Raymarine s1000 Autopilot

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J

JC

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Took the AutoPilot on her maiden voyage. I can only say.... OUTSTANDING!! The Fishing Patterns performed flawlessly. To check the AP's accuracy, I established a Goto waypoint on the Garmin 4208 three miles from my position. The AP turned the boat to the new heading, made a bee-line, and arrived accurately at the coordinates. Next along the course and off my Bow, I placed a waypoint at a distance of 1¾ miles, and another at 30 degrees and 3 miles from my MH. The third and last leg was a turn of 90 degrees and 3½ miles to complete the course. Again the s1000 was on target at each turn with a flawless performance. The AP continued to function down to 1knt (SOG) :D
 
That Zig-Zag pattern will come in handy if there's a U-Boat or two around! :shock:

Kidding aside, was this a drop in install, or did you need any extra fittings and such? :?
 
Every item required for the install was included. Complete with wrenches and hydraulic fluid. I’ve purchased many after market items and have never owned a product that was more organized and complete. The manufacture put a lot of thought into the assembly of the s1000 package.
 
I WENT BACK TO THE LINK YOU SUPPLIED, and reread the info. Can you steer the boat with the remote?

JC,
You have a PM.
 
TonyAmalfitano":2xwimm73 said:
I WENT BACK TO THE LINK YOU SUPPLIED, and reread the info. Can you steer the boat with the remote?
Click to expand...

Yes you can steer the boat with the remote.
 
Tony Wrote
Kidding aside, was this a drop in install, or did you need any extra fittings and such?

I have a 2520XL and I did need extra right angle fittings to turn the hydraulic hoses. Using only the fittings provided by the package I found that I could not close my panel door underneath the console without putting pressure on the hydraulic hoses. I was able to get the fittings at the local ACE Hardware store.

The system works great and I would recommend it to my best friend.
 
Looking for an autopilot right now and I found this thread. The Raymarine units looked really good, but if you are setting an autopilot coord, do you need to use Raymarine C or E series to make it work?
Also, I heard some feedback from a couple of boat owners that the Rudder reference will break on the autopilot. This is definitely something I don't want happening.

I want to be able to set a course using the GPS, then have an autopilot automatically take that course heading, turns, etc. I heard that the Simrad AP16 is the best one, because there is no rudder reference to break. Those arms are quite expensive to replace through Raymarine.

What would someone suggest, or is it rare that the reference breaks? I've been looking at this same Raymarine autopilot for quite some time. Thanks!
 
chris, the st 1000 can be wired to any gps, nmea connection. i have mine wired to a sitex gps, and a new ray c80. color codes are your onlt issue to get em right. your manuf. of gps should be able to help, ray is very helpful too and they even answer the phone!
 
I hate to be a downer, but as I have posted previously, the S1000 was designed to meet a price mark and has limitations compared to a "real" autopilot. Its major shortcoming is the lack of a flux gate to provide heading. It depends on the GPS for heading and if you go too slow for too long, it stops autopiloting. I don't deny it's a great product for the price, but you need to understand its limitations. I tried hard to live with mine, then sold it and upgraded to another Raymarine unit.
 
andertonm":3ecrcobn said:
I hate to be a downer, but as I have posted previously, the S1000 was designed to meet a price mark and has limitations compared to a "real" autopilot. Its major shortcoming is the lack of a flux gate to provide heading. It depends on the GPS for heading and if you go too slow for too long, it stops autopiloting. I don't deny it's a great product for the price, but you need to understand its limitations. I tried hard to live with mine, then sold it and upgraded to another Raymarine unit.
Click to expand...





when you say "to slow" as in how many knots?do you feel it is a decent unit to run from point A to point B.when i do troll it is at 4 to 6 knots.
 
If you are trolling against the current or into the wind, your spped over ground (SOG) as seen by the autopilot may be zero or close to it. When the S1000 sees your SOG is too slow, it quits navigating. You may be making a few knots through the water, but if your SOG drops to a certain point, you're not really making forward progress.

If you had a flux valve (electronic compass) the autopilot would still know which way your boat was pointed.
 
After reading this post, I was pretty convinced on that Autopilot, but, after getting a few opinions and hearing about the Simrad AP16, I think this is the way to go.
I have heard that the mechanical rudder reference can break on these units, disabling the autopilot, rendering the thing useless. I don't know how often this happens, but a guy I know up here replaced the autopilot rudder reference 3 times and finally removed it. He replaced it with an AP16.
Autopilots are really confusing also, and I've never had one on any of our previous boats, so really looking forward to getting the right one installed and not having any future issues.
Has anyone on this forum installed a Simrad AP16 (or similar model) on their parker?
Thanks! Good info here.
 
Rudder reference units are definitely the weak link in autopilot systems. They are "electro-mechanical"devices that can and do get both electrical and mechanical problems. Most outboard units are a "linear resistor" that converts rudder (motor) position to a voltage output. Basically, it's a voltage divider, but the outboards use a Rube Goldberg sort of "screw-in-a-tube" to drive a precision resistor that feeds a signal to the AP. Expensive and definitely does not comply with the KISS principle.

More attractive is the potentiometer in a bronze housing that is typical of old-school rudder position indicators. The pot just has an arm that can be mechanically linked to the rudder to provide a position signal.

My question is - why don't large outboard makers provide a position signal that could be used by whatever instrument? That would eliminate the linkages, alignment, etc.
 
HAHA! Rube Goldberg. The heading input from your engine, pops a balloon, which triggers a small wind up toy to walk across your deck, knocking a broom handle, which turn the wheel at your helm.. Works for me!

Why don't they build a Auto Pilot, using only a Flux reference input mounted on the outboard? A simple auto-learn mode and a GPS and you program the boat (in a setup mode), then you set a course either by degree, or via GPS input. The position of the engine, vs the postion of the boat would determine your heading.. However, if it was based off of a flux reference unit, which will always keep the heading of the boat in one position, regardless of the GPS limitations of speed, it will always reference magnetic posion and GPS location in relation to the bow and/or stern of your craft and the position of the outboard as a separate unit. If you are going at speeds below 1kt, the GPS reference would only have to kick in every 5 seconds to keep you on track. You could even put in mechanical stops (instead of rudder reference) and if the max distance of your engine's steering was exceeded and you were loosing your course, it would then kick the AP off and even trigger an alarm. I really don't know why they need the rudder reference unit. Maybe in the old days, they needed it because of lack of modern electronics.
Trolling for salmon here on the N. Coast is near impossible above speeds of 1.5 kts and even harder if you are stuck at the wheel. Magnetic reference is best. Why not mount one on an outboard?
Ok, I'm officially a geek.
 
I spoke with Raymarine recently about the S1000 and the problem reported with it loosing nav data at low speeds and was told this was a software problem with older units and the newer ones will function at any forward speed over ground. If you have a problem with this unit hooked to a Raymarine it is because your gps filter setting is set to weak automatically by the autopilot and you will need to go in and change it to high while trolling. I have never had this issue trolling at 3mpr and less. The problem may have been related to the gps signal received not the autopilot.
 
maxout":3u4vixoy said:
I spoke with Raymarine recently about the S1000 and the problem reported with it loosing nav data at low speeds and was told this was a software problem with older units and the newer ones will function at any forward speed over ground.
Click to expand...

The new software is accurate down to 1 knt.
 
That's a definite improvement, but remember, that's speed over ground and there are times when you will be trolling into tide and wind when your SOG may be zero or negative. That's when the S1000 doesn't fill the bill. Just want people to know what they are getting.
 
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