A Rant About Electronics

Cruising is a whole lot easier with modern electronics. No doubt about that.

In fact, I think it's fair to say that the whole cruising phenomenon is a result of the electronics revolution -- GPS in particular. There were a whole lot fewer fearless sailors out there when a chart and sextant were the navigational standbys.

But, electronics can go bad. Salt water and carefully corralled electrons are not a good mix. I have met several sailors who simply don't believe that's true, but I for one have witnessed it first hand on more than one occasion.

That hasn't put me off the gizmos, it's simply made me more circumspect. When I can have at hand a low-tech alternative to high-tech wizardry, I do. We always keep paper charts and a good visual so that we know where we are in case the chartplotter decides to quit. Symbiosis has a sextant aboard (and I have at least a modicum of skill at it). We have a mechanical speed log (also good for comparing to the GPS "speed over ground" to get an idea for current). There's a lead line stowed below in case the depth sounder goes dead. You get the idea.

Even so, it's easy to become reliant on complex systems. And it can be difficult to make a seemless transition from one method to another.

One thing I also tried to avoid on Symbiosis is integrated electronics systems. This is all the rage on the "modern" yacht. The wind speed indicator talks to the chartplotter, which talks to the autopilot, etc. In theory, it's a great idea; in practice, it can also be a great idea -- as long as everything is working. But if one system goes down, they can all go down. Not good.

The following is a cautionary tale:

Several weeks ago, my depth sounder started acting strangely. It began offshore in several thousand feet of water. The sounder would read 000. I wasn't too alarmed. In such deep water, it made sense to me that it wouldn't be getting a return signal from the bottom quickly enough to be recorded by the in-hull transducer. Besides, generally after you are out of shallow water, it's not all that important to keep tabs on this sort of thing. Running aground is the main concern, and although it can be useful to know the depth in deeper water for navigational purposes, it isn't all that critical. Even so, when we got nearer to shore (shallower water), the sounder began to display more odd readings. It would lock on an erroneous reading and stay there, only occasionally to switch to another erroneous reading. I did a bit of research and concluded it was probably a bad transducer. That was disappointing considering the unit was only a few years old. I looked up the manufacturer (Moor Electronics) only to discover that they'd gone out of business that very month!

I didn't want to pay for a whole new sounder, but I wasn't likely to find a new transducer for this one, either. I decided that the easiest solution was to hook a transducer to the Garmin chartplotter -- something I'd never done before because of my suspicion of integrated systems.

Although my chartplotter was purchased new in 2012, it was, of course, already considered something out of the pre-Cambrian. Finding a transducer took a bit of doing, but I was able to get one through West Marine. It proved a simple install and everything was working fine. I do admit that I got used to the convenience of being able to see the depth right there on the chartplotter without having to look away to another instrument.

When we left West End last week, as far as I knew our chartplotter was working just fine. The dead depth sounder sat there blankly, but it was no problem because I could see the depth on the Garmin now.

As we motored to Lucaya, the Garmin lost power. At first, I didn't think anything of it. I turned it back on, and after about a minute, it warmed up and returned to displaying our position. Then it turned off again. Restarted. This happened perhaps two dozen times over a 6-hour period. Sometimes it would stay on for 10 or 15 minutes, sometimes only for a minute or so. Probably a loose connection, but nothing I could really check on until I got in somewhere. In open water, this sort of failure is not so critical. Luckily, we had charts for the area and I pulled out a spare handheld GPS and kept close watch on our position while Noi steered. But I was concerned about the entrance to Bell Channel. It looked rather tricky on the chart, with a tight squeeze between some shallows right at the red and green markers. Getting into tight spots is where a chartplotter comes into its own. But I didn't know whether mine would be working.

Of course, just as I was entering the most critical part of the channel -- that very shallow part I mentioned -- the chartplotter quit, along with the depth reading that now was part of the same system. Worse, there was a strong following sea that made the entrance probably the most challenging I have had to make. I came in blind. No chartplotter and no depth sounder. I went in blind. We were lucky.

Had my old depth sounder been working, at least I'd have had that. Yet another system went down with the chartplotter, too. At the same time I bought the Garmin, I also bought a new VHF radio with AIS (Automatic Identification System), which uses a radio signal to show you other boats in your vicinity. So, that too was unusable, at least from the helm, because of the malfunctioning chartplotter.

So, I'm the one that has assiduously avoided integrated systems and I have inadvertently been sucked into the very problem I hoped to avoid!