Article by Capt. Steve Katz
New and upcoming products and technology for 2020
Foulfree
Designed by industry-leading engineers at Propspeed and designated by Airmar as a certified transducer coating, Foulfree releases marine growth, reducing the maintenance needed to keep transducers clean and streamlining water flow.
Up until now, the only solution to keep marine growth from fouling a transducer face was regular cleaning and or the application of a water-based bottom paint. Neither of these solutions were great, but we learned to live with it. Based on the generally acceptable performance of the popular Propspeed product, this new Foulfree coating, available in Spring 2020, should eliminate the need for constant maintenance of the transducer faces.
Fouling on the face of transducers can reduce their sensitivity, bottom-echo returns and positive fish targets. Transducers also perform best with minimal turbulence over their surface during operation. Foulfree is a specialized foul-release coating that is biocide-free and does not poison marine growth. Once cured, Foulfree forms a super-slippery surface over the transducer, preventing marine growth from attaching the face of the transducer. Foulfree offers a long service life, lasting a minimum of 12 months, with an even longer life span in cooler climates.
“Foulfree is an exciting new coating specifically made to enhance the performance of transducers,” said Chris Baird, CEO, Propspeed. “Bringing together our revolutionary product design and working with the experts in transducer functionality from Airmar, we are able to offer boaters around the world a new solution to an age-old problem and improve sonar performance for anglers and cruisers alike.”
Detailed Bathymetry charts
There is a new push by cartography companies to work with highly detailed Bathymetric sources and repurpose the information into meaningful data that can be used on modern chart plotters. CMOR is one of the first companies to aggregate this data into a user-friendly product that was first introduced on Simrad multifunction displays, but now works well with many brands of chartplotters. Other chartplotter manufacturers and cartography companies have been feverishly working to provide similar bathometric data within their cartography offerings.
Much of the USA coastal bathy data is acquired using aerial LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging). LIDAR bathy systems use pulsed blue-green lasers in aircraft to measure ranges to the sea flow below the water’s surface. The range measurements are combined with position and orientation data to obtain accurate, 3D spatial coordinates of points on the earth’s surface.
Most marine charts incorporating LIDAR data information display the seafloor in “shaded relief” views, often with different colors for varying depths. This makes it easy for the captain to “see” the edges, drop-offs, walls and other distinctive features of the seabed below the boat. This helps to provide the 3D look to these modern charts.
LIDAR has been used for land surveying for years, so why has it taken so long for the Bathy data to end up on marine charts? First off, it’s expensive compared to land LIDAR. The lasers are much more powerful, operate on different wavelengths and the water needs to be clear to get a good bottom reading. Aircraft have to wait for the right conditions and fly low and slow to get the laser beam to penetrate deep enough to the sea floor and extract meaningful data.
Bathometric LIDAR has a maximum depth of about 25 fathoms (150 feet). For deeper water, seafloor data is gathered using Multibeam Bathymetry. Instead of just one transducer pointing down, multibeam bathymetry systems have arrays of transducers, sending out fan shaped sonar energy to cover a large swath of bottom, usually covering a distance on either side of the ship that is equal to about two times the water depth.
Here in the USA, NOAA’s department of National Center for Environmental information (NCEI) is the national archive for multibeam bathymetric data and holds more than 9 million nautical miles of ship track line data recorded from over 2,400 cruises and received from sources worldwide. In addition to deep water data, the Multibeam Bathymetry Database (MBBDB) includes hydrographic multibeam survey data from NOAA's National Ocean Service (NOS). Some of the information has been used in marine cartography for years, but more recently additional more detailed data has been included in marine charts used with popular sportfish marine electronics.
CLEARLINE™ System
How often do you need to clean the seawater cooling systems on your boat? Seawater is the most popular way to cool refrigeration systems, air conditioning systems, stabilizing systems and other on-board heat generating equipment. Even the newest cooling systems using a freshwater loop have a seawater heat exchanger that needs to be cleaned. Microorganisms living in seawater can attach themselves to the seawater plumbing systems, causing a build-up of marine growth and eventual restriction or stoppage of water flow. This is very dependent on the location and use of your boat, but most sportfish boats suffer this issue no matter how they are used and maintained.
Over the years many ideas and techniques have been tried to reduce or eliminate the growth, but most sportfish crew simply schedule regular cleanings to keep their systems at maximum efficiency. These regular cleanings are time consuming, expensive and there is always a chance of damage when removing and reassembling manifolds, piping, valves, etc.
The CLEARLINE™ System by Electrosea is an “ingenious solution to the barnacle problem where the strategy is not to remove them, but to prevent them from growing in your raw water lines in the first place”. The system incorporates a specialized sea strainer that uses a small amount of electricity, regulated by a computerized control unit with external sensors to monitor the seawater system. This control system can even integrate with sophisticated boat systems such as OcotPlex, used on Viking Sportfish boats. The specialized strainer is an electrochlorinator, producing controlled amounts of chlorine from the seawater itself. This low level of chlorine is compatible with copper nickel, titanium and other marine alloys at the same time eliminating barnacles, biofilm, and marine scale from growing inside the seawater piping systems. The chlorine level is similar to that found in tap water. Customers starting with a descaled or new seawater system have reported little or no growth during regular scheduled maintenance.
