Author Topic: AIS receiver for my station (Read 16691 times)

iomkiwi · « **on:** March 14, 2012, 09:02:17 PM »

My new AIS receiver and mini computer are on their way.
Soon I will be able to receive GPS position and speed reports from ships and boats around this part of the country.

I was looking around this site one day and noticed the link about possibly getting a free receiver, I thought to myself that I may as well give it a go as I have a VHF aerial at the top of the mast that sits doing nothing most of the time.
I sent off the letter asking in the middle of last month and a week or so ago they came back with a reply saying that I was eligible and they would get one set up, the email arrived yesterday saying that it is now on it's way.

Hopefully very soon the map you saw if you followed the link earlier will have boats in the Bay and up the Northland coast - and of course a map of this area will become a part of my site.

(and it also means that if a Rena or Costa Concordia come visiting we will have independant evidence of their course)

TokWW · « **Reply #1 on:** March 14, 2012, 11:31:17 PM »

That sounds so cool! - I want one... But I don't have any coasts around LOL!

Suezy · « **Reply #2 on:** March 14, 2012, 11:56:32 PM »

Good one Alan - you will be a boy with a new toy.

JennyLeez · « **Reply #3 on:** March 14, 2012, 11:57:42 PM »

I actually think he should have bought all his friends one

iomkiwi · « **Reply #4 on:** March 15, 2012, 07:21:09 AM »

I've supplied the link so you can all ask for one

Sanctuary Weather in Auckland has one already

iomkiwi · « **Reply #5 on:** March 15, 2012, 10:21:58 PM »

It left Hamburg on Monday afernoon, has gone through Leipzig, Bahrain, and Seoul to Auckland and was passed on to courier system around midday so hopefully I will find it here when I get home tomorrow

JennyLeez · « **Reply #6 on:** March 15, 2012, 10:38:42 PM »

You will have a full weekend iomkiwi

iomkiwi · « **Reply #7 on:** March 16, 2012, 07:16:04 AM »

Yes - another thing I want to get going before I leave for the Shaky Isle.

- and it is now with local courier

iomkiwi · « **Reply #8 on:** March 18, 2012, 08:22:49 PM »

The parcel was sitting waiting for me when I got home on Friday, opened it up and the power supplies they sent have the wrong plugs for NZ

Mounted and connected what I could anyway, went into town on Saturday to get adapters and had everything plugged in and going by lunchtime. All the lights came on as I expected, green light flashing away merrily on reciever, steady light on mini-PC.

-then I read the instructions (

) and found that a fast flashing green light may not be what I want, it means there is interference! I am sure the interference is coming from the dud usb camera up the mast. I have uninstalled the drivers etc for that camera and now the lights are flashing as they should. A red flash every few seconds shows it is receiving data from the aerial, a second green light flashing shows it is sending to the mini-PC.

So I think it is all working fine, I have sent an email off to the suppliers as they should have given me some login details so I can check, am also asking what they want to do about power supplies as the adapter solution isn't the best.

If I don't have an answer by Tuesday I might just hook up keyboard/mouse/monitor to the mini-PC and see if I can see from there. The mini-PC is about the size of an external portable hard drive - it's not the sort of thing you have setup to operate all the time - and should be set up for my location already.

iomkiwi · « **Reply #9 on:** March 23, 2012, 08:10:14 PM »

Ships that pass in the night

TokWW · « **Reply #10 on:** March 23, 2012, 08:49:23 PM »

Cool Alan! That's quite like the airplane one that people provide a local "radar" for and fill in the gaps for tracking all aircraft - 'cept they move a bit faster ... LOL!