Another trawler, PC centric for sure

Nordic Tug Helm

This is the pilot house of a Nordic Tug 37 belonging to a Panbo reader in the state of Washington. It’s his very first boat! But he did spent an unusual amount of time learning navigation and analyzing all his electronics choices. It was the “locked-in” nature of dedicated electronics versus the flexibility of computers that ultimately drove his decision, plus a high comfort level with PCs. He did not, however, put all his eggs in one basket. Two matching Shuttle XPC computers (Athlon, for lower heat/power) drive the two 20” Viewsonic monitors, and all NMEA 0183 inputs/outputs are split and switched so that the chart table PC can do everything the helm PC can, and vice versa. Dual Raymarine active GPS antennas each split to one of the Standard Horizon GX3500 DSC VHFs and one of the Shuttles. (And, yes, I do think that NMEA 2000 could make most of this small data networking far simpler and more robust). 

At any rate, besides being quite the contrast to yesterday’s helm, the photo above (bigger here) shows normal operating mode, with Nobeltec Admiral on radar duty to port, and Coastal Explorer at the helm as primary plotter. The owner seems to have mixed feelings about both packages, favoring CE a bit for its interface, “familiar, modern and easy to use“. Apparently there’s a chance that CE will one day support the Nobeltec/Koden radar scanner that’s plugged into his Ethernet hub, but no guarantee. The boat also tracks AIS targets (with a SeaLinks receiver), which the owner says they “really, really like” in Puget Sound. Check out the key strips on both monitors; more on those tomorrow.



Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison

Panbo editor, publisher & chief bottlewasher from 4/2005 until 8/2018, and now pleased to have Ben Stein as a very able publisher, webmaster, and editing colleague. Please don't regard him as an "expert"; he's getting quite old and thinks that "fadiddling fumble-putz" is a more accurate description.

3 Responses

  1. Jeff says:

    That sure is a sweet ride…well done.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Looks pretty I wonder how it would to be to use at night. For Daylight only?

  3. Alex says:

    We haven’t run at night, except across Lake Washington, and I probably had the PC off. CE and Nobeltec have night modes, and the monitor can be dimmed down. I’ll try this out when I have a chance.

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