Multifuctional display and Radar

[devilrays]

I would like to know what Multifuctional Display and Radar I should be for a 260 Sundancer? I'm not sure how much room I have to mount the display and it's for a 2003 260DA with radar arch. Just looking for ideas, because I'm going to look at a boat tomorrow and if it looks anything like the pictures I might be getting pending a survery.

 

[Sheffield]

It depends on what you want to achieve. It appears from the Sea Ray brochure that there is a flat space that you could mount a display.

When you say multi-fuction, do you want:

1) GPS and Map

2) Radar

3) Fishfinder

4) Depth sounder and fishfinder.

All but the radar can be done from a number of companies. Raymarine has a new A series product that does all but radar... Navman also has some smaller footprint gear. I have used both Raymarine and Navman and they are pretty good kit for most applications.

Check out:

http://www.raymarine.com/raymarine/Default.asp?site=1&SECtion=2&Page=1227&Parent=790

or

http://www.navman.com/Navman/Templates/productinformation____39373.aspx

Be careful and make sure you measure the depth of the unit to make sure that it has enough room. As an option, you can always use a bracket mount but they always look a bit sad to me...

Radar presents a few more challenges. How much weight can the arch take? It is also likely that you will have to use a brackted unit. Raymarine makes some lower cost units in [packages (scanner and display)... check out:

http://www.raymarine.com/raymarine/ProductDetail.asp?site=1&section=2&page=758&product_id=1676


Good luck and good boating!

Joe aboard "Sheffield"

 

[devilrays]

I would like to have a unit where I can at least have a Chartplotter and Radar. I'm not looking to break the bank with these, so I'm looking to spend maybe $2500 for a radar and Chartplotter, but would like to have the option to add the fishfinder on it. I was looking at the Raymarine C70 unit and liked them, but can I go with a bigger screan or should I stay with the 6.5" screen?

 

[Sheffield]

It will all be about the space on the dash unless you want to use a bracket...

 

[wkearney99]

Personally I don't think the C-70 has a large enough screen to be useful. The C/E-80 pack a lot more useful information on the screen. Otherwise you're faced with having to jump back/forth between lots of pages to get the info you'd want.

Still, a smaller unit is better that "no" unit. In looking at that picture, is the height of the panel just above the mic mount (sort of the L-shape leading under the steering wheel) "tall" enough to accommodate a -80 series? You could have a local shop fabricate a faceplate of sorts that allowed you to bridge the blank and the L-shape area to fit a larger display. You could move the existing controls up onto the left side of the upper console. Or you could even have them fabricate a whole new panel for the entire lower left side of the console to give you one big 'blank slate' on which to re-mount all the controls.

It's really unfortunate the designers aren't allowing more room on the consoles of smaller boats for decently sized chartplotters.