Friday, February 15, 2013

McMurdo Smartfind S10/ Standard Horizon Matrix GX2100 AIS

I have just bought a Standard Horizon Marine VHF transceiver GX2100E for Tui which has an integrated AIS receiver. Lets see how the McMurdo Smartfind S10 Man Overboard AIS beacon looks on this in test mode.  This is a bench test and we are far from the sea. On the right here is the display with VHF channel, GPS display and the AIS position display






The beacon goes in to active test mode by turning the handle to test and holding it a few seconds. The strobe light flashes and I took it outside. After about 30s it acquired a GPS fix and the light goes in to a pattern of groups of three flashes







Here is how it looks on the AIS display of the radio. The MMSI of the beacon starts with 97 indicates it is a beacon (I am not yet sure if the MMSI needs to be registered on the ships radio (OfCOM) license or with the MCA as EPIRBS have to be. It did not trigger an alarm, but as it is in test mode it presumably looks just like a ship.



















As it has an MMSI the radio thinks you can call it. You can send a DSC alert but that will not do anything as far as I know.  The MMSI is built in the device, unlike radios where you have to apply for one and have it registered.