Chips & charts for Alaska

Doryman · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 2:44 pm Post subject: Chips & charts for Alaska

I have a Raymarine E-80 on my Tom Cat and am looking for Navionics chart chips for our planned trip north this summer. I usually get the Platinum series chips but after a phone call to Navionics I learned that the chip for the area between Vancouver Island and Admiralty Island is a special order item. I'm currently investigating how to order it through a dealer.

I'd like to hear from those of you who have cruised north with Raymarine gear what chips you used. Did you go with the Gold or what? And which paper charts did you take? I bought the 5 overview charts of SE Alaska from Armchair Sailor, taking advantage of their boat show discount. I am considering getting a PC/Mac based free or low-cost charting program for backup access to NOAA charts instead of paying $500+ for the complete set of paper charts.

Thanks,
Warren

Will-C · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 3:37 pm Post subject: Chips & charts for Alaska

Hi,
Not been to Alaska yet but you might try taking a look at Coastal Explorer nav software by Rosepoint Navigation. Once you purchase the software package you can download the charts you need for free either raster or vector charts are available. You can save trips route as normal windows type files in your documents etc. I'm still getting used to using it. What's nice is they have a planning mode you can do anywhere and a cruising mode if you can link with your GPS your boat shows right up in the charts. Sometimes the people at Active Captain have a special on Coastal Explorer as that is how I purchased my software. Active Captain is free and interfaces now with Coastal Explorer I believe.
D.D.

rogerbum · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 4:00 pm Post subject:

Warren,

I you by the BC charts from Navionics for the Android or i-phone - it covers everything from the N. Oregon coast all the way past Admiralty island. The cost of the program was around $12. Perhaps not how I'd want to navigate as my primary source of navigation but definitely worth the price and a good backup. I think on an ipad (with the built in GPS) it would be plenty good for navigation in practice. The maps are downloaded to the device so no internet connection is required to use them.

Grumpy · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 9:35 pm Post subject:

Warren,

I am in the same phase of planning as you but for 1 year later.

Coastal explorer is great and all the NOAA charts are available online for free. NOT the same situation with Canadian charts. They have a marketing expert working for then who has determined that if you want the (Vector or Raster)charts for the East side of Vancouver Island then they are approx $550. or $175 respectively. So far OK not cheap. But.... then you find that if you want to go beyond the end of Vancouver Island you need to buy the charts for the West side which include the charts North until you hit the free NOAA charts again. so once more, with feeling, $550 or $ 175.

Now that is for coastal explorer which I use for planning. NOW, unless you use it for navigation, THEN you need to buy the xtra chips for your on board chartplotter, which in my case means Raymarine + Garmin Backup.

This is where it gets really funny. I already have extra chips in my plotters so my Raymarine covers up to Hakai Passage and the Garmin goes to the end of Vancouver Island albeit in very great detail including satellite imagery which is nearly as good as the Google earth images on my Droid. BTW I just checked the Raymarine satellite image of Holmes Harbor and it shows a railroad. Shocked

I wouldn't know. I only live here!!

If you factor in the known background fact that outside of the major shipping channels, these "navigational charts" (which require you to aknowledge they are not for navigation) are little more than guidance since they have not been re-surveyed in our lifetime(s) you get back to to the reality that you will have to rely on common sense and good seamanship.

In addition to all that, Canadian rules require that you have paper charts.

Oh. I forgot the good bit. If/When you pay out the approx 2 BU's for all the Ca charts you will need, you get 1 year of updates for free provided that you register them.

All that may sound cynical and I am sure that we can put a man on the moon with greater accuracy (provided CNN is watching) but I will still probably buy all of them and live with the high pucker factor 'cos that adventure... right?

Spoken as one who has spent all day messing around this subject when the time would have better spent on a perfectly flat ocean just enjoying it.

Merv

Andrew · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 9:49 pm Post subject:

Warren,

When I bought my boat used from up in Alaska, it had a Navionics chart chip in the Raymarine chart plotter.
The chip advises its for North BC to Baranof Island
CF/914g
June 2005

I bought a chip for the area around Vancouver Island as I live in Port Alberni on the island. If you wish to borrow this chip, just let me know. Its a CF card( the big size). It may be older but might be useful if you can't find anything more suitable.

Andrew

Doryman · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 10:43 pm Post subject:

Doryman · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 10:52 pm Post subject:

rogerbum · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 11:17 pm Post subject:

Warren - Didn't you have an Android phone yesterday or was that a Blackberry? If you have an Android, the Navionics program is hard to beat. I'd have to pay many $100's for all the charts included in the software for $12 or so. In fact you could almost buy the ipad + the Navionics program for < the cost of the charts alone.

Doryman · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 11:27 pm Post subject:

rogerbum · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 11:44 pm Post subject:

Doryman · Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 11:53 pm Post subject:

Grumpy · Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2011 10:12 am Post subject:

Great point about the navionics app on Droid Beer

I hadn't noticed that it went that far.

So for $10+/- i get it on my phone but it will cost me anywhere from $350 to $1100 to get it on my computer plus the price of two chips to get it on my GPS systems.

I think we are being pillaged Crook

Now all it wants is some bright person to tether a phone to a 'puter so I can have a big screen version of what's on the phone or better yet just give us all charts at a reasonable price as a contribution to boater safety Laughing

After all, Google Earth can do it for land based people.

M

JamesTXSD · Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2011 11:03 am Post subject:

After reading through this thread, I went to the App Store for the iPad... I see that Navionics has changed their marketing: they now sell ALL of the US for $24.99 (coastal and inland lakes), or all of the US and Canada for $29.99. If that isn't a good reason to buy an iPad, I don't know what is. Certainly, one can do this on an iPhone or Droid, but this is a screen equivalence to the C/E-80.

To respond to Merv's post - are they sticking it to us on the actual chartplotter CF cards? Absolutely. Just like Garmin and all the others have done for years. These phone/iPad/tablet options didn't exist when chartplotters were the only practical way to get this info at your helm. Do I hold that against them? No, the development costs and market were what they were. The government didn't give away the electronic charts for free back then. The nav market has changed. I like my E-80, and I have a bunch of different chips for it. I don't see that I will be buying anymore in the future though... unless they get competitive with the CF cards. Paper charts? Joan doesn't like to leave the dock without 'em. I have the entire US on a couple DVDs. I vote for buying a couple cruising guides to supplement the electronic charts and use the left over $$ for fuel. Wink

Best wishes,
Jim B.

matt_unique · Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2011 11:05 am Post subject: Charts

Grumpy · Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2011 11:16 am Post subject:

Jim,

I absolutely agree with you. Having spent all my working life in engineering and marketing of high tech electronics I fully understand the business model on which it WAS based.

My comments are really a tongue in cheek poke at the fact that the model has changed dramatically. who knows, next year maybe we will have brain implants with the charts, radar, weather and AIS embedded so we can "see" where we are going. Shocked

Bottom line is it's really funny when you think that what we are discussing is really an out of date set of information which doesn't even have accurate depictions of many of the marina's we visit. Google Earth does a much better job of that!!

Last year I was on board a $MM Westport that was fitted out in the hopes of selling it to USCG (or some other power with enough money) and I pointed out to the salesman that he was using the same charts (on a VERY big monitor) that I was and they did not show the marina that we were currently moored in.

I have just spend a few happy hours papering two walls of my office with 1:40000 charts of the areas I wish to cruise this year all in a nice mozaic that even my poor eyes can read. Stick little triangles of red tape on all the "Dragons", green on all marinas etc and you can really get a God's eye view of what you are trying to do. And you can sit back and have a drink while you do it.

Merv