Upgrading navigation instruments

Fed up with glitches, Graham Keating replaces his 1997-vintage navigation instruments with multifunction displays

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The original 25-year-old autohelm instruments aboard my Vancouver 38 Pilot were beginning to worry me – the odd, unexpected communication errors with the newer chart plotter always happened at crucial moments! So we decided to replace them with new Raymarine colour displays.

Many of us are faced with the challenges of maintaining fantastic boats; they are generally aging gracefully but we're probably all finding that some components are reaching the end of their working lives.

At 25 years old Maunie of Ardwall is looking very good for her age (especially considering the 60,000 miles on her log) and we are working hard to keep her in prime condition, with major upgrades completed as and when required.

This big project, undertaken in September 2022, aimed to address her 1997-vintage autohelm network of navigation instruments.

Linked upgrades

Over the years the original network system-consisting of three instruments in the pilothouse and five in the cockpit -had been upgraded in stages; first, a Raymarine colour chart plotter replaced both the original Yeoman plotter and the green-screen radar, and then an ACU400 autopilot was installed when the original autopilot computer failed in New Zealand.

The addition of newer generation Raymarine technology meant that a clever converter was required so that the original Autohelm instruments, which operate on the SeaTalk network interface, could converse with the newer SeaTalkNG operating system.