True Wind and Ground Wind—and Why We Need Both

When we are underway, we measure the apparent wind speed (AWS) with an anemometer and the apparent wind angle (AWA) relative to the bow with a wind vane. We also read the course through the water (CTW) with a heading sensor and the speed through the water (STW) with the knotmeter. Thus we can find the apparent wind direction (AWD) from AWD = CTW+AWA, and from this we can solve for the true wind speed (TWS) and true wind direction (TWD), as shown below. 

This true wind, shown on the left above, is what sailors care about—more specifically, what the helmsman and trimmers care about, because this is the wind their target speeds are tied to as presented in the polar diagrams.

The navigator and tactician, on the other hand, have the job of planning the route ahead, so they need to know if the wind we are experiencing now is what the forecasts said it will be, and they need to know if the changes in the wind that have taken place are consistent with the forecasts. To do this, they cannot use the same "true wind" that the trimmers use, unless the (COG and SOG) vector is the same as the (CTW and STW) vector. These two vectors can differ for a lot of reasons, including instrument calibration and steering bias, but the usual cause in a well founded vessel is actual motion of the water, currents.

The wind in the forecasts is "ground wind," meaning it is relative to the fixed earth, the ground. The true wind on the left above is relative to the water, and if that water is moving the ground wind will not be the same as the true wind. It is usually not a big difference, but it can be big, and even in cases where it is a small difference, this difference could mask a notable change in the weather. Thus it is best to have two sets of records (histograms), one of true wind and one of ground wind.

A change in the true wind alerts the helmsman that a new heading might be called for in steering, and a plot of the trend lets them think ahead to new sails or points of sail. But changes in true wind as such do not necessarily tell us what is going on with the weather map ground wind, because true wind is tied to STW, which in turn is dependent on CTW. A change in the ground wind speed might lead to a change in true wind direction, when in fact the ground wind did not change direction... or vice versa.

This possibility is enhanced when sailing in strong currents, which is common in the Pacific Northwest, and in other places like the Bermuda Races that have to deal with Gulf Stream eddies and meanders, with currents up to 4 kts. 

We look at some numerical examples below, but first a quick look at how this distinction is implemented in the nav station. There are two ways to address this. Either the nav program accepts all the sensors independently (CTW, STW, COG, SOG) and then it computes the four results itself (TWS, TWD, GWD, GWD) or sophisticated wind instruments that include all these sensors, compute both values for display and graphing on their own multi-function displays, or they transmit TW and GW to the computer nav programs for them to display and analyze.

Expedition, Rose Point Coastal Explorer and ECS, qtVlm, Deckman and TimeZero/MaxSea are examples of navigation programs that do these computations based on individual inputs, although TimeZero displays only one type of true wind at a time—you decide at setup if the displayed "True wind" is going to be TW or GW as defined above. Also each of these programs will also display the pre computed results from instruments if delivered to them in a NMEA sentence, discussed below.

Two examples of wind instruments that compute, display, and export both true wind and ground wind are the B&G H5000 and the AirMar 220WX. The former uses the terms true wind and ground wind, but the latter uses a NMEA influenced misnomer called "theoretical wind." The AirMar theoretical wind output can be GW or TW or both, but to get TW you must send it a NMEA sentence (VHW) with knotmeter speed—that unit has a GPS and a heading sensor, but no knotmeter. 

This wind data gets transmitted to and from the computer using the NMEA sentences discussed below.

AWA and AWS use VWR, and TWA and TWS use VWT. In both of these sentences, the wind angle (0 to 180) is followed by a L or R (left or right) for port or starboard winds. The sentences are simple and symmetric. It seems T stands for true and R for "relative," which is here meant to mean apparent.

These sentences are in wide use, but NMEA recommends a different sentence to use for both of them, namely MWV, which is a more complex sentence. When you have both AW and TW to transmit, you would have two MWV sentences, distinguished by an R or T following the wind angle. They say the T is for theoretical, but the only logical way to interpret what they write is to call that True, water based, as defined above.

The complexity comes in the way the wind angle is defined for both T and R. It is the (0 to 360) relative bearing of the wind direction. Thus a wind angle of 90 would be 90 R in the other sentences, and a wind angle of 270 would be 90 L. The wind angle 330 is 30 L, and so on.

GWD and GWS are given in MWD. Here the wind direction is just 0 to 360, "relative to North," and the speed is the wind speed "that blows across the earth's surface."

In principle, the wind data in the sentence MDA (Meteorological Composite) should in fact be GW ("wind speed and direction relative to the surface of the earth"), but this sentence is misused so often that NMEA discourages its use, and indeed this one is fading away. 

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I want to add specific numerical examples to show the value of GW for weather analysis and forecasting, and specifically why recording TW alone could miss vital signs of weather changes... but this will take some time, and I want to post this much so I can get feedback from anyone interested in this topic.  I also now have some nice Expedition log data thanks to racing navigator Andrew Haliburton, which I can show as well once we get it analyzed.

