When Kathy and I first bought Snickerdoodle we installed a Signet knotmeter. It lasted about eight years and then began to
malfunction. Of course, the warranty had
expired. But, I called Signet and they
still sold the same model and I bought a replacement that was supposed to fit
into the same thru hull for the transducer and same housing for the thru-bulkhead
gauge. Unfortunately, the thru-bulkhead
housing was a little bit tight and the new knotmeter never read true. After a couple years, I quit trying and
bought a hand-held GPS that fit on an oak bracket that I made and could put in
the companionway. This worked fine until
one of my crew in a race sat on the GPS and broke the antennae.
The following winter I read about chart plotters and found
that Garmin made a model with a four-inch screen that had all the US fresh
water lakes and rivers loaded from the factory.
I bought one of these and a movable bracket to mount it on.
At the boat, I sawed off the inside of the knotmeter housing
flush with the inside of the cockpit to cabin bulkhead. After securing the adjustable bracket and
placing the chartplotter on it, hooking up the electrical connections, et. al.
I turned the unit on and it worked perfectly.
And, with the adjustable bracket, I can simply view speed, heading,
time, Lat/Lon, and the chart of Lake Pend Oreille…… Or, I can swing the
chartplotter into the companionway opening and play with other features.
So, if your knotmeter has “bit the dust”, you might consider
a chart plotter. They are pretty neat.
