected what visual markers I was watching for and interpreting. Even
then, I still took a wrong turn once or twice.

Another part that stuck in my mind was transiting the Palmico Sound in
North Carolina. You think you are out in the middle of the ocean but in
fact the water can be very shallow. There's a channel you follow
but unless you are constantly looking back at the last channel marker
you passed and then looking for the next one coming up, it's easy to
find your depth alarm going off as you move out of the channel. Again,
the chartplotter helped a lot.


There are plenty of places even in Chesapeake Bay where water depth
suddenly disappears even if you are a significant ways offshore. That
was also true in the ICW in northern Florida, where the deep part of the
channel was very narrow, narrow enough to put you on the mud if a pusher
barge was coming your way and you had to move to avoid it. A
chartplotter and depth finder are necessities. Now, to get from one
point to another in Chesapeake Bay, well, it's pretty easy without any
electronics.


I am familiar enough with Cape Cod Bay, the Cape Cod Canal and most of
Buzzard's Bay that I could navigate without charts or chartplotters in
the daytime. Going through Wood's Hole to get out to the Vineyard or
Nantucket can be dicey for the inexperienced though. The first time I
did it with the Navigator I noticed the ferry that runs from New Bedford
out to Martha's Vineyard was approaching at the same time I was. I just
slowed down and let it enter first ... and then just followed it
through. There are two narrow channels you can take halfway through.
Between them is a big pile of rocks. Every year you hear of at least
one boat that ran up on them, punching holes in the hull. I'd see them
every summer at Kingman Yacht Center where they would be towed, hauled
and repaired.

On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 18:01:50 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

I am familiar enough with Cape Cod Bay, the Cape Cod Canal and most of
Buzzard's Bay that I could navigate without charts or chartplotters in
the daytime. Going through Wood's Hole to get out to the Vineyard or
Nantucket can be dicey for the inexperienced though. The first time I
did it with the Navigator I noticed the ferry that runs from New Bedford
out to Martha's Vineyard was approaching at the same time I was. I just
slowed down and let it enter first ... and then just followed it
through. There are two narrow channels you can take halfway through.
Between them is a big pile of rocks. Every year you hear of at least
one boat that ran up on them, punching holes in the hull. I'd see them
every summer at Kingman Yacht Center where they would be towed, hauled
and repaired.

===

There is also a big operation in New Bedford Harbor called Fairhaven
Shipyard. They almost always have one or two boats that have been
severely holed (no pun intended).

Woods Hole can be a scary place even with good visibility and an
excellent chartplotter. The hazzards come up at you quickly and look
nothing like the chart unless you are familiar with the area. A 10 ft
tall buoy throwing a 3 ft wake is an awesome sight. To make life
really interesting, one of the channels has a cross current as I
recall, and it's not unusual to encounter small boats fishing right in
the middle. I always have my course plotted out in advance on both
the Furuno and a laptop.

Justan Olphart wrote:
On 3/23/2015 10:03 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 10:06:16 UTC-3, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 8:15 AM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 7:21 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 7:00 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 23:22:42 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"

wrote:

The iPad I have has a GPS built in. As the guy in the video
explained
it will receive the GPS signal and work with Navionics even if you
don't
have a 3G connection or have it shut off. That's how I
understood what
he said.

===

That's the way Navionics on my smartphone works as long as you've
downloaded the charts you need in advance. I do that at home on my
wifi connection by going to the areas I'm interested in and
zooming in
for maximum detail. After that, the charts for that area are
permanently stored.



I have an older (2011) iPad-2 but it is the full featured version
with
64Gb, wi-fi, cellular, and has the GPS chipset. This might give me a
reason to use it. It just sits on my desk because I don't really
have a
use for it.


I sold my iPad after a year and went back to a Macbook Air. The
iPad was
nice for "entertainment," but I never got used to the inability to
reach
the file system in a "normal" computer way. My wife has a Kindle and
enjoys it: she's on the commuter bus twice a day and reads books or
does
email offline. Last week, I bought her a new iPhone and in the process
at the phone store I was offered a new iPad for "almost free," which
makes me wonder if the bloom of tablets is fading a little.


I really don't follow the smart phone and tablet varieties that seem to
have taken over and dominated so many people's lives today. My wife is
an iPhone addict, constantly using it for texting, calling, playing
Scrabble or some similar game with 10 people at the same time. I
have a
Android cell phone that I guess is a "smart phone" but I rarely use it
and when I do it's just to make a quick phone call. I don't use it's
internet browser and rarely use it to read email. Old fashioned I
guess. I like computers with a real keyboard. Trying to text
someone a
message on the tiny little keyboard that slides out or on the fake
keyboard on the screen takes me forever. I just have no interest in
it.

