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Romany

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This is an old gem which has been discussed before but I cannot find the thread so - the problem is Navman 3150 and 3100 multi LCD that don't seem to display all figures. Mine are constantly annoying me, and seem to show differing portions of the LCD each time I switch them on.

 

I have seen thru the forum a couple of you tubers showing how to fix this and it seems to involve replacing a little strip connector. Unfortunately I am not in the least electronically gifted and so wondering if there is anyone out there who has the skill/experience to attempt a repair? Money or rum in payment.

 

Failing this anybody know if the nmea sentences put out by navman gear will be readable by other manufacturers kit?

cheers - Nigel

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NMEA: According to the books, YES.

 

NEMA sends a signal of data called a "sentence"; rather like a morse coded flashing light.

 

Let's say the WHITE light sends speed and depth numbers.

Then another coloured light e.g. RED sends Wind Speed and Direction data in another "sentence". Then a GREEN light sends other data sentences and other colours send other data sentences.

 

So you can see these different lights flashing in sequence, White, then Red, then Green etc.

 

So as the receiver (instrument) you see all the messages in turn. However if you are only interested in the BLUE message, then you disguard and forget the other colours and wait for the next BLUE message that means someting to you e.g. Lat/Long data and then you read (display) ONLY that information that you can recognise.

 

So firstly one needs to know WHAT sentences are being sent

Identify WHICH sentence is important for you

Tell your receiver THAT sentence to observe and display.

Some recievers are colour blind and can't see some colours.

 

So Night time is your wire and you can read the electronic signals, but similar to real night time navigation, some navigation lights are hard to identify if there is other lights from houses, street and traffic lights nearby (=noise / interference).

 

Hope that simple analogy helps.

 

So yes the Navman 3100 Multi sentences are on Page 16 of the user manual. See manual P12; 8-1 NMEA.

NMEA 0183 outputs: DBT, DPT, PTTKD, PTTKV, VHW, MTW, VLW; input RMC.

PTTKD, PTTKV are both proprietary (Navman only) sentences

 

So the general NMEA sentences are without looking them up:

DBT, Depth Below Transducer

DPT, Depth

VHW, Velocity Heading Water = boat speed & Water temperature

MTW, Mean True Wind

VLW, Velocity Local Wind = Apparent wind

 

RMC Recommended Minimum data for gps (layout C)

 

For real confusion, google NMEA as there will be a lot of stuff that appears.

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This is an old gem which has been discussed before but I cannot find the thread so - the problem is Navman 3150 and 3100 multi LCD that don't seem to display all figures. Mine are constantly annoying me, and seem to show differing portions of the LCD each time I switch them on.

 

I have seen thru the forum a couple of you tubers showing how to fix this and it seems to involve replacing a little strip connector. Unfortunately I am not in the least electronically gifted and so wondering if there is anyone out there who has the skill/experience to attempt a repair? Money or rum in payment.

 

Failing this anybody know if the nmea sentences put out by navman gear will be readable by other manufacturers kit?

cheers - Nigel

 

The repair on mine has worked quite well for the last 18 months or so. It is a bit fiddley and time consuming but it delayed the inevitable replacement.

 

PM me if you want and we can discuss an attempted repair. If you are spending $$$/rum you may want to think about the replacement option because it may be more economical in the long run. Absolute Marine do a one for one replacement for the two instruments that you mentioned using the AdvanSea product as PaulR mentioned. They use the same sized cutouts and are designed to use the same wind gear/transducers. Otherwise there are a raft of alternate suppliers that frequent this forum on a regular basis that could help you out.

 

Cheers Steve

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Advancesea heads are a direct swap for Navman. No need to do wiring or transducers, just swap heads and off you go.

 

have you actually done that to prove it? And what about the Navbus connections (not NMEA) which are proprietary to Navman - what do you do with those?

 

So yes the Navman 3100 Multi sentences are on Page 16 of the user manual. See manual P12; 8-1 NMEA.

NMEA 0183 outputs: DBT, DPT, PTTKD, PTTKV, VHW, MTW, VLW; input RMC.

PTTKD, PTTKV are both proprietary (Navman only) sentences.

 

PaulR - linked to my Q above, it sounds like your PTTKD and PTTKV signals are the orange and blue Navbus proprietary signals? If so, are you saying the Advancesea head unit replicates this?

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Advancesea heads are a direct swap for Navman. No need to do wiring or transducers, just swap heads and off you go.

 

have you actually done that to prove it? And what about the Navbus connections (not NMEA) which are proprietary to Navman - what do you do with those??

Knot personally, all that gear and others like them are now too old school for my liking, even if I do currently wear some Navman but knot for much longer.

 

OK, from the horse mouth as I write - You can swap a Navman 3100 head with a Advansea head with no problems or dramas. The Navbus chat swaps to NMEA apparently seamlessly. No need to change transducers.

 

But the 3150 head does need to chat to the appropriate sender unit. There is no other sender bar the Navman one it will chat too. So with the 3150 wind gear it's a fix or totally flick and replace the entire thing right through.

 

Just because 2 units have NMEA it doesn't mean they will talk to each other. All the instruments I have to be fitted are being replaced before they even leave their boxes as even though all have NMEA they still won't talk to each other. Differing strings and some have strings other don't. Watch for that one.

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Thanks for your input all.

 

I will ask the 'experts' who design and sell these things and see what they say before doing anything related to money or time, and in the interim follow the age old method of 'listening' to the boat.

 

It seems bloody funny that the advansea and navman are remakably similar in form and function - right down to the model numbers. Makes me wonder if advansea just brought the info from navman or whichever big giant company swallowed them up? That being the case I think I'd prefer to try another - however I had already emailed absolute marine regards to Garmin instruments so will wait for a response.

 

All this electronic shite maybe good for serious racing, but (depth aside) really -when it comes to cruising and just havin a private race with anything heading the same way - who really needs the bs that seems to inevitably come with the gear - no matter who makes it.

 

I will report the response from advansea when /if I get one.

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The issue with old and new electronics not communicating is NMEA 183 and NMEA2000 which are two completely different systems. The later having been developed for the Automotive industry and is a far easier and better system.

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Pretty sure that the EP distributor of Navman was pissed off with the quality issues and decided to make/have made their own version with a properly bonded screen.

 

In gear of this older type the NMEA network only applies from the head unit to other head units. The transducer to head unit connection is all analogue. I imagine that Absolute Marine would confirm whether the Advansea will work with the exiting Navman depth and wind transducers. From my conversation with them a couple of years back, I think they do.

 

In NMEA 2000 gear the sensors and head units are all on the network. Each unit sends out a set of data. Each unit can then use any data on the network.

 

In my case, my tri-ducer provides a bunch of depth data, speed data and sea temp data. My wind sensor provides wind speed and angle, compass heading, pitch and roll angles and rates, barometric pressure, gps position, speed across the ground, heading across the ground. It also reads the speed data from the tri ducer and provides various true wind angles and speeds. Other than these two I have a tank level sender which provides a couple of measurements of tank level. Some people would add a chain counter, electrical system sensors, engine sensors and so on. In my case a single display (at the moment) picks and displays whatever you want from this collection, including logging and graphing over time (if you want).

 

When I connected the sensors and display to the network backbone and connected the backbone to the power the units all talked to each other immediately and the display started displaying data. Needless to say, I was pretty happy.

 

The wind sensor also spits most of this data out in NMEA0183 on a separate network cable.

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