This isn't so much a "Brag" as a confession. This isn't pretty. I post this in hope that folks will advise ways to make this cleaner and easier to work with. I have not done much electronics tinkering, and lack craftsmanship.
My boat came with a set of dead Datamarine instruments. I had all of the old transducers removed and glassed over when I last hauled the boat. In retrospect I wish I had tried to save the paddle wheel. It also has an older 5 inch Garmin chartplotter with sounder. I also have a USB GPS dongle for location, but the Garmin is my only source of NMEA depth; it has a transducer epoxied inside the hull. I use the Garmin at the helm, augmented by tablets and smartphones (Wilhelm SK on iOS is a brilliant app for instrument data). I don't have one of those newer angled pedestal guardrails, so I fashioned this arm that sets the GPS back freeing up room to mount gadgets.
I added a masthead NMEA wind instrument, from Nasamarine. It didn't last long before water entered it and shorted/rusted out the electronics. I ordered a new circuitboard and gasket from England, and sealed some problem areas with silicone. This time it has lasted much better. I don't like the process of aligning it - shorting a couple of wires while the vane is pointed dead ahead - and wish there was a software offset in Openplotter for wind direction.
When I pulled out the Datamarine instruments I saved the enclosure that was used for the "brain" of the system. Since there was a big hole cut in my hull liner for it, I thought it might be good to store the Pi there. I replaced the front (top, as I have it oriented) panel with a sheet of black hdpe, so I can put buttons and LEDs and such wherever desired. At the moment I have a momentary button I use to shut down the pi, a power LED, and a power switch. It's basically a bin that I shove the hub, the pi and its proto hat, and a wad of wires into.
Hanging out the bottom of that is a brass terminal strip to which I've zip tied some DB9 breakout boards connected to the USB/Serial converters. The power supply and NMEA 0183 feeds from the Garmin and the masthead terminate here. Yeah, it's a mess. But it's all out of sight when I cram it back in the enclosure.
I have the two i2c components, the IMU and humidity sensor, mounted inside an RJ45 surface mount jack, as I have seen others do. I have this screwed to the bottom of a shelf in my nav station so that it is away from interference and heat of the pi. I also run the 1 wire stuff off of here for no good reason.
I have 4 one wire temperature probes. One is zip tied to the brass engine water intake thruhull. I call that sea temperature. I have one on the engine exhaust, and the radiator, and one in the ice box to monitor the beer temperature.
On the proto hat I soldered my first surface mount chip... badly. Broke a leg but got the ADC to work. I measure house bank voltage using a little divider breakout.
Just in front of the nav station I have a TV for the salon. It is on a mount that pivots 90 degrees so that it can face the seating area or serve as a monitor at the nav station. It is also visible from much of the cockpit in that position.
Very excited to have installed the Kip app for SignalK. FINALLY a practical (and attractive) instrument display for Openplotter. I also think it looks better than anything that is available for Android. Eager to get it customized to my liking.
I have an SDR going to a rail mounted antenna. This has stopped working, can't be enabled in Openplotter, on this trip to the boat. Not sure why. My home PC sees it. For that matter I have a wifi adapter doing the same thing. Seems like it might be the power from the hub is too weak or cables too long.
Not pictured I have some inductive sensors, as suggested by Ole Saastad, on a water tank. I don't have them working through Openplotter yet.
Any suggestions for cleaning up the wiring would be appreciated; connectors, busses, etc.
I am not sure why my boat shows that it is moving a fractional knot most of the time. It started several openplotter versions ago.
Greg Vaughan
Laguna 33GT "Star of the Orient"
Slidell, Louisiana, USA
My boat came with a set of dead Datamarine instruments. I had all of the old transducers removed and glassed over when I last hauled the boat. In retrospect I wish I had tried to save the paddle wheel. It also has an older 5 inch Garmin chartplotter with sounder. I also have a USB GPS dongle for location, but the Garmin is my only source of NMEA depth; it has a transducer epoxied inside the hull. I use the Garmin at the helm, augmented by tablets and smartphones (Wilhelm SK on iOS is a brilliant app for instrument data). I don't have one of those newer angled pedestal guardrails, so I fashioned this arm that sets the GPS back freeing up room to mount gadgets.
I added a masthead NMEA wind instrument, from Nasamarine. It didn't last long before water entered it and shorted/rusted out the electronics. I ordered a new circuitboard and gasket from England, and sealed some problem areas with silicone. This time it has lasted much better. I don't like the process of aligning it - shorting a couple of wires while the vane is pointed dead ahead - and wish there was a software offset in Openplotter for wind direction.
When I pulled out the Datamarine instruments I saved the enclosure that was used for the "brain" of the system. Since there was a big hole cut in my hull liner for it, I thought it might be good to store the Pi there. I replaced the front (top, as I have it oriented) panel with a sheet of black hdpe, so I can put buttons and LEDs and such wherever desired. At the moment I have a momentary button I use to shut down the pi, a power LED, and a power switch. It's basically a bin that I shove the hub, the pi and its proto hat, and a wad of wires into.
Hanging out the bottom of that is a brass terminal strip to which I've zip tied some DB9 breakout boards connected to the USB/Serial converters. The power supply and NMEA 0183 feeds from the Garmin and the masthead terminate here. Yeah, it's a mess. But it's all out of sight when I cram it back in the enclosure.
I have the two i2c components, the IMU and humidity sensor, mounted inside an RJ45 surface mount jack, as I have seen others do. I have this screwed to the bottom of a shelf in my nav station so that it is away from interference and heat of the pi. I also run the 1 wire stuff off of here for no good reason.
I have 4 one wire temperature probes. One is zip tied to the brass engine water intake thruhull. I call that sea temperature. I have one on the engine exhaust, and the radiator, and one in the ice box to monitor the beer temperature.
On the proto hat I soldered my first surface mount chip... badly. Broke a leg but got the ADC to work. I measure house bank voltage using a little divider breakout.
Just in front of the nav station I have a TV for the salon. It is on a mount that pivots 90 degrees so that it can face the seating area or serve as a monitor at the nav station. It is also visible from much of the cockpit in that position.
Very excited to have installed the Kip app for SignalK. FINALLY a practical (and attractive) instrument display for Openplotter. I also think it looks better than anything that is available for Android. Eager to get it customized to my liking.
I have an SDR going to a rail mounted antenna. This has stopped working, can't be enabled in Openplotter, on this trip to the boat. Not sure why. My home PC sees it. For that matter I have a wifi adapter doing the same thing. Seems like it might be the power from the hub is too weak or cables too long.
Not pictured I have some inductive sensors, as suggested by Ole Saastad, on a water tank. I don't have them working through Openplotter yet.
Any suggestions for cleaning up the wiring would be appreciated; connectors, busses, etc.
I am not sure why my boat shows that it is moving a fractional knot most of the time. It started several openplotter versions ago.
Greg Vaughan
Laguna 33GT "Star of the Orient"
Slidell, Louisiana, USA