Radar

[Poly]

Originally Posted by BruceB

I can't find online instructions to get installation details...

Try cactus - they usually have the manuals - e.g.
http://www.cactusnav.com/manuals/Fur...3%20manual.pdf although I don't see any safety or installation instructions relating to people distances (but there are for compasses - so one might assume that it is OK?).

[BruceB]

The instructions don't have any info on safe distances, damn.........
I have two questions now for those who know about these things-

1. What are the safe distances for people for a 2.2kW radome like this.
2. What are the consequences of running the battery cables through a duct with the sheilded signal cable as recommended NON to do in the instructions

[codprawn]

Originally Posted by Mollers

C'mon Codders, now that is cobblers. Night is no issue ya numpty owing to nav lights, ambient light etc, etc. Serious fog is a major issue and a gadget strapped to your swede is not what you want. We were caught in less than 10m visibility earlier this year with no radar, it was not funny. Falmouth coastguard had to giude us in from 6m at about 4knts out to avoid anchored shipping. Buy a radar.

FLIR can be of use in fog - I would say that a FLIR set would be of far more use far more of the time than RADAR would on a small boat!!!

[Poly]

Originally Posted by codprawn

FLIR can be of use in fog - I would say that a FLIR set would be of far more use far more of the time than RADAR would on a small boat!!!

So in fog you would rather have the sort of IR system you can buy for £600 than the sort of radar you can get for the same money?

Bearing in mind that:

• for that money you will not get a decent IR imaging system which can see through any real fog.
• with IR you are only looking in one direction at a time, wheras by scanning radar relatively quickly you can look all around
• if you are looking through the IR device you are not maintaining a proper look out. You can glance at a Radar screen.
• cheap IR systems are unlikely to be fully waterproof (and if they are will have less effective optics)
• determining the range will be difficult (or on cheap systems possibly impossible) with a IR system.
• range, bearing, automated interpretation/aids/warnings are incorporated into even low cost radar systems.
• for a little more money you can integrate radar with a chart plotter.
• trying to keep an imaging device stable on a boat is hard at speed or in any sort of sea.

[codprawn]

Granted you will need to spend more on a FLIR system - maybe £1,200 or so but as for keeping an all round view you can strap it to your head!!!

In an ideal world you would have both but which would get more use? I have been caught in fog once - I have been out at night many times!!!

[Poly]

Granted you will need to spend more on a FLIR system - maybe £1,200 or so

Its been about 8 years since I last has any reason to work with IR imaging systems and I know the quality has improved enormously and the price has fallen dramatically since then - but I think to get a system capable of doing what you are suggesting (including head mounted, waterproof, seeing through fog (which not all FLIR sytems will) with even 1/4 VGA resolution, and the sort of sensitivity you would need for night navigation you are actually looking at a lot more than £1200. Please do post a link if I am wrong.

but as for keeping an all round view you can strap it to your head!!!

Thats not the point - the RADAR is plotting in all directions (effectively) at all times - you will get dizzy rotating your head at that speed. And then also don't have the advantage of adding in your ordinary eyesight too. Not to mention reading instruments etc.

Originally Posted by codprawn

In an ideal world you would have both but which would get more use?

well I think you only need to look at the relative market uptake in the small boat world to decide that

I have been caught in fog once - I have been out at night many times!!!

did no one tell you that radar works at night (and during the day) too!


I am not suggesting that FLIR couldn't be a useful aid to navigation - but a replacement, or even higher up the priority list than RADAR - come on...

Have you actually navigated a RIB using a headmounted FLIR or are you recommending to the ribnet audience that we spend thousands on a "theory"...

[BruceB]

I have actually decided to buy the small Furuno radar after talking to various companies today about the positioning hazards. I now think it is practicable on a large enough A frame
I don't believe FLIR has much to recommend it compared to radar even at the limited heights it can be mounted in a small boat. The main reason I would want it is for night use and the od time in the fog where I am not particulary interested in the land but missing the big ships moving up and down the Forth!
Just waiting on word back on a best price from two places then splash the cash.
This just leaves a sounder to buy for the electronics although my little 182C is looking kinda small now, wonder if I should fleabay it and buy something bigger?

