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Remember when we used to plot dredge paths with paper charts and a grease pencil?
Now I just punch the GPS coordinates into the onboard screen, but I still keep a paper backup in the cab after a system glitch left us drifting near the Mobile channel for 20 minutes last fall. Anyone else still run a hybrid setup like that?
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kaib181mo ago
@ward.mason makes a fair point about digital redundancy, but how exactly are you powering that second system independent from the main one? Last season our backup display died because its power source was actually tied to the same bus bar as the primary, just further down the line. That glitch near Mobile channel where the paper saved us was a GPS antenna failure not a power issue, so the backup chart still had us plotted right relative to the buoys. What's your setup for keeping that second screen truly separate?
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Honestly, I don't even trust the backup paper that much anymore. If the main system glitches, what's to say your written coordinates are right for that exact second? That drift near the channel proves my point. I put my faith in having two separate, full digital systems running off different power sources. Paper feels like security theater to me now.
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