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Post by On y va on Jan 11, 2016 17:46:10 GMT
For some time I have been investigating the "problem" of how to communicate efficiently when i.e. crossing an ocean. I have no need to really be able to talk to people. Getting short messages and grib files is what is important to me. I bumped into a relatively cheap and what appears to be reliable option via a friend of mine, who is currently crossing the Atlantic.
The system consists of a satellite communication module Skywave IDP690, with built in antenna and a "Star Tracking" smart box. For sailing boats, the dome type IDP690 unit is best as it will also perform at an angle. (http://www.skywave.com/en/our-technology/satellite-cellular-communication/idp-series/idp-600)
Data is sent and received via the inmarsat satellite system and fed to and from a land based server (The company that has developed and sells the smart box provides this service). This server zips (email) data to make it as minimal as possible. You can also get grib files with it.
But, what I like about this system, is that you do not need to have your laptop connected 24/7 to receive messages. The smartbox uses a USB memory stick. So if you want to say send an email, you prepare it on your laptop and put it on the stick. You then insert the USB stick in the smart box and it will send it for you automatically, usually within minutes. And when a message is received, a led will flicker on the smart box. You take the stick from the smartbox and read the message on your laptop. The Skywave terminal IDP690 itself (independently of the smart box) sends position, SOG and COG at intervals that can be preset. So the system also works as a tracker for loved ones and friends.
For gribfiles, you have to load a certain text code onto the USB stick and the smartbox will send this code to the server and within minutes you get the relevant grib file returned, relevant to your position and area. Various gribfiles are possible.
The costs involved are what I can see cheaper than getting in data via a satphone. And with the service of this company and communication via their server, data usage is safe as well as minimalised.
I have asked this friend (who is now mid ocean) to give his user verdict once he reaches Brazil.
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allthewaythere
Junior Member
Sun Odyssey 45.2
Posts: 22
Jeanneau Model: 2000 Sun Odyssey 45.2
Yacht Name: All The Way There
Home Port: Detroit, Michigan
Country: USA
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Post by allthewaythere on Jan 12, 2016 0:04:55 GMT
On y va - When you post your friend's feedback, can you also post on the hardware cost. The flashing red 'message waiting' feature seems very cool. Thanks - Alan
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Post by On y va on Jan 12, 2016 8:39:58 GMT
As it interest me a lot, I have asked the supplier of this "smart box". Here is the cost setup:
The ST-Star tracking kit is 999 euros, the smart box is 169 euros.
The yearly service charge for giving position data (incl. access by others with a code to their website where they can track your boat) and the sending of data/messages is 210 euros per year. This includes 75 polls per quarter (so 300 position reports per year). Extra polls are at 1,30 euro per poll
Sending or receiving messages to and from the system, is 90 cents per message of max 1000 characters.
The Skywave terminal and Inmarsat sat system have been upgraded early 2015 and will be guaranteed till 2023. Skywave uses the D+ Inmarsat satellites.
I think these are prices including of VAT, as all other prices on their website are incl. VAT.
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Post by hoppy on Jan 12, 2016 12:26:06 GMT
Have you looked at Iridium GO? The pricing at first glance does not seem to give your "simple" solution a financial advantage over the GO. I suppose if you don't already have an iPhone/Android then the GO gets much more expensive, but if you don't have them, you'll probably be happy with carrier pigeons or smoke signals for your comms
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Post by On y va on Jan 12, 2016 14:02:49 GMT
I considered Irridium GO too initially, but it is not as "swish" as it appears to be.
So far I have heard not much good about Iridium GO. Lots of time no connection and loss of signal and very slow. What I like about this system is that you plug in the USB and the rest is fully automated. Both for sending as well as receiving data.
Does Irridium Go send your position/COG/SOG?
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Post by hoppy on Jan 12, 2016 22:00:17 GMT
The GO certainly has had teething troubles. The first user I "followed" online had lots of problems at the time of the 2014 ARC. On the forums users seem to be reporting more satisfactory results recently. I think some of the problems were more related to not using an external antennae and the apps. Clearly you need to have it mounted with an external antennae and hopefully the app developers have made their apps better.
I have been using Predictwind for weather using phone/wifi connections and they have designed their MAC/PC software and phone apps to work with the GO and sell it with packages, so hopefully it works well.
Yep, iridium is slow.
