GPS, or Global Positioning Systems, are satellite-based navigation systems developed by the U.S. Department of Defense for military purposes&#;but they're familiar to most of us as the navigational system used by our phones and cars. Whether you&#;re talking about the GPS on your , in your car, or a marine GPS for boats, all these units receive radio signals from multiple orbiting satellites to determine your position.
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There are currently 30 active GPS satellites in orbit, plus some extras reserved as spares in case one or more satellites has mechanical difficulties or is damaged. By knowing the position of a minimum of three of these satellites, and calculating the time differences between the transmitted signals&#;which are moving through space at over 186,000 MPH&#;your GPS receiver can determine its exact position anywhere on earth.
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The more satellite signals your GPS receives, the more accurately it can calculate that position, and while accuracy depends on a number of factors ranging from atmospheric conditions to receiver quality, when many multiple satellites are in view a common GPS receiver can typically put your position within a 16-foot radius. High-end receivers with dual channels can get significantly more accurate.
Originally boating GPS units displayed your position in latitude and longitude, and while that information can still be displayed, on most modern marine GPS people use a digital chart to see where they are&#;much like you can look at a street map showing your position on your cell . A GPS that can display charts is called a &#;chartplotter&#; or &#;GPS/chartplotter.&#; And in recent years digital charts have become much more comprehensive in the areas they cover, have improved detail levels, and better accuracy. In fact, many modern chartplotters also allow you to improve the digital charts you look at in real-time as you operate your boat, by matching up your GPS position with depth soundings taken by your fishfinder.
Navigating with GPS is usually the most efficient, easiest way to navigate a boat, but far too many people use it as a graphical representation rather than a numeric one. You can display a digital chart on your GPS unit, and steer the boat in such a way that the boat icon at the center of the screen points in the correct general direction. But you&#;ll steer much more accurately if you instead use a dedicated &#;steering screen&#; that gives you the numeric compass heading you want to follow, the course you&#;re actually steering, and an arrow or indicator that tells you whether to steer to port or starboard to get back on the most direct course.
Be sure to read Marine Navigation: How to Navigate a Boat to get a more complete picture of navigating boats both with and without GPS. And remember: while most of us do depend on GPS to navigate our boats most of the time, no one should ever rely on it 100-percent. Like any electronic system GPS is subject to failure and you&#;ll need to know how to get back home when your electronics let you down.
Learn More: Marine Navigation: How to Navigate a Boat
Even boaters who never leave sight of land should have a GPS/chartplotter aboard, on just about any boat. You never know when you&#;ll encounter fog, or a mechanical issue forces you to stay out late and navigate home in the darkness. And at times like those, you&#;ll be quite relieved you have GPS aboard. Plus, today&#;s units are so inexpensive (you can get a basic GPS/chartplotter for just a couple hundred dollars) that there&#;s really no excuse not to have one.
Wait a minute&#;your already has GPS, so why get another one just for your boat? That&#;s a good question, particularly because you can use a number of boating apps to more or less turn your into a mini-chartplotter. Cell phones, however, have a number of drawbacks:
So while having a cell with a navigational app loaded up can come in handy and is a good back-up to have aboard, it should never be depended upon as your main navigational tool.
Anchor Alarm
A feature of GPS that&#;s useful to boaters in particular is the ability to set an &#;anchor alarm.&#; You can establish a geofence around your boat while it&#;s at anchor, and if the anchor drags or the line comes loose and your boat goes through the geofence, your GPS will sound an alarm.
Security System
Some of today&#;s systems also allow you to interface with your boat&#;s GPS from afar, via an app on your cell , so it acts as a security system. You can set that geofence up around your boat, and if someone tries to steal it, you&#;ll get a text alarm as soon as it moves out of position.
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Additional Features
If your GPS is &#;networked&#; (wired to the other electronics aboard the boat) it can also fulfill a number of additional functions.
To learn more about GPS and see the government&#;s official statements about it, read FAQs, and more, visit the official U.S. Government GPS website.
Read Next: 5 Best Marine Navigation Apps for Boaters
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This article is the first one of an ongoing series of that I, Ryan, am writing about the systems on our boat, Polar Seal, a Beneteau Oceanis 40 from .