We do not need to discuss the value of the TW (water based true wind), because that is fundamental to sailing and well known.

For now, please let me know if there are comments on the above to date. I know there are sailors with strong feelings on this topic, so my goal here is to show how these two concepts fit onto the boat, and who specifically might use which.

I found it interesting to note that the racing program Adrena refers to and tabulates the wind in a grib forecast as GWS and GWD, which is of course true. But if you ask the meteorologist who coordinated the production of this grib forecast  if that is ground wind, they would almost certainly say, "What is that?  Do you mean true wind?"

In the meantime, here is a quick look at this distinction using qtVlm simulator and live data from the Gulf Stream that I just now downloaded: GFS wind and RTOFS current.

Above is view without current and we see TW and GW are identical and both equal the wind on the grib, read from the cursor position in the status bar.

Recall that after clicking to see the image you can right click again, open in new tab and then zoom in for more detail.

Below we add the Gulf Stream and this boat is sitting in about 3 kts at the moment.

Now we see that only the GW agrees with the grib winds and the wind directions differ by 4º and the wind speeds differ by 3 kts.  So the effect is clear, but the real value comes in analyzing the trends, which can tell us much, even if the actual values do not differ too much, but this will take me a bit longer to put together.

Another thought to address is the uncertainty in the forecasts is something like ±2 kts on the wind speed and ±10º or maybe a bit less on the direction. These uncertainties are about the level of differences in the two wind definitions in some cases—but that fact should not distract us when it comes to an effort to do the best we can in the analysis. One definition of the wind is right for this comparison and the other is not, and even though the forecasts have a notable uncertainty, that does not mean they will be wrong by that much. In short, it is not productive to ignore this distinction in wind definitions because the uncertainties in the forecast data and our own measurements might be comparable. By ignoring the distinction we increase our measurement uncertainty in a way that could be avoided.

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Here is an earlier article that includes the formulas we use to compute the winds, plus much discussion of the concepts in the comments.  True Wind From Apparent Wind — Revisited.

Adding Elevation Contours to ENC in qtVlm

One of the things we miss the most in using ENC is the essential absence of terrain info, especially elevation contours, buildings, and streets we can see from the water. There are occasional spot elevations on ENC, and even more rarely a cliff, but not much more.... and I should add here that some nations do a better job on the land than we do.  But it is generally not as good as we are used to with paper charts, and the sad part is, it could indeed be very much better—I am optimistic that the new NOAA Custom Charts (NCC) will make up for this, eventually.

A hint in that direction is the qtVlm function that lets us overlay shape files on the charts we are looking at, be they ENC or RNC.  

For an enhanced view, right click, open in new tab, then zoom in.

The top row is standard RNC left and ENC right of a chart section. Below I have overlaid streets and elevation contours....but without any enhancement. The contours are every 20 ft, which we can easily change to every 40 ft, etc; we can change the line thickness and the color bar to improve the picture. Likewise the streets are not optimized at all. This is just a quick view, but we can, as shown in the video link below, put the cursor on any contour to read its value, or on a street to read its name. You have to zoom in to see it, but we can easily identify the famous Water Street along the water in Port Townsend. 

My main goal here is to show how to get this contour data; once that is done, loading it into qtVlm is quick and easy. The process is not hard once you know the sequence. We are going for elevation contours over US lands.

How to get elevation contours

Step 1.  Go to https://apps.nationalmap.gov/downloader/

Step 2. Pan and zoom the map to the area you care about (it has a fast, positive response)

Step 3. On the top right, choose map indices = 7.5 minute, and it will draw in the areas we can select this way.  (There are ways to get larger sections at a time, up to 1ºx1º but those contour files will be 200-300MB, which are too big to load at one time. They load, but slows the program down and we never need this all at once. ) 

Step 4. Scroll the left side menu to the bottom section and check:  "Topo map data and topo style sheets."

Step 5. Check 7.5’ x 7.5’  and check Shapefile.

Step 6. At the top left Set Area of interest = Mat Extent/Geometry, then click Extent, then on the map draw a rectangle inside of what you want. Don't encompass it, but rather just have the border inside of the ones you want. (The choice will be 1, 2 or 4 or  more tiles, but we do not need to download all we select. You can also "clear Geometry and start again.)

Step 7. Back to the top left then choose Search products, and you will get a list of all the files you can download. The link is on the bottom.  Note that each tile has a name.

Step 8. You will get a file such as: VECTOR_Nordland_WA_7_5_Min_Shape.zip.  When you unzip that you get a folder called Shape that contains 180 files. We need then to pull out just the ones called Elev_Contour

Step 9. Copy these into a new folder named, say, Nordland_contours.  You can then load these into qtVlm using menu View/Shapefiles and SHOM/Open a shapefile   (SHOM is the French Hydrographic Office). In this process you direct the program to the main SHP file, but the program also needs others in this set.  You can then add multiple such files, keeping the data sets in separate folders on your computer.

