While I can’t imagine having 9-16 AMPS of current draw that this arrangement supports (4 amps east and west of each of two power taps), I have effectively eliminated any amperage or voltage drop limitations on my N2K network and its ability to grow.Īs good as this sounds, it was a difficult choice. Another bonus of having two backbones is that I can carry more current, as I have effectively quadruppled the amount of power on my overall backbone by combining two backbones with the split tap solution Ben wrote about here on Panbo. I suspect the same voltage drop concern I have for low tech golf cart batteries will be true for some high tech battery technologies that are coming down the road capable of being discharged to very low levels without reducing charging cycles. I actually considered the largest sized cabling offered by Maretron, but it appeared hopeless to get through my conduit. This is especially important to me as my golf cart style 6v batteries tolerate being discharged down to 20% every once in a while, effectively giving me a better power to weight ratio than standard lead/acid, but the voltage levels can get really low, such that I wouldn’t want them to drop yet another volt traversing my N2K backbone.
This will be an improvement over my current arrangement where I did not plan a power saving mode … and hence nearly all my marine electronics are powered up to keep an eye on how well my anchor is holding and the current weather picture at my finger tips.įor my blue and grey networks, I am using NMEA 2000 wiring components from Maretron including double end cord sets available in blue and grey, and chose the “Mid” size backbone for its larger diameter power wires that result in significantly reduced voltage drops vs. While on the grey network would be things I would want active still at anchor such as a GPS (plot boat movement at anchor), fresh water tank sensors, battery monitor, and a chartplotter to display this information and weather (I currently have a pair of Raymarine e-series chartplotters and a Raymarine Sirus Weather Receiver). Most cockpit displays, most sensors (like the Airmar PB200), future autopilot, and so forth would be on a blue (blue water) network. The thought was to power a smaller network when my sailboat is on a mooring or at anchor. There were also a number of Autohelm/Raytheon Chart Plotters and the popular Pathfinder range of MFDs (RC530, RL70, RL80C, etc.) that all had NMEA Outputs, that would transmit the SeaTalk Instrument data. Here is a diagram showing the pin out of the Pathfinder and Pathfinder+ unit’s NMEA OUT Cable.Two backbones, yes that’s right. Originally the Autohelm ST50 Tridata and Multi instruments had an NMEA0183 Output and this was also true for the ST50+ range – for an ST50 or ST50+ instrument here is the wiring diagram:īy the time the ST60 range was released, the only instrument to have an NMEA0183 Output was the Multi instrument and when the ST60+ came out just the Graphic Display instrument had an NMEA0183 Output – For ST60 or ST60+ instrument, here is the wiring diagram.įor Raytheon Chart Plotters (RC530, RL70, RL80) Take the system below, most Multi-Function Displays have an NMEA port on them or perhaps the system has one of the SeaTalk to NMEA interface boxes (P/No E85001) which has an NMEA Ouput or an RS232 Output or you can also add our SeaTalk to NMEA converter, either of which can be connected to our WLN10 – Here is the wiring diagram for the SeaTalk to NMEA interface. Our WLN10/WLN30 cannot connect directly to a SeaTalk network but there are usually one or two NMEA0183 outputs in the Autohelm, Raytheon or Raymarine system where our WLN10 can be connected to. After NMEA0183, this is probably the most common network found on boats and there are still tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of boats around the world that have a SeaTalk network onboard.
Autohelm, the UK autopilot and instrument manufacturer who were bought by Raytheon in the 1990s and then evolved in to what is now Raymarine, developed their own instrument interface called SeaTalk.
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