Some guys have posted on another thread saying radar is an indispensable piece of equipment on a small boat. I am considering buying one, I fish on a 20ft CC it's a May Craft, I have fished for tuna in the bay, I don't go beyond PH Bar and only round the Cape when I am certain the weather will be nice but I fish the middle of the bay which can sometimes be a long ride from Sesuit. I struck out on the tuna this year but am determined to get it done next year and could use a little info on why I should go get that radar. I think I know the answers but am curious to hear what others who just put one in have to say.
Collision Avodiance, Position Fixes via ranges(primary, bearing secondary)...Collision Avodiance. Not only buy one but learn how to use it. Practice on clear days and get used to what targets look like at various ranges, various coastlines and how they show up on the display. Practice heading home, on clear days by using electronics only. Build confidence and know your equiptment. Remember CBDR constant bearing decreasing range indicates collision! Use safe speed for the conditions you are in no blasting at 30+ kts in 1/4mile vis! Make your boat more "visible" to others put a highflier reflector on a pole and stick it in a rod holder. Your life is worth it! Buy one. Nuff Said!
170# BFT, countless Musky 40+", Sunnies with my boyz
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safety and situational awareness
pspear -
I was in the same state as you a couple of years ago, so let me share my experiences and thought process. Take it for what it's worth - just my experience.
I have a 24' Romarine. I opted for the 6 kw 4' open array from Furuno with ultra high definition (a marketing term - I think).
I did this for a few reasons.
1. safety. I have had friends whom lost their lives at sea. When a fog bank rolls in, I'd pay 10x the amount paid for radar.
2. safety. At night, I have used my radar several times to coorelate actual channel markers with those on my gps/chartplotter. VERY helpful.
3. situational awareness. I kept hearing Terry Nugent talk about finding birds with a radar. I respect him and his opinions tremendously. I went down south and found they did the same, use radar to find birds. I bought the largest, open array radar I could for my boat. I know I went a weeee tad past the finish line with it, but I am happy and it works better than I could have hoped.
I can find birds and often it points my naked eye in a bearing of where I am getting radar hits. I am then able to see the birds, see what direction they are flying or hovering, diving etc. I am then able to position my boat in such a way as to capitalize on the best intelligence around - BIRDS.
4. situational awareness. On my first trip of the season, I did what I had read about and heard from other boats. We launched out of GH and headed East. I came up to the SWC, saw all sorts of live and boats. We put the lines in. We were trolling for hours. All of a sudden, I came out of my trance and noticed there weren't any boats around. I mean no where to be seen. hmmmm. I checked my chartplotter and GPS for fear I was running to Portugal and just came to. Nope. They all left me. hmmmmm. This is my first time offshore in this boat. This is my first time fishing for tuna. This is the first time anyone in this boat has ever fished for tuna. hmmmm. Maybe the other boats know something I don't.
Hey! Wait a minute! I have radar! It cost a mint - use it.
I dialed the radar waaayyyy out. I heard the array slow down and the chart rescale for something on the order of 24 mi or something. All of a sudden I noticed there were all these hits from this place just around the corner of the cape called "Peaked Hill Bar."
I had never heard of the place, but figured the seas were in our favor, lets give it a shot. I tell the guys to pull the lines in. They look at my puzzled. I mean it's not like I really knew what I was doing since we all just started tuna fishing on this trip. We haul lines and I make way to PH. The life returns to the surface. I see the other boats (previously viewed radar hits) and within 30 minutes we are tight.
1 take down.
1 fish landed
I never would have relocated to this position had it not been for the radar.
Send me a PM and I can get you my cell phone to talk more if you want. I love mine and would encourage you to get one. Any radar is better than no radar. As you know, this is my first season fishing for tuna. So far we have gone out 7 times and have landed 5 fish. Much of that success is due to my electronics and the best fish finders in the world - birds.
Of all the electronics I have on my boat the one piece I would never do without is radar. Late June and early July I needed to run it nearly every day with the constant fog in the area. Sometimes the harbor was crystal clear but a few miles offshore it was pea soup.
Yeh, I was feeling pretty exposed (& ill prepared) having thought I waited out the fog in July waiting to leave Dux, only to find pea soup 4 miles off the race this year. Not a good feeling.
1st - any radar is better than no radar. Putting on an open array is prob. not practicle on your boat, but you can still see birds w/ a 4kw dome (& practice). A 2kw dome will keep you safe (er), and is lighter and smaller than a 4kw.
One group of products to consider are the new broadband radars from Simrad, Northstar, & Lowrance. They are reportedly very effective in shorter range (> @ 6 miles), and that's about as "far" as you can see w/ the lower mounts on CC's. They are also very light, and put out a fraction of the radiation compared to standard radars (they say less than a cell phone). I think the size & weight make them very attractive for smaller boats, the performance sounds good, and the prices are relatively reasonable.
I will never leave the dock headed offshore on a boat without radar. Period. I have a 2 kw Garmin and it works perfectly for collision avoidance, locating buoys and mapping out the coastline. I usually never set it to a range higher than 6 miles (usually less than that) because I am not interested in seeing birds or anything else besides immediate hazards. Sure there may be a few exceptions (storms, etc) but for the majority of the time I'm using it for safety purposes only (I guess using it to locate storms would go into the safety category as well).
As has been said, learn to use it before you need it, so when you do, it will be second nature. Also, I would recommend the book Radar for Mariners by David Burch as an aid for learning the basics of radar and collision avoidance on up to much more advanced usage of your new radar unit.
I just upgraded my entire electronics group from an old Furuno radar and Garmin Chartplotter to the new Lowrance Broadband unit and tied that into the Lowrance HD-10 FF/chartplotter. We get plenty of Fog in the LIS as well and most of the boats that I have seen or "not seen" are running way too fast with no electronics. I am most concerned about distances within one mile radius and this unit is amazing. I can mark buoy markers 10' off my bow. The radar overlays my navionics chartplotter which is like cheating. Like most electronics, the price of this unit and others like it will start coming down. Check out both if your in the market. With a good radar unit, you can run with much greater piece of mind day or night.
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safety and situational awareness