When we decided to get into sailing and go cruise full time, I (Ryan) had no prior experience of boats or sailing. At that time, I felt the sailing world was a giant black hole! Everywhere I turned, there were words I did not even know existed, such as Spinnaker, code 0, halyard, bulkhead, NMEA , NMEA , seacock, you name it.The more I would explore these terms, the more I realized how little of an idea I had what about I was getting myself into. It took me three years to finally feel like I&#;m getting a handle on all these terms. Although I realize that as time goes on, I&#;ll find more and more topics I don&#;t know about.We get many questions from our views and readers about our boat Polar Seal, and the systems we use onboard. We get asked what navigation system we have, our solar panels setup, what we like, what we don&#;t like and what we would do differently.That is why I have decided to start a series of articles about different aspects of our sailboat, a Beneteau Oceanis 40 from , and hopefully, start a discussion with our little community about this aspect of our cruising project.
back in , neither Sophie of I had experience of sailing. I have done an extensive amount of research but in the end, everyone has they own views, opinions, wants and needs. Something that works for me might not work for you, and that&#;s okay! If you think we could do something different or better, feel free to let us know in the comment section below, or send us an (We see you Andy).And now I present to you our&#;. Electronics! More specifically our Navigation equipment: what we currently have, and how I would prioritize our navigation equipment if I were to do it all over again.
When we received Polar Seal, our Beneteau Oceanis 40 from , she was kitted out very well. She came with:
I was excited to have all this equipment on board. I felt it all had a use, although being ten years old, I was skeptical as to how long it would all work.However after three years of use myself I can honestly say that most of this &#;classic&#; Raymarine equipment is holding up well. With the exception of our Radar, which I believe we could actually have repaired, and the fish finder (which never worked correctly), the navigation equipment is doing its jobs jo nicely. The only other thing which is failing is the cable on one of the handheld units of the VHF.
The only issue I have personally had with Raymarine has been their lack of replacement parts for this equipment. I understand you can&#;t produce replacement parts forever, and you want the public to buy your new stuff but this equipment is installed literally on thousands of boats and will be for the next 10 years. Not being able to get replacement parts after 10 years is very disappointing and I feel it points to the consumerist world we live in. Navigating in the heavily trafficked and swelly waters of the North Sea, good navigation instruments were very appreciated.
Now, to answer the question &#;what would you suggest to have on board?&#;. Some of us to have the resources to buy a used boat, throw away all the navigation when they get old, and start over. We do not, but I have spent a significant amount of time thinking about the possibilities, and my ideal setup, which I may line up in an upcoming article.This is how I would prioritize the acquisition of marine electronics when it comes to navigation equipment, and how I resonate around it.
Cause you basically always want to know how much water you have under your keel, how the wind is blowing and how fast you are going.
Having two plotters has been wonderful. A person can keep an eye on things on deck or below. That said, with technology advancements, a person really does not need two chart plotters these days. Having a single chart plotter in combination with WIFI or a multiplex and displaying the information on a tablet would work as good for us.We know some sailors have no chart plotter, but instead, connect all their equipment to a laptop running Open CPN. I personally prefer having one system onboard whose sole function is navigation and communication.Redundancy: We carry a backup set of Navionics digital charts on one of our phones which I like and use a lot.
Polar Seal came with a unique VHF setup: one VHF station in the cockpit and one at the navigation table, both with external speakers. I love this setup, and if I were to do it again I would do it the exact same. The off watch person can set the volume in the cabin below to hear what is going on, while the person on watch in the cockpit can set the volume on deck independently: a great solution.Further to this we are able to connect a Shakespeare hailer to the VHF which allow for automatic foghorn sounds. That is a tool we have used coming in the straight of Gibraltar and we quite enjoyed having it.Redundancy: We also have a handheld VHF which we typically keep in the ditch bag. Now and then, I take it out if I am wandering around the boat and want to be able to hear what is going on.
After navigating this season through some of the busiest shipping lanes in the world in Northern Europe as well as in the thick fog of Western Spain and Portugal, I feel like I have a good handle on what works and what does not for us.My personal opinion is that the best tool a sailor has is their eyes, followed by a good set of binoculars and a hand-bearing compass.The first next thing I ensure I have is a radar. A radar allows us to see everything around us, regardless of the equipment another boat has or not. Furthermore, today's digital, doppler and 4G radars use so little power that a person can potentially leave it on as long as they would like.The third piece of equipment I do really enjoy we have is an AIS transponder (we just upgraded our AIS receiver to an AIS transponder). In today's marine world, a lot of boats (from large ships who are required to have time, to fishing boats, to yachts) have AIS transponders. Those help a person get a picture of the traffic going on around them.In addition, having access to a ships MMSI, name and Call signs helps with general communication in the event a potential collision course needs to be worked out.However, the AIS system relies on others boats to have equipment on board (a transponder) in order for us to see them. To conclude, I will say this: there are many other tools and gadgets that we could set up on our boat. I resonate from the standpoint of a conservative budget. At some point this year, we were considering doing a major upgrade of our chart plotter and radar system, which gave me the opportunity to study the latest technologies in the field and think through what my ideal setup would be for our marine electronic onboard.This, with all the specifics of brands and models, will be the topic of an upcoming article! This article is part of an ongoing serie of article that I, Ryan, am writing about the systems on our boat, Polar Seal, a Beneteau Oceanis 40 from .
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