Article by Capt. Steve Katz
Winter Boat Show Circuit - What You May Have Missed
The winter boat show season is prime time for manufacturers to introduce new products and show off what they have been working on over the last year.
Starting in November with the Ft. Lauderdale Boat Show and finishing with the March Palm Beach Boat Show, there are a lot of events to showcase new marine products.
Here are some of the highlights:
Seakeeper
The most popular gyroscopic boat stabilizer has introduced the smallest gyro to date, called the Seakeeper 2. This model is designed to be used in boats 27 to 32-feet in length. This new model is 25% lighter and 20% smaller than the Seakeeper 3. The unit weights 414 lbs and is approximately 25” x 25”.
A Seakeeper can be installed anywhere in a boat, from amidships aft, as long as access is provided for routine maintenance. This unit, like the Seakeeper 3, runs on 12v battery power. Once the unit is up to speed, the power draw is reasonable, even for most outboard powered boats. The unit is designed to eliminate up to 95% of boat roll. I had the opportunity to visit the Seakeeper facility last fall as part of my annual Seakeeper dealer training and can tell you these American made Seakeepers are designed and built by some great craftsman using the latest in manufacturing techniques. Seakeeper is a local company, founded in Maryland in 2003. They introduced their first gyro in 2008 and have grown to over 160 employees. They recently expanded manufacturing capacity to produce more than 6,000 units per year.
Furuno
Furuno introduced a few new products this winter. They have a great looking new 7-inch and 9-inch stand alone chartplotter/fishfinder machines, and while they may be the little brother to their flagship TZT and TZT2 units, they look just like them with edge-to-edge glass touch screens on their models GP-1971F and GP-1871F.
Furuno also introduced a new autopilot, the NAVpilot-300. This autopilot was designed for center consoles with outboard engines and drive-by-wire systems on small and mid-size boats. While many of us think an autopilot is just to steer the boat in a straight line, this autopilot can do much more! The most innovative feature is the wireless remote that is not just any remote, but a motion sensitive gesture controller. This remote allows you to “point and click” to steer your boat to the direction you are pointing the remote from anywhere on the boat. This is a great feature when operating your boat with a limited crew or following a moving school of fish.
For those with larger boats, Furuno introduced the black box system for the TZtouch2. This hardware can run two independent marine monitors, allowing you to have the glass bridge that meets your requirements, no longer limited by the two all-in-one TZtouch2 screen sizes.
Garmin
Garmin has some good news and some new products introduced over the winter. Garmin and Navico (Simrad/Lorrance/B&G) have ended their three-year long dispute relating to sonar and auto guidance patents. This will allow both companies to bring new innovations to the market faster and benefit all marine consumers.
For Garmin users this may be most noticeable with the names and technology of their sonar features and specific transducer hardware. It seems like they are bringing back some transducers that were once discontinued due to patent issues. While it is too detailed to cover in this issue, Garmin has published a few software updates that actually bring new useful features to their products without confusing you too much. Two interesting updates include the increased integration of the ActiveCaptain product and OneHelm, an integrated solution for controlling boat systems from a single display. Garmin also updated and expanded their popular ECHOMAP product line, now called ECHOMAP Plus. This new product line includes powerful CHIRP sonar capabilities, full feature GPS chartplotter and now Wi-Fi for access to the free Active Captain marine app. These are available in 4, 6, 7 and 9-inch screen sizes.
Lowrance
Lowrance introduced the HOOK2, a new series of fishfinders/chartplotters, with auto tuning sonar that actively corrects sonar settings for the clearest underwater view. These new models use CHIRP sonar with a coverage area two times their previous models and also includes Sidescan and Downscan sonar. These HOOK2 models are available in 4, 5, 7, 9 and 12-inch screen sizes.
Simrad
Simrad announced the long awaited upgrade of the popular NSO navigation system. This new model, the NSO evo3, includes a high definition display as large as 24-inches. This system is designed to be the centerpiece of a Simrad system, easily connected to other Simrad modules, like the Halo radar, S5100 CHIRP sonar, ForwardScan and StructureScan sounders. This NSO evo3 runs a iMX6 quad core processor, making it fast and responsive to the Captains input and also easily connects with Wi-Fi, HDMI video in/out and J1939 engine data and the traditional NMEA2000 and Simrad networking without noticable decreased speed.
Lindgren-Pitman
To help you reel in the big fish you see on your new sonar, LP introduced a variable speed, 12volt reel, the SV-1200. Similar to the popular single speed S-1200, the new model offers the ability for the fisherman to adjust the speed of the retrieve, from a slow crawl to speeds faster than the single speed S-1200. While these types of electric reels are primarily used for dredge fishing, the ability to adjust the speed makes the new SV-1200 a good choice for just about any fishing where an electric reel is desired.
These weren’t the only new products and rumors at the winter show circuit. I will continue in the next edition with updates on engines, and more products of interest for sportfishing.
Captain Steve Katz is the owner of Steve’s Marine Service and holds NMEA, AMEI and NMEA2000 certificates along with ABYC Master Technician certification and factory training from many manufacturers.