As I recall you are heading to Patagonia, you might want to look at whether Inmarsat will be suitable. You might find that when you are so far south that the satellites will be low on the horizon which might not suit the dome antennae (might need something more directional) and if you are sheltering behind even a low hill, you might be cut off from weather updates. Iridium might be a better choice.
Don't know on the GO's tracking. I know it does tracking but don't know about SOG/COG. Hopefully it does because I consider them important which is why I think Spot s junk for cruisers.
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Post by On y va on Jan 14, 2016 18:24:31 GMT
My main appeal to this unit (which I found out today has been developed by an Inmarsat dealer and in close conjunction with Inmarsat) is that it does things for you, without having to look at it or do anything. Plug in the USB memory stick and that´s it. Also when a message arrived. Blinkerdy blink and you know there is a message. Get laptop and read message or grib file. I do not have any stuff on my laptop navigational wise. Just not my cup of tea. I rely on my e7 with the right navionics chart in it and as a backup my iPad with navionics charts loaded. Inmarsat covers Patagonia completely. Even parts of Antarctica. But the latter has a too high Brrrrrrrrrrrr factor for me. www.inmarsat.com/about-us/our-satellites/our-coverage/
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Post by hoppy on Jan 14, 2016 22:38:59 GMT
Inmarsat covers Patagonia completely. Even parts of Antarctica. But the latter has a too high Brrrrrrrrrrrr factor for me. I realise that. The problem with Inmarsat is that their satellites are stationary over the equator, so the further south you are, the lower on the horizon the satellites will be. At the bottom of Patagonia, Inmarsat 3-F4 at 54W will be at an elevation of 25 degrees to the horizon, which could be a problem. www.groundcontrol.com/Satellite_Look_Angle_Calculator.htm
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Post by On y va on Jan 15, 2016 9:01:48 GMT
hoppy : you refer to the ISAT Data Pro map, where deep South and high North are less well covered. Skywave uses the D+/IsatM2M Network Service, which has comnplete coverage up to +/- 75 degrees: D+/IsatM2M Network Service www.skywave.com/en/our-technology/data-network-services/mapsFrank, my friend who is now mid Ocean towards Brazil started with the Irridium Go. He found it very cumbersome and frustrating, besides very expensive due to the many resends and re-attempts. So he switched to this system Another big plus of this system, is that you know the other side has received your message as you get a receipt confirmation. I find that rather important actually. We´ll see what his findings are once he reaches the other side.
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Post by hoppy on Jan 15, 2016 12:55:56 GMT
at sea it will be fine, but at anchor in Patagonia you will find yourself in the "shadow" of a hill or mountain that does not need to be so high to stop your comms for inmarsat as the sats will be at 25 degrees elevation, whereas Iridium will still be available at times when they pass overhead. Your friend will have his sats at perhaps 80+ degrees elevation and nothing to block it, so it will work fine.
You should look at how well Inmarsat phones work down in Patagonia for sailors or even hikers.
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Post by On y va on Jan 15, 2016 15:01:59 GMT
If that is the only objection, than for the rest it appears to be superior to Iridium Go. So there you go!
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Post by hoppy on Mar 31, 2016 9:51:15 GMT
We´ll see what his findings are once he reaches the other side. So, I guess he must have reached the other side by now, any news on how it worked? My cruising ambitions have been cut back but I still "need" sat coms for the occasional mid-passage weather update. I was never so happy with the GO as something to throw into the grab bag if things go to sh!t so I think I have found a reasonable priced solution for me. There is an Aussie company on ebay that sells many used Iridium 9505A handsets with a new battery and charger for around €450. I guess they have good volumes because people need them for inland use and Iridium has special lower rates within Australia to make having a satphone a more viable option. So I am thinking about getting the 9505A and a serial-usb adapter/cable. For data usage I'm thinking about using Xgate for email and perhaps getting their RedPort Optimizer www.globalmarinenet.com/product/xgate/ so I can use Xgate for emails from a iPhone. It looks like it will give me a GO like user experience at a much lower price. Last year for weather and playing with weather routing, I used Predictwind www.predictwind.com/ I'm happy with that and will subscribe again. Last year it supported the GO and now it also supports Xgate. Because my offshore needs will be limited, I'll probably get the minimal Iridium prepaid minutes (50 minutes) over 2 or 3 months. Maybe at a later date circumstances change and I can justify buying the GO and getting the unlimited data package, then the 9505A can reside in a grab bag as a backup.
