Island Time 1,234 Posted December 2, 2014 Share Posted December 2, 2014 I had an Interphase fwd scanning sonar - it was fantastic, especially in Coral. Unfortunately, Interphase was sold to Garmin, and they discontinued it. There is now a new option; B&G have released ForwardScan™ - it is very similar to the old Interphase. Simple to use, and well priced. See the front page http://www.crew.org.nz for details Link to post Share on other sites
drbob 0 Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 As used on Vestas VO65? Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Share Posted December 3, 2014 Could have been useful eh Link to post Share on other sites
drbob 0 Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 though at 19kn it would have to look forward a long way to give you a chance of avoiding Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Share Posted December 3, 2014 Yeah, realistically at that speed I doubt it would have saved them. But a radar guard zone probably would have....So would sound navigational practices! Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 How much of this electronic crap do you need on a boat. Maybe the greatest lesson to come out of the Vestas incident is the more heads out of the boat and the less playing space invaders inside the better the seamanship becomes in general. Save the $1000.00 and the rest and buy another lead line. Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Share Posted December 3, 2014 A lead line won't show you what is ahead, only whats under. I found the fwd sonar fantastic in the coral, and where charts are poor... Link to post Share on other sites
Black Panther 1,581 Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 P has a point though - there must have been bodies on deck looking ahead. I wonder at what range they saw it. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 5 metre swells, raining, dark and 20 knots.... would have to have sensational eyesight or foresight and be expecting something like an atoll to show up! Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Share Posted December 3, 2014 Agreed splat, Electronics would have been the only possibility AT THE TIME, but beforehand, sound navigation practice would have prevented this. Electronic or Paper. Link to post Share on other sites
SloopJohnB 323 Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 look down at the blue water not the blue pixels Link to post Share on other sites
DrWatson 374 Posted December 3, 2014 Share Posted December 3, 2014 So the big question for me if I were to purchase one of these new fangled forward scanning sonars is not whether or not I will see, or be alerted to, that coral reef I am so carelessly barreling toward, but rather, will I see that mostly submerged and abandoned VO65 ahead of me, or more worryingly, that 40ft steel container.... Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Share Posted December 3, 2014 The answer is it depends. On the settings you have set and the alarm parameters. My old interphase one would do 210m fwd, but in a seaway with breaking crests, would give false alerts if the alarms are set too shallow. I'd expect better out of this unit - it is 15 years newer after all! I have no personal experience of the new B&G product at this point. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 Any idea if these forward looking gizmos would pick up a floating but semi-submerged container or stuff like that very near the surface? What about a sleeping/sun tanning Whale? Link to post Share on other sites
Island Time 1,234 Posted December 4, 2014 Author Share Posted December 4, 2014 yep, both of the above. with the provisos given above. I used to set the old one to alarm if it saw anything 3-20m deep. Shallower than 3 it would detect the wave clutter. It saw several whales, but also schools of fish would cause an alarm. Max range was 210m fwd, which is not much if you have a fast boat, but great for approaching a difficult or unknown entry... Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 That could be clever and damn handy. Thanks IT. Link to post Share on other sites
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