Here is a quick look at elevation contours over Port Townsend area—not optimized in display, with just random colors used. But we see already something we could not see on the RNC or the ENC, namely there is a pronounced channel on the peninsula that is only 20 to 40 ft high bordered by 160 to 200 ft high hills.  This can funnel in winds creating notable wind lines at the boundaries shown here that are indeed known to local racers, which our lead weather instructor Dave Wilkinson can vouch for. He knows these waters well. Elevation contours and spot elevations on nautical charts are referenced to mean sea level, unlike the heights of lights and bridge clearances which are relative to MHW.

The video below illustrates the procedures above plus then loading them into qtVlm.

Downloading the files and loading into qtVlm (8:03)

NOAA Chart Catalogs—A Thing of the Past...Not Really

We have always praised the value of having a paper chart catalog on board as the best way to know what charts are available and a way to index what you have on board. Just annotate the catalog with a highlight marker around the charts you have.  This proved very valuable when doing a lot of sailing over several charts, or any longer voyage.

Originally, folded paper chart catalogs were delivered in great bundles to all chart dealers, who in turn handed them out to mariners who ask for them. Then as cutbacks started, this was discontinued, to be replaced by PDF versions that could be downloaded and printed or not. These could be annotated in the digital form as needed. The transition to PDF happened quite a few years ago.

But just recently, we noted that the PDFs were gone, as were previous links and web pages devoted to them.  So this is a deeper level of cutback—foretelling inevitable cuts related to paper charts, all of which are destined to be gone by end of 2024. These catalogs were all about paper charts, or the raster echarts (RNC) copied from them. Those catalogs told us nothing about the vector charts (ENC) we will all be using in a year or so. Several paper charts have already been removed... and indeed minor details are no longer being updated on the paper charts, but only in the ENC.

But we still have a couple years of sailing on paper charts where these catalogs remain valuable, which made me that much happier to discover a solution to this that will certainly take us right up to their last day on earth. The solution comes from the Coast Pilots, which we can download in full as PDFs.

Despite cutbacks in some areas, the Coast Pilots are flourishing and becoming even more important resources to all mariners, not just ship captains.  They include, for example, a complete set of the Navigation Rules, and much local knowledge on wind and current. Because some states have two Coast Pilots covering their waters, we made a Custom Interactive Index to the Coast Pilots that resolves that issue, which is not clear online.

The Coast Pilots also include all we need to create a dedicated Paper-Chart Catalog. At the end is a link to download the one we made to replace the now defunct original Pacific Coast Chart Catalog. The cover looks like this:

Each Coast Pilot has an index page showing the coverage of each chapter.

Then each of these chapters has, somewhere included, a page that shows all charts in that region. The Chapter 8 example is shown below.

Once you have these pages extracted from the Coast Pilot for each chapter, you can compile those to make the Chart Catalog.  The Pacific Coast is just 10 pages.  Then you can highlight these to mark the charts you have on board.  There are tools on line for extracting PDF pages, or just use screen caps and then print them.

This is what a page might look like once you have highlighted the charts you have on board.

Here is the Chart Catalog made as outlined above.

Pacific_Coast_Chart_Catalog_2022.pdf

Once we are switched to all ENC and the new NOAA Custom Charts (NCC), which will be our paper chart replacements, we can think on ways to index these. But they will all be custom areas,  not likely following existing paper-chart borders.

For the ENC we will eventually all be using, there will then be fully reschemed ENCs that have tidy borders, scales, contours, and logical names, so it will be easy to make graphical indexes for these—but this is more or less a non-issue, in that we would most likely have all of the charts installed at all times. Looking back at that time, these paper chart catalogs will be like the plastic trays we used to organize our music cassettes.

WAAS and EGNOS: Satellite-Based (GPS) Augmentation Systems (SBAS)

Outdoors with a clear view of the sky, we turn on the GPS and in seconds get a fix, and only periodically do we pause to be amazed at how accurate it is. To the vast majority of users, this is black-box technology. We might know that it works on a ranging principle, effectively measuring how far we are from the known positions of several satellites, and from that it can compute a position roughly like we do with radar, measuring the distances to two or three landmarks, and then plotting the intersection of these circles of position. The GPS measures the distances by timing the signals on their path from the satellite to our receiver.

Nevertheless, this is all black box. There is no way for most of us to comprehend the timing precision required (fractions of a billionth of a second), nor even how that might be achieved. It takes three satellites to get a two-dimensional fix and four to get a three dimensional fix, which is one more than we might expect, because the extra one is needed to solve the timing problem. 