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Post by Tafika II on Mar 31, 2016 15:23:01 GMT
I looked at a lot of options and while the GO bugs "seem" to have been worked out, the unit is too stationary on the boat. I lucked out & bought a used (2014) Iridium 9555 with DC charger cradle, external antenna & Pelican case with 500 minutes left (Expire May 2016, but can roll-over with purchase of more minutes for 3 years). Total cost...$450. This option gives me the flexibility to download compressed weather data, email, and text data. We have three friends currently completing they 4 and 6-year circumnavigation. One uses a GO, one uses a 9555 phone and the other SSB/modem. The couple who have the sat phone also have SSB/modem setups, but have expressed they were glad to have the sat phones for emergencies and weather update downloads when crossing the Pacific and more so, the Indian Ocean. To me, a very big factor is if the phone is in the charging cradle fully charged and you have a go-to-the–life-raft situation...grab it and go! You can’t do that with stationary systems or SSB.
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Post by On y va on Mar 31, 2016 19:07:02 GMT
hoppy : Yes, Frank made it to Brasil just in time for the carnaval and moved on and it now enjoying his steaks in Uruguay. Never knew that the Uruguyans eat more kilos of meat than people in any other country in this world.....58 kgs per person per year!!!! I must move there immediately!!!! Anyway, I emailed him about his experiences and he wrote as follows: Skywave module works very good. The tracker send my position every hour at 100% rate. Sending emails is also at 100% succes rate. Receiving is at 95% succes rate. This will be rectified by Skywave, by adding an extra check. This means the unit will now check whether a sent email has succesfully been delivered. If not, it will resend automatically. So there we have it. I know what I am getting!
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Post by Don Reaves on Mar 31, 2016 19:43:32 GMT
On y va -- maybe your data is more recent than 2002, but according to Wikipedia, Uruguay is in 17th place at 98.6 kg/person. Denmark has top honors at 145.9. I was surprised that the US is only in 5th place at 124.8. Here's a partial list:
kg/person (2002) Country 145.9 Denmark 142.1 New Zealand 141.7 Luxembourg 131.3 Cyprus 124.8 United States 124.1 St. Lucia 123.6 The Bahamas 118.6 Spain 113.8 Greenland 112.2 French Polynesia 108.8 Mongolia 108.1 Canada 106.3 Ireland 101.1 France 100.7 Hungary 99.3 Saint Kitts and Nevis 98.6 Uruguay 97.6 Argentina
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Post by hoppy on Mar 31, 2016 20:31:44 GMT
I'd guess that the 58kg pp is for only beef whilst Denmark's figure will be predominantly pork and New Zealand, lamb. I spent a couple of days across the river plate in Buenos Aires and OMG the meat there... You go into a place that looks more like a an office cafeteria, pay very little and get a steak that is on par with a top steakhouse in Aus/EU or wherever.. Talk about off topic
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Post by On y va on Mar 31, 2016 20:42:52 GMT
2002?? My god! that is nearly the previous century!!! I don´t know this myself, it is just that Frank (the reason for this whole topic) mentioned this in his voyage email update about Uruguay. I just looked it up, it seems Hong Kong currently has the highest beef consumption per capita, followed by Argentina and then Uruguay. Anyway, his simple satellite data com unit worked ok! (back on topic)
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Post by hoppy on Apr 8, 2016 20:56:06 GMT
I looked at a lot of options and while the GO bugs "seem" to have been worked out, the unit is too stationary on the boat. I lucked out & bought a used (2014) Iridium 9555 with DC charger cradle, external antenna & Pelican case with 500 minutes left (Expire May 2016, but can roll-over with purchase of more minutes for 3 years). Total cost...$450. This option gives me the flexibility to download compressed weather data, email, and text data. We have three friends currently completing they 4 and 6-year circumnavigation. One uses a GO, one uses a 9555 phone and the other SSB/modem. The couple who have the sat phone also have SSB/modem setups, but have expressed they were glad to have the sat phones for emergencies and weather update downloads when crossing the Pacific and more so, the Indian Ocean. To me, a very big factor is if the phone is in the charging cradle fully charged and you have a go-to-the–life-raft situation...grab it and go! You can’t do that with stationary systems or SSB. $450 is a pretty good price for the 9555 even without the minutes, with 500 makes it a steal...
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Post by hoppy on Apr 10, 2016 20:04:54 GMT
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