I used the iPad for a while at the guitar shop and it was much better
for browsing or emailing but it wasn't a cell phone. I usually just
left it out on a table with it displaying the shop's website, list of
guitars and prices for customer's use. When I turned the shop over to
my friend I took it home and it just sits, unused.

I seldom use my HTC 'smart phone' either, so when the 3 year contract
was up with Virgin last August, I changed over to prepaid. I pay
$100.00 up front and if I don't get too gabby or carried away with
texts, that'll last the full year..working out to just over $8.00 per
month for my cellphone (plus 15% tax)
I doubt many can beat that.

How much data, text, minutes do you get for $100?


He has no idea.

On 3/23/2015 8:02 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 18:01:50 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

I am familiar enough with Cape Cod Bay, the Cape Cod Canal and most of
Buzzard's Bay that I could navigate without charts or chartplotters in
the daytime. Going through Wood's Hole to get out to the Vineyard or
Nantucket can be dicey for the inexperienced though. The first time I
did it with the Navigator I noticed the ferry that runs from New Bedford
out to Martha's Vineyard was approaching at the same time I was. I just
slowed down and let it enter first ... and then just followed it
through. There are two narrow channels you can take halfway through.
Between them is a big pile of rocks. Every year you hear of at least
one boat that ran up on them, punching holes in the hull. I'd see them
every summer at Kingman Yacht Center where they would be towed, hauled
and repaired.

===

There is also a big operation in New Bedford Harbor called Fairhaven
Shipyard. They almost always have one or two boats that have been
severely holed (no pun intended).

Woods Hole can be a scary place even with good visibility and an
excellent chartplotter. The hazzards come up at you quickly and look
nothing like the chart unless you are familiar with the area. A 10 ft
tall buoy throwing a 3 ft wake is an awesome sight. To make life
really interesting, one of the channels has a cross current as I
recall, and it's not unusual to encounter small boats fishing right in
the middle. I always have my course plotted out in advance on both
the Furuno and a laptop.


I only transited through Wood's Hole (and back) 3 times that I can
remember and all were with the Navigator. Each time I exhaled with
relief after making it through. It's no big deal to the locals and
fishing types that do it all the time. I never tried it with the
underpowered Grand Banks. Didn't have the gonads. It had a tough time
transiting the Cape Cod Canal if the current was against us but it is
wide and deep. :-)

On Monday, 23 March 2015 11:16:26 UTC-3, Justan Olphart wrote:
On 3/23/2015 10:03 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 10:06:16 UTC-3, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 8:15 AM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 7:21 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 7:00 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 23:22:42 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

The iPad I have has a GPS built in. As the guy in the video explained
it will receive the GPS signal and work with Navionics even if you
don't
have a 3G connection or have it shut off. That's how I understood what
he said.

===

That's the way Navionics on my smartphone works as long as you've
downloaded the charts you need in advance. I do that at home on my
wifi connection by going to the areas I'm interested in and zooming in
for maximum detail. After that, the charts for that area are
permanently stored.



I have an older (2011) iPad-2 but it is the full featured version with
64Gb, wi-fi, cellular, and has the GPS chipset. This might give me a
reason to use it. It just sits on my desk because I don't really have a
use for it.


I sold my iPad after a year and went back to a Macbook Air. The iPad was
nice for "entertainment," but I never got used to the inability to reach
the file system in a "normal" computer way. My wife has a Kindle and
enjoys it: she's on the commuter bus twice a day and reads books or does
email offline. Last week, I bought her a new iPhone and in the process
at the phone store I was offered a new iPad for "almost free," which
makes me wonder if the bloom of tablets is fading a little.


I really don't follow the smart phone and tablet varieties that seem to
have taken over and dominated so many people's lives today. My wife is
an iPhone addict, constantly using it for texting, calling, playing
Scrabble or some similar game with 10 people at the same time. I have a
Android cell phone that I guess is a "smart phone" but I rarely use it
and when I do it's just to make a quick phone call. I don't use it's
internet browser and rarely use it to read email. Old fashioned I
guess. I like computers with a real keyboard. Trying to text someone a
message on the tiny little keyboard that slides out or on the fake
keyboard on the screen takes me forever. I just have no interest in it.

On 3/23/2015 8:42 PM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 11:16:26 UTC-3, Justan Olphart wrote:
On 3/23/2015 10:03 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 10:06:16 UTC-3, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 8:15 AM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 7:21 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 7:00 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 23:22:42 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

The iPad I have has a GPS built in. As the guy in the video explained
it will receive the GPS signal and work with Navionics even if you
don't
have a 3G connection or have it shut off. That's how I understood what
he said.

===

That's the way Navionics on my smartphone works as long as you've
downloaded the charts you need in advance. I do that at home on my
wifi connection by going to the areas I'm interested in and zooming in
for maximum detail. After that, the charts for that area are
permanently stored.