Typical GPS accuracies quoted assume you have a clear view of the sky, defined as seeing all satellites above 5º high in all directions—inside or near a structure (boat!) this is never the case. Then the nominal horizontal position accuracy is quoted at about ± 8 meters. It can in fact be a bit better than that, and it can be notably less than that in real conditions. The website gps.gov is an excellent source for all things GPS. It generally has plain language discussion of most topics, followed with links to the more mathematical and engineering matters. Mariners might also look at the GPS section of navcen.uscg.gov.  The FAA remains a primary reference.  There is also an online magazine (GPS World) devoted to latest developments, often with stories and links interesting to mariners and laymen—the latest issue has links to recent EGNOS studies.

On land, GPS accuracy is not often as good as we might get at sea with a well positioned antenna. But on land or at sea anything approaching 8 meters is remarkable, being a half a boat length or less for many mariners and indeed a boat length for thousands more.

On land it can be worse when part of sky is blocked. The proof positive way to test this is just turn your GPS on and leave it running overnight, connected to a navigation program that is plotting its track every few seconds or so. Be sure the program is set to high accuracy tracking.  In the morning you will see what the spread in values is, and indeed, whether or not the centroid of that track pattern is indeed where the unit was located.

This type of test gets you two numbers. The spread in values and the distance between the mean location and the true location. Be sure the GPS and the chart you are using are set to the same horizontal datum, such as WGS 84.  

In a sense, the point at hand in this note is that if you do this test in the US or Europe with a relatively new GPS unit positioned next to the south side of a building you will likely get notably better results than you will get with it up against the north side of that building.

We can thank the aircraft industry for that as they are the ones who motivated development of a higher accuracy GPS fix so that aircraft could use it for navigation. The altitude or elevation output of an uncorrected GPS is not good enough for aviation; much of the time it is actually terrible, relative to what we can do with a modern barometer, which most all of our cellphones include.

The improved GPS signals are called "augmented," and the system in the US is called WAAS, the Wide Area Augmentation System. In Europe it is called EGNOS, the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service. There are also systems in India (GAGAN), Russia (SDCM), and Japan (MSAS), but we are not looking at these for now. 

There are indeed other ways to notably improve GPS locally, typically called Differential GPS;  the USCG and others have offered such services for some years. They work essentially the same as WAAS that we describe below, but on a local basis. GPS can indeed provide centimeter level accuracy with these tools, along with other enhancements, but this is another topic, beyond conventional navigation.

Yet another category of enhanced GPS performance oriented toward aircraft is called Ground-Based Augmentation Systems (GBAS), whereas WAAS and EGNOS are known as Satellite-Based Augmentation Systems (SBAS). The graphic below shows schematically how WAAS works.

Figure 1. Schematic of the WAAS system for improved accuracy and availability.

This system uses three geostationary satellites (called the WAAS satellites) located over the Equator in the Eastern Pacific (we show just one), along with some 38 reference stations (RS) scattered across North America (only two shown above), along with three master stations MS (we show just one) and six uplink antennas for getting the data back to the WAAS satellites (we show just one).

The 32 or so GPS satellites are in medium earth orbits (MEO), about 1.5 earth diameters above the surface. They are more or less evenly scattered around that shell. The three WAAS satellites, are geostationary at 2.8 earth diameters above the surface. They do not move, remaining on the Equator at the longitudes shown in the figures below.

Surface footprints of the geostationary SBAS satellites. At the satellite locations, they would be directly overhead. At the boundaries shown they will be 5º above the horizon. These are the satellites in use as of Dec, 2021. The satellites are changed periodically, so you may see older versions online.  A satellite's PRN number (stands for pseudo random noise) such as 133 for SES-15. The NMEA satellite SBAS ID numbers are defined in NMEA sentence GBS as PRN - 87.  Thus PRN 133 goes to 133-87 = 46. This shows where the WAAS satellites can be seen, but only in the shaded areas can these be used for improved GPS accuracy, discussed later in this post. (NMEA 48 replaced NMEA 51 in May, 2022.)

The GPS fix we get without help is not as good as it could be due to small errors in the timing of the signals, precision of the satellite's ephemeris (how well we know where they are located at any second), atmospheric effects on the signal transmission, as well as the lingering problem of multipath errors when the signals reflect or diffract around objects on the way to the receiver whenever we do not have a "clear view" of the sky. All small effects, but we are considering here very precise measurements.

The system works like this: The several reference stations continually record the GPS fix they get from the satellites in view to them at the moment, which they compare to their precisely known geodetic location. The discrepancy observed is then passed on to a master station that coordinates that observation with similar ones at the same time from the other reference stations, and from this they deduce what the errors are in the signals from each of the satellites that would account for the observed discrepancy. This information is then transmitted to antennas that send the data to the WAAS satellites, which in turn sends it back down to any WAAS enabled receiver on our vessels (or smart watch!) for an improved position fix. Although it was an advertising point at one time, these days, most GPS receivers include this functionality routinely.