[Poly]

Originally Posted by BruceB

I have actually decided to buy the small Furuno radar after talking to various companies today about the positioning hazards. I now think it is practicable on a large enough A frame
I don't believe FLIR has much to recommend it compared to radar even at the limited heights it can be mounted in a small boat. The main reason I would want it is for night use and the od time in the fog where I am not particulary interested in the land but missing the big ships moving up and down the Forth!
Just waiting on word back on a best price from two places then splash the cash.
This just leaves a sounder to buy for the electronics although my little 182C is looking kinda small now, wonder if I should fleabay it and buy something bigger?

And Bruce - to bring us back on topic a little - you might want to check this out for a discussion on radar safety: http://www.powerboat.ie/forums/archi...php?t-481.html

[jwalker]

Originally Posted by codprawn

FLIR can be of use in fog - I would say that a FLIR set would be of far more use far more of the time than RADAR would on a small boat!!!

Codders, radar gives you much more information than seeing. You can view the positions of vessels relative to your own boat and relative to each other. You can see their distances from yourself and others and you can see their direction of travel with certainty. You can predict the likely movement of traffic based on its current movement and so plot you own course more effectively. Seeing comes a poor second. I've said it before but I'm going to repeat it; I've frequently seen vessels, during daylight, on the radar before I've noticed them visually.
If you're in an area when you are viewing discontinuous land, either islands or promontories, because of your low viewing angle it is impossible to discern with certainty the layout and the distances off, radar shows this clearly.
At night it can be very difficult, and sometimes impossible, to see navigation lights and the other displayed lights on vessels either because of the background illumination or simply because of your distance from them. Radar allows you to see them and make an educated guess at their likely movements. For example, if you notice a vessel following a curved path it is possible it's fishing and you may wish to give it searoom in a particular direction. Even if it isn't fishing, you're alerted to it being unpredictable and you'll be giving it that extra room.
I've no idea whether the devices you are advocating are able to discern colour, if not then you're not going to have much more information about vessels other than simply knowing they are there and that's only if you have spotted them in the first instance. If you're out at night and it's only slightly busy I'd doubt you could keep track of and make proper sense of what's happening around you by simply seeing in IR.

The notion that radar is only really of use in fog is wrong.

If you have radar and learn how to use it well, as I said to BruceB, it'll become your friend.

[BruceB]

I intend to mount it on the A frame but since I am going to have a custom frame made up it will be relatively high and I will have a pedestal mount above that to mount the radome on.
Since we will be sitting about 5-6 feet in front and about two feet below the horizontal plane we should be fine. We will still catch the fringes of the beam but only just. Or I may put it over the console, haven't made my mind!

[Poly]

Originally Posted by jwalker

I've no idea whether the devices you are advocating are able to discern colour,

JW - no they don't they are measuring the heat emitted by the object(a function of its temperature and the material at the surface). Whilst more modern systems will display this in colour - it is not the colour of the object just a representation of the temperature/emissivity (in the same way that a colour fish finder isn't actually measuring the colour of the bottom).

[jwalker]

Thanks for that, it's what I guessed but couldn't say.

[Mollers]

Originally Posted by BruceB

I intend to mount it on the A frame but since I am going to have a custom frame made up it will be relatively high and I will have a pedestal mount above that to mount the radome on.
Since we will be sitting about 5-6 feet in front and about two feet below the horizontal plane we should be fine. We will still catch the fringes of the beam but only just. Or I may put it over the console, haven't made my mind!

I don't know the type of ribbing that you get upto, but I doubt whether you'll actually need to have it switched on that often. I'm an advocate of having radar on ribs, but switch it on when you really need it rather than just to have another cool screen to look at. Around here at night, inshore, crab pots are much more of a hazard than anything that the radar is going to pick up. I'd rather keep my eyes peeled for pot dans than upset my natural night vision by looking at bright screens.
If you're in thick fog or offshore in shipping areas at night, then that's a different matter.