I have an older (2011) iPad-2 but it is the full featured version with
64Gb, wi-fi, cellular, and has the GPS chipset. This might give me a
reason to use it. It just sits on my desk because I don't really have a
use for it.


I sold my iPad after a year and went back to a Macbook Air. The iPad was
nice for "entertainment," but I never got used to the inability to reach
the file system in a "normal" computer way. My wife has a Kindle and
enjoys it: she's on the commuter bus twice a day and reads books or does
email offline. Last week, I bought her a new iPhone and in the process
at the phone store I was offered a new iPad for "almost free," which
makes me wonder if the bloom of tablets is fading a little.


I really don't follow the smart phone and tablet varieties that seem to
have taken over and dominated so many people's lives today. My wife is
an iPhone addict, constantly using it for texting, calling, playing
Scrabble or some similar game with 10 people at the same time. I have a
Android cell phone that I guess is a "smart phone" but I rarely use it
and when I do it's just to make a quick phone call. I don't use it's
internet browser and rarely use it to read email. Old fashioned I
guess. I like computers with a real keyboard. Trying to text someone a
message on the tiny little keyboard that slides out or on the fake
keyboard on the screen takes me forever. I just have no interest in it.

I used the iPad for a while at the guitar shop and it was much better
for browsing or emailing but it wasn't a cell phone. I usually just
left it out on a table with it displaying the shop's website, list of
guitars and prices for customer's use. When I turned the shop over to
my friend I took it home and it just sits, unused.

I seldom use my HTC 'smart phone' either, so when the 3 year contract was up with Virgin last August, I changed over to prepaid. I pay $100.00 up front and if I don't get too gabby or carried away with texts, that'll last the full year..working out to just over $8.00 per month for my cellphone (plus 15% tax)
I doubt many can beat that.

How much data, text, minutes do you get for $100?

--

Respectfully submitted by Justan

Laugh of the day from Krause

"I'm not to blame anymore for the atmosphere in here.
I've been "born again" as a nice guy."

0 data...calls are 40 cents a minute. texts .25 each. Adds up quickly if you are the gabby sort.

Tracfone has a better deal. 1200 minutes, 1200 texts and 1.2 gig data
$100 for a year.

--

Respectfully submitted by Justan

Laugh of the day from Krause

"I'm not to blame anymore for the atmosphere in here.
I've been "born again" as a nice guy."

Justan Olphart
On 3/23/2015 8:42 PM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 11:16:26 UTC-3, Justan Olphart *wrote:
On 3/23/2015 10:03 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 10:06:16 UTC-3, Mr. Luddite *wrote:
On 3/23/2015 8:15 AM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 7:21 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 7:00 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 23:22:42 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
- show quoted text -
"Tracfone has a better deal. 1200 minutes, 1200 texts and 1.2 gig data
$100 for a year. "


Not much good if it isn't available up here.

On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 18:51:02 -0700 (PDT), True North
wrote:

Justan Olphart
On 3/23/2015 8:42 PM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 11:16:26 UTC-3, Justan Olphart *wrote:
On 3/23/2015 10:03 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 23 March 2015 10:06:16 UTC-3, Mr. Luddite *wrote:
On 3/23/2015 8:15 AM, Keyser Söze wrote:
On 3/23/15 7:21 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 3/23/2015 7:00 AM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 23:22:42 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
- show quoted text -
"Tracfone has a better deal. 1200 minutes, 1200 texts and 1.2 gig data
$100 for a year. "


Not much good if it isn't available up here.

===

You might want to look into T-Mobile if you can get an accout there.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcwebertobias/2013/12/30/why-t-mobiles-new-global-roaming-plan-is-an-industry-game-changer/

wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 13:25:27 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

On 3/23/2015 12:48 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 23 Mar 2015 11:02:47 -0400, wrote:

As for the question at hand, I think a tablet would do most of your
navigation needs in a boat and the main issue would be the packaging.
If you are running a dry cruising boat like Wayne it should be fine
but in a CC fishing boat you want something tougher.

===

Navionics on a large smartphone in a ziploc baggie works pretty well,
even in the dinghy.


Future boat plans are for something in the 36'-38' range that will have
an enclosed helm station so I don't think salt spray, etc, will be an
issue. If I ever get a smaller, outboard type boat a cheap, dedicated
Garmin or whatever would suffice. I wouldn't be going cruising in it.


What ever happened to the days when local knowledge was all you
needed? I know people who can't seem to find their way to the Publix
without the nav system in their car and they have lived here 20 years.
I am still not sure why you need electronics if you are not going
offshore.
I certainly would not trust the NOAA charts in the bays around here..

In the local Sacramento River Delta, easy to get lost. Lots,of tall
levees, and parallel channels. So can not eyeball where you are at times,
and riprap levee's can appear very similar.