With WAAS in place, the nominal optimum horizontal accuracy of 8 m is reduced to about ±1 m and the vertical accuracy is reduced to about the same. On board, however, we would typically set our GPS to compute only a 2-dimensional fix, and we manually enter the elevation of our antenna. Ruling out the 3-d fix yields faster and more dependable positions.

Note too that these are capabilities of the system, viewing all the sky with presumed good geometry of the satellites. There can be times when the geometry is not as good, like doing a compass bearing fix using two landmarks that are near each other. During times when the geometry is not good,  the accuracy is not as good. This varies with time. I am not sure of the best summary, but in practice it is likely that the addition of WAAS takes a fix from a practical average of ±10 m down to ±3 m. 

In any event, being able to view a WAAS satellite not only improves the accuracy of the position by applying the corrections, it improves the number of satellites we can use, and adds integrity to the fix by monitoring the health of each satellite. It also improves the accuracy of your COG and SOG, especially at low speeds.

But for this improvement to take place, your GPS receiver has to see one of the WAAS satellites. At sea within the footprint of the satellites this is easy, but on land or on inland waters, we have to check that they are not blocked by local terrain or buildings. In short we need to know the angular elevation above the horizon of the WAAS (or EGNOS in Europe) satellites, and the direction to them (azimuth) from our specific location. 

Here is a 

LIVE INTERACTIVE WAAS SATELLITE CALCULATOR

Sat Lon is the longitude of the WAAS or EGNOS satellite, from the table above. Ship Lat and Lon is the observer's position.  Elevation is the angular height of the satellite above your horizon viewing in the true direction Azimuth. Enter the data then press Calculate.

Example: to see WAAS satellite 46 from the Pacific Northwest (47.8 N, 122.3 W) we must be able to see the sky in direction of 189 T at 35º above the horizon. That is about one third of the way up from the horizon to overhead.

You can find the elevation and bearing to any of the geostationary SBAS satellites from any location within their footprint this way,  then put this info into your logbook or memory, so you know where to look for this extra accuracy.

But keep in mind that you can see the SBAS satellites from a vastly larger area than they actually provide augmented accuracy for. Each of the systems is limited to providing accuracy data to regions that are covered by their reference stations. Outside of these areas, outlined below, you can be getting a fix from satellites that the reference stations do not see. So these services are limited to the regions shown.

The farthest north WAAS reference station in the US at Barrow, AK. I believe they all have the same design.

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Here is an example taken in front of our office. The GPS (Bad Elf Pro) had a good view of the sky, but not at all what is officially called  clear or full sky. 

This was a run for 3 or 4 hours. This does not show very detailed results in that it would be best to record Lat Lon every few seconds and then plot those distributions. The notable NE and SE excursions were likely just a few seconds each.  The mean location of the track seems to be roughly 5 m SW of the presumed true location, but we do not know if this OpenStreetMap is accurate. It does agree with Google Earth, but they could be from the same source. In short, it is always valid to question what we are calling the right answer. If we are using an ENC, we can look into the accuracy of the data parameter for where we are. You will find that this varies more than we might have guessed.

The more interesting observation from this has been the confirmation that only one WAAS satellite shows up at a time, even though all might be in view. In our case here, I did actually see each of them (44, 46, and 51) on different days, but always only one at a time. This seems a logical way for them to behave.

We need to look to NMEA sentence GGA to determine if the WAAS is active. Below is from a later view when it switched to 51:

$GPGGA,233533.000,4740.4708,N,12223.9031,W,2,10,0.84,46.7,M,,M,,*5B

             Time       Lat         LON    6  7    8    9  10  

6 = 2 means differential, including WAAS, or 9 meaning generically SBAS. (0 = no fix, 1 = normal GPS fix)

$GPGSA,A,3,30,13,09,14,27,04,08,07,20,05,,,1.15,0.84,0.78*00

satellites used for the fix + last 3 related to uncertainties

$GPGSV,3,1,12,07,81,021,16,30,59,286,18,09,45,155,19,08,38,091,23*73

$GPGSV,3,2,12,51,33,159,30,14,28,219,29,27,27,055,17,20,24,274,17*7A

$GPGSV,3,3,12,05,22,306,29,04,12,142,12,13,09,311,24,16,07,046,*7E

sat number, elevation, azimuth, SNR for each, 4 to a sentence.

I will return later to add more about these sentences.

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Reference for computing altitude and azimuth of the satellites: https://tiij.org/issues/issues/3_2/3_2e.html

Connecting GPS to a Computer

To run an electronic charting system (ECS) such as OpenCPN, qtVlm, Coastal Explorer, Expedition, Time Zero, or any of many other fine navigation programs, on a computer requires connecting a live GPS receiver to it. Unlike tablets and phones, most computers do not include a GPS receiver, but it is easy to add one.

