Keep Control

by Sail Staff, Posted June 16, 2007

Wireless is all the rage on boats these days, as exemplified by the advent of handheld multifunction controllers. Simrad’s RemoteCommander is a prime example. Not only does it let you control your NMEA 2000–compatible autopilot, chartplotter, and other instruments from anywhere on the boat via Bluetooth, it is also a VHF handset. Simrad USA, 425-778-8821,

Be Seen

by Sail Staff, Posted October 16, 2007

Class B AIS still awaits FCC approval, but ACR’s Nauticast B will be a complete and well-made solution. It comes with both GPS and VHF antennas along with cabling capable of sending position and target information to both a plotter and a PC simultaneously. Included software simplifies setup and lets a user easily enable silent mode or send a Mayday. Testing done outside U.S. waters suggests that

NMEA Knife

by Sail Staff, Posted October 18, 2007

Originally Franson GpsGate simply enabled GPS NMEA 0183 data flowing into a PC or PDA serial port to feed multiple programs simultaneously, but now it’s something of a software Swiss Army knife. The latest 2.5 version works with all sorts of I/Os like Bluetooth and the Internet, supports multiplexing and data logging, and lets groups share their location data over the Web. Any member can see

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