[jwalker]

Mollers, as you say, the lighting is a problem at night and that goes for plotters, radio etc too but I limit it with a smoked perspex overlay which works well. The three radars I've had have a minimum range of 1/8 mile which is just a couple of hundred metres and at that range they were able to pick up danbuoys...you need to know they are in the vicinity though or you'd not be on that range anyway so I guess limited use. It's the fekkin plastic milk bottles around here.

Something which is common on ribs is the radome mounting at an incorrect angle. Most radars have about 20° vertical angle of transmission. Since there's very little in the sky at close range which you would want to see, it's worth having the radome angled down to ensure it sees the sea at 200 meters.

[MikeCC]

Originally Posted by BruceB

Since we will be sitting about 5-6 feet in front and about two feet below the horizontal plane we should be fine. We will still catch the fringes of the beam but only just. Or I may put it over the console, haven't made my mind!

Don't forget that the helm will probably be standing a lot of the time.

[BruceB]

I very rarely stand, really only in really rough weather. in fact the whole point of the large dual console is to give both of us a comfy seat out of the wind.
I don't intend to have it switched on much either, bit pointless when in good weather you can see more than the radar can possibly pick up!
I sometimes have been out in the Forth, Clyde and offshore Argyll where it has been known to be foggy, high rainfall or ships charging up and down or even all three at once. This is when I think it will be useful.
I can think mof a several occasions being able to know what was around would have made me feel a whole lot better!
The fact that I called it a gadget seems to upset some folk but what are RIBs to most users but expensive toys?
Anyway its on order along with a Icom M505, Garmin 340 colour sounder and Sony marine CD/MP3 player to go along with the garmin 182C plotter and charts I aready have.
That should be enough "gadgets" to keep me amused for a while!

[codprawn]

Originally Posted by jwalker

Codders, radar gives you much more information than seeing. You can view the positions of vessels relative to your own boat and relative to each other. You can see their distances from yourself and others and you can see their direction of travel with certainty. You can predict the likely movement of traffic based on its current movement and so plot you own course more effectively. Seeing comes a poor second. I've said it before but I'm going to repeat it; I've frequently seen vessels, during daylight, on the radar before I've noticed them visually.
If you're in an area when you are viewing discontinuous land, either islands or promontories, because of your low viewing angle it is impossible to discern with certainty the layout and the distances off, radar shows this clearly.
At night it can be very difficult, and sometimes impossible, to see navigation lights and the other displayed lights on vessels either because of the background illumination or simply because of your distance from them. Radar allows you to see them and make an educated guess at their likely movements. For example, if you notice a vessel following a curved path it is possible it's fishing and you may wish to give it searoom in a particular direction. Even if it isn't fishing, you're alerted to it being unpredictable and you'll be giving it that extra room.
I've no idea whether the devices you are advocating are able to discern colour, if not then you're not going to have much more information about vessels other than simply knowing they are there and that's only if you have spotted them in the first instance. If you're out at night and it's only slightly busy I'd doubt you could keep track of and make proper sense of what's happening around you by simply seeing in IR.

The notion that radar is only really of use in fog is wrong.

If you have radar and learn how to use it well, as I said to BruceB, it'll become your friend.

I have used radar many times - I have only used FLIR once - but I was totally won over by it. It really is incredible but then again the system I was looking at cost about £50,000!!!

[Cookee]

Originally Posted by codprawn

I have used radar many times - I have only used FLIR once - but I was totally won over by it. It really is incredible but then again the system I was looking at cost about £50,000!!!

So your recommendation wasn't based on any personal knowledge of the type of unit you were recommending then? And you wonder why people have a go at you?

[jwalker]

Originally Posted by Cookee

So your recommendation wasn't based on any personal knowledge of the type of unit you were recommending then?

.....

[bedajim]

So if your going to buy one which one would the panel go for

As there is one day left for my darling wife to get it and wrap it for me