Note added Jan 28, 2024, about 3 yrs after this was originally published. We were surprised to learn that many of the then popular units are no longer for sale. We will keep the discussions as they largely apply to replacement units, but mark the section in brackets [ ] followed by options available now.

GPS Options

There are several kinds of connections. Some years ago, the only option was via a serial port connector and this is still available, but since few computers have those connectors these days, this would then be  achieved using a serial to USB converter cable. But this would likely be an old GPS if it had a serial connector on the output. These days we are more likely to have a USB connector that plugs directly into the computer, or we could use a Bluetooth connection, or a Wi-Fi connection. Or we might have a NMEA 2000 (N2K) connector, but for most computer-based ECS these would need the output converted to NMEA180 and there are several N2k-USB gateways for that such as the Yacht Devices YDNU-02.

So we look here at the generic options: USB, Bluetooth (BT), and Wi-Fi. These all have options in the $100 range; there are USB GPS for about $30, and some as low as $12, and indeed there are phone apps that will transmit a wireless GPS signal to your computer for $8—or spend $40 for an app like qtVlm and you get a whole array of sensor data (position, time, heading, heel, and barometer) from phone to computer by Wi-Fi, as well as a top of the line mobile nav app.

Here are examples we know about and have tested, but there are certainly very many other options. We do not have any commercial interest in any of these products. We have pictures of these shown below.

[ •  Inexpensive USB GPS: Globalsat BU-353S4 about $30. This is probably as inexpensive as they get. Has about a 6 ft cable, and you just plug it in (and follow set up notes below). Might need a USB cable extension. They are inexpensive. These units must see as much of the horizon as possible... but can look through a glass portlight (industrial Velcro!). ] See replacements such as

Under $20 USB at Amazon

USB with magnetic base and long cable for use in a car

These are both very low cost and plenty adequate for training and backup.

[ •  Low cost Bluetooth GPS: Globalsat BT-821C We have had several of these over the years and old ones still work, but not clear if still available. Was about $50. Again, velcro to a portlight, or at home set it on a window sill.  ] A good BT GPS is always a great tool to have in your nav kit. I do not find any low cost versions, but there are still a couple good higher end units listed below.

When pulling out the old units, remember GPS technology has changed; newer units will get a fix faster, and with fewer satellites, and potentially more accurate results.  My guess is anything older than about 10 years would likely show notably less than optimum performance.

[ •  High-end Bluetooth GPS with data logger and app: Bad Elf Pro about $200. You can also just turn it on periodically without any BT or other connections to record and save nav data. Very good BT behavior and includes a basic mobile app as a back up. Great battery life. Going sailing with friends, turn it on and tie it somewhere in view of the sky, then you can take it home and export your track as a GPX file.  This will also of course serve as a live BT GPS signal for your ECS navigation. ]. This excellent Bad Elf unit is discontinued, with only expensive units from the company that we do not need. There are though still a couple very good BT units at or near $100.

Dual Electronics We have one and they work great. Also serves as external GPS for iOS devices

Garmin GLO 2.  Have not used one, guaranteed to be excellent.

 •  Antenna mount N2k GPS with built in heading sensor: Lowrance Point-1. About $270. This is an excellent unit for a vessel. We have had one for a couple years now, super fast connections.  It connects to a N2k backbone that includes the USB gateway that links it to the computer. 

There are several related units at West Marine. Many made to connect to AIS or radio, so we need to add connector adapters.

Garmin GA38 Just $78. Includes a long cable, but with BNC (coax) connectors at each end, so you will need to go from BNC to USB to get into the computer. 

 • Handheld dedicated GPS unit: It may take some research, but some of these can be wired to your computer to use as a primary source of GPS.  We have many of these dating way back, but the example we use here is our Garmin GPSMAP 78s. This is an old one, it was one of three used by team MAD Dog when they set the record for the R2AK in 2016—we had the pleasure of working with them in preparation for the race. Connecting these hand held GPSs to the computer can take some research. It is usually not covered in the manuals. We explain below how to do it with this one.

•  An iOS App that broadcasts GPS signals to your computer from your phone is GPS2IP. There is a well documented free version for testing (4 minutes at a time), and then $8 for full version with no time limits. It is best to test the free app to be sure all works as you expect, before the purchase. Our experience is it works great. The app can be set up to transmit other phone sensor data, but at present it is position and heading. These connect via a Wi-Fi link, either TCP, UDP, or Socket, as explained in detail at their website, which also includes step by step instructions for actually connecting to most of the popular navigation programs. The app will transmit in the background, but running the GPS and broadcasting data are a heavy battery draw, so the unit must be either plugged in or not far from it.

•  The mobile version of qtVlm both iOS and Android will also broadcast the GPS signals to your computers via Wi-Fi. It has a demo version, but for this function we need the paid version, which is $40. The app will also transmit your barometer, heading, and heel, all obtainable from sensors in the phones. It will also run and transmit this data in the background, but as noted above, this is a heavy battery draw, so the unit has to be plugged to power.  But with this, you have a full navigation system in the phone, plus a backup way to send signals to your computer. A BT or USB device is likely best choice for regular usage.

