Ordering Equipment and Other Fun Stuff: Round One

The First Mate tells me that when I am ordering upgrades, I am like a kid in a candy store, and I think she is right. Our Morgan was pretty baron when it came to electronics, having only a broken VHF radio, a broken depth finder, and an autopilot that is not connected properly. So, in the interest of properly outfitting our boat for voyaging around the Pacific, I had to get busy.

The first round of purchases included the following:

Simrad RS35 VHF/AIS receiver with wireless remote.
Raymarine A78 display with GPS, depth, and radar.
West Marine handheld VHF with GPS and distress.
Raymarine SeaTalk to NMEA adapter.
12 foot RIB and Honda 8 HP twin cylinder outboard.
New windlass.
150 foot of new anchor chain.

So far I have everything installed with the exception of the radar and the NMEA backbone so that the AIS receiver can talk to the A78 display. The RIB is probably a bit overkill at 12 feet, but we were tired of dealing with small skiffs that were no fun to get around in and fish from, so I insisted on something really large and stable. We have not been disappointed, and the eight HP Honda is enough to get her up on a plane and hit close to 20 knots.

I really can’t wait to complete the installs on the Raymarine system. The GPS and depth seem to work well, and it has DownVision and CHIRP, which paint an image of the bottom, as well as detect fish. As soon as we settle on our arch I will be mounting the raydome.

And not for round two!