Albin Owners Group

Here’s is a picture of my current helm. The Garmin 741 is 2 years old, it also has 18hd radar and a thru Hull transducer. I will be adding a new vhf with AIS and 8’ antenna and plan on keeping the 741.

My last boat has a 10” screen right on the dash. I am looking for options/opinions on what to do? There is no room on the dash and I don’t think I want to mount a fixed unit next to the compass

I was thinking about just adding an iPad with active captain and a vision card. Has anyone used the iPad/active captain?

I mounted a 10” Garmin on top of the dash.
Good solution, no hindrance to sight or visibility forward and the charts and info are right in front of your face.

Not sure if Garmin has something similar to what Simrad does? - my Simrad mirrors to my IPAD (and Phone) over wifi - giving me a 2nd (and 3rd) functional plotter

My 28TE has the fiberglass shell mounted to the ceiling. I think that under way on plane the bow is still up and anything on the top of the dash looked like it would block my vision. If I was standing my vision would be blocked. However sitting it's fine. I see that harbor mode it would not block as the bow is down and my line of sight would be above any mfd. The picture makes it look huge based on the angle however it's not. The shell was on the boat when I purchased her and it had a Furuno in it.

My 28 TE has the same shell arrangement as Mike’s. I have a 12” Simrad MFD, Simrad AP and a remote search light controller mounted in it; no visibility issues. Don.

I do not have a chart plotter/MFD and will be cruising the ICW, Great Loop, Bahamas, etc. leaving tomorrow. I use an Android tablet running both Navionics and Aquamap. They both display ActiveCaptain Community data. Aquamap also Waterway Guide data and USACE chart overlays. Navionics offers dock-to-dock auto routing, AIS and sonar charts. An iPad would be just as good if not better.

I also have a laptop running OpenCPN for a 'birds-eye" view and it's connected to my AIS transceiver/receiver (Vesper XB-8000).

Thanks for the info, so many options...

What size and model simrad do you both have. I have the same over head bow and want to put in a new GPS Fish finder.

NSS12

Garmin 741xs & Standard Horizon GX2200 Matrix VHF/GPS/AIS mounted side by side on the dash. This case the AIS output from the VHF is linked to the chartplotter via NMEA 0183. The chartplotter is a combo that can display speed, heading, depth, and position in the corners of the screen, or show fishfinder graphical display full screen or half screen shared with chart display. All touch screen functioning. In operation on our boat since late 2017.
One of my favorite features of the A25 is the built in chart table at the helm. Allows laying out chart atlases or regular folded charts right there at the helm.
Don't have Apple iPad or Active Captain. But I don't know some folks that use Active Captain & love it.

In case you're wondering, these pics were shot while heading up Toba Inlet in Desolation Sound, BC in 2018.

I built a complete new helm and had custom faceplates made for the stock gauges This reduced the space needed and I was able to gain enough space for a 12 “ screen and all the stock gauges with plenty of room for additional electronics This is a 31 TE but the faceplate change will gain you some space.

I built a complete new helm and had custom faceplates made for the stock gauges This reduced the space needed and I was able to gain enough space for a 12 “ screen and all the stock gauges with plenty of room for additional electronics This is a 31 TE but the faceplate change will gain you some space.

That looks fantastic!!

Anthony Warren
1999 28' Albin MadMoney

Here is my new dash. It was a fun project for sure. The Albin logo is backlit with fiber optics.

Mike
Very nice looking dash, my project this year is to replace all of the switches, on my 31 they are on the bulkhead.