Wired GPS connections

The above are sample sources of GPS and other NMEA data we can use, now we take a look at the actual connection, and for this we will use qtVlm as a typical ECS to show the process. This is essentially the same for all ECS, once you find how you access NMEA connections. In OpenCPN it is Setup/Connections; in Coastal Explorer it is Settings/Electronics; in Expedition it is System/Instruments, and so on.

Below shows the units we used for the input testing.

These are, left to right, Lowrance Point 1 antenna mount (connected by wire to the N2k backbone shown below, which in turn was connected via USB to the computer), an iPhone with qtVlm mobile app running and broadcasting GPS and other NMEA data to the computer by Wi-Fi, above it an old Globalsat bluetooth GPS, and next to it is a new Bad Elf pro Bluetooth GPS; above it is a Globalsat USB GPS; then the Garmin GPSMAP 78s, which is connected to the computer with a custom Garmin cable; below that is another iPhone, this one running the GPS2IP app broadcasting the GPS data by Wi-Fi to the computer; and on the right, an older antenna mount GPS from some 15 year ago. It still works but is slow.  The window faces due south, but there are large windows to the right of this pic providing a slice of sky view to the west and N-NW. You can click the pic, then open in new tab, and zoom for detailed view.

The N2k bus (backbone) we use for testing is shown below. 

The far left cable is the Lowrance Point 1, next to it is the YD Gateway that can be configured to output the N2k signals or convert them to NMEA 0183 which are needed for many if not most stand alone ECS. The output cable is USB. Next to that is a YD N2k barometer, followed by the 12V power connector.  We have a review article called Introduction to NMEA 2000 with a Refresher on NMEA 0183.

qtVlm connections

That is the hardware we use, now we can look at the connections. In qtVlm this is at Preferences/NMEA connections, which brings up the window below (in Windows this is Configuration/NMEA connections).

Here is the incoming setup. qtVlm can export this data to another device (Output tab), but we are not covering that here. Recommend leaving Automatically start NMEA in the Off position for training. Underway this would be turned on.

We look at the port options below. The NMEA signals will always be: 4800, No parity, 8 bits, 1 stop bit, and no control. No need to change any of these.

The Replay file is a way to view NMEA data stored in a file, which we don't cover here. (We used this function to reenact the grounding of the Ever Given in the Suez Canal.)

Edit custom serial ports is a function for Linux users. Not needed here.

Next is option to set up 3 different serial port sources (USB or BT), which we could then switch with a click. Only one at a time is used. Also not difficult to change one as needed.

If your device (i.e., tablet or phone) has an Internal GPS, this is where you turn it on. This would be for those running the mobile version of qtVlm.  Next to that is the option to Send to NMEA outputs, again not covered here—this is covered in the Wi-Fi GPS section below.

RMB is a NMEA sentence that describes the active waypoint. This is left off. It is an option to let some external device determine what the active waypoint is. 

Display raw NMEA data  I prefer to leave on for training as it is a quick way to note we are getting signals, and it is easy to shut off.  

Record NMEA data only applies to real NMEA signals, not simulated. You can if you like record a day's sail or a race or a practice maneuver, and then replay to study it... or to gather information to improve your polar diagram.

Date and time from NMEA is useful when away from any network for an extended time. Not needed on shore with your computer connected to the internet. This automatically keeps your local computer time  up to date. Offshore, however, your computer is just another quartz watch, which will gain or lose time.

What you see when you drop down one of the serial port input options is typically a list of not just the active ports, but all the ones you have looked at recently. On a PC these will show up as a list of com ports, as shown below

For the direct USB cable plugin the process is usually just plug and play. With PC connections, the com number is typically unique to specific USB input plugs, with one, for example, called com3 and the one next to it com4, and on the other side of the laptop com5, etc. It can be valuable to use the same input for the same device to save having to reconfigure screens like the one above.  These com numbers can also change if you connect multiple devices. 

For the Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connections, there are usually a couple steps to follow in the correct order, which we come to below.

How these serial ports show up in a Mac is always a surprise. Below is what we see on an iMac after using several of the GPS sources shown above. In the Mac version of qtVlm you will see two basic forms: cu.port-name and tty.port-name. You can use either one for the input. Other Mac nav programs may only show the cu.port-name.  I think we see both in qtVlm because it offers the option to export the data as well as import it.

The green symbol on the right is a NMEA sentence filter. Most ECS have this option in some form. In this case it looks like the following, where we compare the Display raw NMEA data window, before and after applying a filter. This option is not often called for. You may have the same data from two sensors whose sentences can be identified, and this way you can shut one off.

