aleaddict
04-04-2007, 05:24 PM
First, I want to give a shout out to NoSlack for his great help and support to this Blackman newb. Kudos, m' friend.
I bought my Billfisher at the end of the season last year. The electronics were about 10-years old and most of it shot. The sounder had a bad PCB (no love) and the inside of the radome looked like a meth lab from all the corrosion. Only thing that worked was the Furuno GP-30, but that model did not have a chart plotter. Needless to say, it was time for an upgrade.
Went to the Fred Hall show in LB a few weeks ago and picked up the Furuno NavNet vx2 1824 radar, BBFF1 sounder and BBWGPS. I thought about going smaller (and cheaper), but in the end I got a great deal. Only thing I worried about was whether my through-hull 'ducer was still good. I bought the 8-to-10 pin adapter cable and plugged everything together. To my surprise (and delight), everything worked perfectly ! !
Now I had to mount this display on the bridge, and having seen NoSlack's posts on this site I was determined to follow in his lead. I "borrowed" some 1/8" thick Ss plate and 3-1/2" Ss tube from a friend and started makin' chips. The plate was just large enough to handle the footprint for the mounting bracket. Leveling the top plate required a lot of measuring but I finally got all the angles correct. Here's a pic of the mount with my bullet showing it square.
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet01.jpg
I used TIG for the welds followed by an orbital sander to clean it up. Not the most beautiful welds but its pretty hard welding on a round corner. Regardless of looks, I believe in function over form, and this baby is rock solid ! !
I could only tack-weld the top base plate to the pedestal since I was limited in workspace. I may try to use a stick weld to complete the bead or just seal it with silicone and call it good. Here's a pic of the front weld (sorry of the lousy focus job).
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet02.jpg
And here's how she looks in all her glory. I still need to locate a hole for all the cables running up to the back of the display, as well as repair all the old holes left by the previous owners, but that's another project . . .
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet03.jpg
Thanks again to NoSlack for the .dwg files and all helpful tips for this project. I owe you BIG TIME ! ! I'm planning on hitting Cat and SCI on Mother's Day weekend. Hope to see you on the water soon.
Best always, Brian/ale
I bought my Billfisher at the end of the season last year. The electronics were about 10-years old and most of it shot. The sounder had a bad PCB (no love) and the inside of the radome looked like a meth lab from all the corrosion. Only thing that worked was the Furuno GP-30, but that model did not have a chart plotter. Needless to say, it was time for an upgrade.
Went to the Fred Hall show in LB a few weeks ago and picked up the Furuno NavNet vx2 1824 radar, BBFF1 sounder and BBWGPS. I thought about going smaller (and cheaper), but in the end I got a great deal. Only thing I worried about was whether my through-hull 'ducer was still good. I bought the 8-to-10 pin adapter cable and plugged everything together. To my surprise (and delight), everything worked perfectly ! !
Now I had to mount this display on the bridge, and having seen NoSlack's posts on this site I was determined to follow in his lead. I "borrowed" some 1/8" thick Ss plate and 3-1/2" Ss tube from a friend and started makin' chips. The plate was just large enough to handle the footprint for the mounting bracket. Leveling the top plate required a lot of measuring but I finally got all the angles correct. Here's a pic of the mount with my bullet showing it square.
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet01.jpg
I used TIG for the welds followed by an orbital sander to clean it up. Not the most beautiful welds but its pretty hard welding on a round corner. Regardless of looks, I believe in function over form, and this baby is rock solid ! !
I could only tack-weld the top base plate to the pedestal since I was limited in workspace. I may try to use a stick weld to complete the bead or just seal it with silicone and call it good. Here's a pic of the front weld (sorry of the lousy focus job).
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet02.jpg
And here's how she looks in all her glory. I still need to locate a hole for all the cables running up to the back of the display, as well as repair all the old holes left by the previous owners, but that's another project . . .
http://10xx.net/Marine/navnet03.jpg
Thanks again to NoSlack for the .dwg files and all helpful tips for this project. I owe you BIG TIME ! ! I'm planning on hitting Cat and SCI on Mother's Day weekend. Hope to see you on the water soon.
Best always, Brian/ale