New Class B+ AIS systems
AIS (Automatic Identification System) is a widely used maritime identification system that is one of the best navigation and safety systems since the invention of maritime radar. Initially, there was a powerful and expensive Class A AIS system for the largest regulated commercial vessels and a less powerful and less expensive Class B AIS for smaller less regulated vessels. Voluntary installations were often found on sportfish boats. Note that both of these systems are Transceiver – meaning they transmit AND receive information. There are many receive-only systems that are very beneficial, but not discussed here.
A new regulation a few years ago allowed for a third AIS system, fitting in-between the two current offerings. This is sometimes referred to as Class B+ or Class B SOTDMA or Class B 5W. Why is this new offering important? The Class B+ has over twice the transmit power and range of the original Class B, 5 watts which doubles the transmit range to 10-15 miles. Most important for sportfish vessels, the Class B+ uses the same technology of the Class A AIS for sending messages. It has the same top priority when it comes to reserving a transmission time slot in the AIS airwaves, guaranteeing that it will always be able to transmit, even in busy AIS congested waters. For fast moving boats this is important as a missed Class B transmission can result in a vessel moving a long distance before it is able to send its next transmission.
If you are wondering if your vessel is required by the USCG to have an AIS system, you can review the regulations at www.navcen.uscg.gov/?pageName=AISRequirementsRev
Satellite TV
When the action on the water ends, let the big screen entertain the crew. It seems that most tournament sportfish boats and even many center consoles are equipped with the latest and greatest satellite communications systems, TV, phone and internet. In this area, there are solutions for boats of all sizes.
When traveling outside of the US coastal waters, Satellite TV service can become complicated and expensive, no matter what type of antenna your vessel is equipped with. In the past, many sportfish boats have had two sets of Satellite TV receivers, one Direct TV set for coastal USA and one set for Latin America Direct TV. A few years ago, Latin America DirecTV changed its coverage area and the English language programing diminished to only a few channels, making the complications and expense of this service less than in the past.
The DISH TV network has some great coverage in the Caribbean and Latin America using a single satellite. While not a duplicate of what’s available on the traditional three DISH satellites in the USA, it still has a very good offering when away from home. DISH service has not been very popular with boaters in the USA due to the need to switch between three satellites while changing HDTV channels as compared to specialized antenna systems from KVH and Intellian that can easily track the three DirecTV HDTV satellites at the same time.
So why is Satellite TV on this list? It is now much easier and less expensive to receive American TV service when traveling away from the USA with a standard marine satellite TV antenna that you may already own. You can eliminate the expensive LNB change-out needed when outside the coverage of the coastal USA. The DISH network offers a month-to-month service for subscribers, making it easy to change service to DISH while out of the USA.
Most Marine satellite TV antennas can be easily re-programed to track a single DISH satellite covering the area where you are traveling. The need to re-configure the coax cables to the receivers is nothing in comparison to the antics that were necessary in years past to switch to DirecTV Latin America.
You should check with your local marine electronics company to confirm compatibility. Most 18” and larger Satellite TV antennas can receive DISH throughout the Caribbean and Central America. Heading farther east towards the Dominican Republic will require a larger 24” antenna.
After switching to DISH, many boaters decide to keep the service, since it has continuous coverage in the coastal USA and therefore does not require changing of service or equipment when traveling. (recently a boat equipped with a basic KVH TV6 24” satellite antenna was able to travel from the Mid-Atlantic area to Florida and the Dominican Republic, watching DISH along the way, without changing antenna settings, receivers, etc.)
If your boating keeps you closer to shore, both Intellian and KVH make small Satellite TV antennas beginning at 13” in diameter and weighing 10 lbs. This entry level antenna can be fitted to most any size boat and can be combined with a month-to-month DISH service account, allowing you to easily turn off the service in the off-season and keep your costs low. These systems work great for coastal boaters and even cover much of the offshore fishing grounds. A larger antenna always provides a better signal strength and a better signal in bad weather such as rain, heavy fog, etc.
In this column we often review the newest electronics products from the major marine electronics companies such as Furuno, Garmin, Raymarine and Simrad. The product lifecycle is geared toward the fall and winter boat shows for new product introductions. By the end of winter, most of the new products we could review quickly become old news. There are definitely some new products on the way so keep an eye out for manufacturers’ press releases and Facebook posts timed with upcoming boat shows.
One electronic fishing product that is not new, but gaining popularity exponentially is sonar. Not the traditional fish finder, but commercial sonar, using a large retractable transducer that can look all around the boat, like underwater radar for fish! These systems were designed for commercial fishing applications and have quickly made their way onto sportfishing boats once people realized their capabilities after seeing captains locate, track and catch tournament winning fish. The Furuno and Koden products are the most popular. The hardware cost for these sonar systems range in price from $17,000 to $80,000, but one tournament winning fish can easily cover the cost of a Sonar.
These maintenance, safety, fishing and entertainment ideas will help keep your boat in good condition and help to provide an enjoyable experience for all those aboard.
Captain Steve Katz is the owner of Steve’s Marine Service and holds NMEA, AMEI and NMEA2000 certificates along with ABYC Master Technician certification and factory training from many manufacturers. To reach Steve, call 410-231-3191.