Once the GPS, or NMEA stream more generally, is connected you can view the quality of the GPS data from the NMEA tab in the Dashboard. Start the NMEA and then press GPS status to see something like this:

I have to say "something like this..." because this is artificial in that you cannot see the two color panels at once; it is one or the other. This shows the satellites being used for the fix. The numbers are the actual satellite numbers; this is not just counting them.

Latest build of qtVlm also now predicts satellite locations for Iridium and GPS satellites and more.

The "Constellation" view is a radar presentation showing their relative locations and elevations. The circumference is the horizon, the point overhead is in the middle. The black ring is halfway up the sky. Red means the satellite has been identified and is there, but for some reason is not being used in the fix. This information is being transmitted from the GPS receiver that is doing the fixing and then telling us this satellite information in sentences GSV and GSA. The green squares are Russian GLONASS satellites (numbers 65-88). Not all receivers are configured to use these. US GPS are numbers 01-32. Augmented GPS (WAAS) are 46, 48, 44, and provide highest accuracy, but these geostationary satellites over the Equator are not easy to see on land at higher latitudes, as buildings or terrain to the south may block them out.

Video demo of connecting a wired GPS to qtVlm. (7:06)

Bluetooth GPS

Bluetooth (BT) is another popular way to connect a GPS to the computer. Once set up, it generally works as well as a wired connection, but there are two extra steps to the connection: paring the GPS device to the computer and then connecting the nav app to the serial port created by the pairing. It is important to recognize that this is two distinct steps. The Bluetooth GPS may allow for paring with multiple devices, but once paired to a computer, you can only connect one app at a time to that serial port in that computer.  Other computers on the boat could connect to the same BT GPS and use it.

The paring process will typically create two ports. In Windows they will appear as two consecutive com ports (i.e., COM6 and COM7) in a Mac they appear as cu.port-name and tty.port-name). In the PC, one of them is called "incoming" and the other is "outgoing," but this is from the perspective of the device, i.e., the GPS. So we want to use the one called "outgoing." In a PC only that one will work. You can try one and if that does not work, use the other, or you can look ahead of time, from the Windows "Bluetooth & other devices" panel, scroll down to the bottom and click "More Bluetooth options," then click COM Ports, where you learn which is the Outgoing port. It will also be the one with a name.

Bluetooth in a Mac makes a similar distinction between incoming and outgoing, more basically tied to who is asking for the data, but either one will work on a Mac, so this is not a potential stumbling block... do I hear Mac users quietly clapping in the background?

 

Video demo of connecting Bluetooth GPS to qtVlm. (5:40)

Once the connection is made via BT the behavior in qtVlm is the same as described above with the USB. If you have both BT and USB you might use two different ports on the set up page to save setting it up again.

Wi-Fi GPS

Finally, there is a way to get GPS into your laptop navigation system that you might not have known of, namely there are a couple phone apps (iOS and Android) that will broadcast the GPS position and time data over Wi-Fi that you can then pick up with your computer. Furthermore, since modern phones also include sensors for heel angle, barometer, and heading, you can get all of that info as well. In short, with such an app, your phone is a back up navigation system!

Below are two videos showing this connection. One using GPS2IP, which is an iOS app, and the other is using the mobile version of qtVlm, which is available in iOS or Android. GPS2IP has a free demo version you can use to see that it all works. This one lets you connect for 4 minutes. The full app is $8 and it makes a permanent connection. This app provides GPS data and heading.

Connecting an iPhone GPS to qtVlm via Wi-Fi using the GPS2IP app (2:25).

You can also do this using the qtVlm mobile app for iOS or Android as shown below.

Connecting GPS and other sensors from a smartphone to a computer (10:03). The method shown using qtVlm mobile can connect to any nav program, in Mac or PC, but the example connects it to the computer version of qtVlm.

In our online course we cover use of the internal simulator for practicing with GPS and other NMEA signals including simulated depth sounding. Later we will come back and add the use of external NMEA simulators, of which there are several.

Also to follow shortly will be an article on augmented GPS signals both in US waters using the WAAS system and in Europe using the EGNOS system. Generically these are called SBAS for Satellite Based Augmentation Systems, which are ways to get more accurate GPS data. Invented for aircraft, but marine and land navigation can often take advantage of this.

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For completeness, we connected the Garmin 78s using a custom cable from a much older Garmin III+ unit, shown below. It splits from the 4 pin plug to a 12V power connector and to a serial connector that we then connected to a serial to USB cable. There is also a setting in the 78s called Export NMEA. Then it all (magically) worked just fine. The newer Garmin handhelds seem to mostly not have such a wired connection option, but models such as the 276CX offer both BT and Wi-Fi links to a PC so they would serve as a backup source for the ship's electronics if needed.

If you have one of these older popular handhelds, which do in fact still work well, you can find a direct 4-pin to USB cable from third parties online, but it would be worth checking with the sellers about your application, to be sure the power and the data are wired as you need.