Sirius weather on TZT2

J

Jay

Guest
I just added Sirius Weather (offshore package) on my TZT2 system. Everything seems to be working. However, despite having set the forecast period for 8 days, I never seem to get more than 2 days of forecasts. After that, the wind bars are displayed, but they do not change as one moves the time bar forward. Also, no matter where I touch the screen, the waves period is .01 seconds. This cannot be right, though it is still new to me. Not sure if it is relevant, but I have the latest operating system, 5.03.

Jay
s/v Airborne
Mason 44
 
Good morning Jay,

Thank you for inquiry. Please see the photo below, I found this on the Sirius Marine Weather website. I am a little confused on your questions. With the offshore package the information below explains a 5 day weather forecast and only up to 48 hours for wind.

Sirius Weather.JPG

I believe we may be facing a couple of things. The TZT2 has the ability to use (2) different weather services: Sirius Satellite Weather and a NavCenter Weather. As you are aware the Sirius Weather requires a weather black box, Sirius antenna, and also a subscription. The Navcenter Weather only requires an internet connection.

When using the Sirius Weather I am not aware that you can choose your forecast period? I believe maybe you are referring to the NavCenter Weather display where you can choose your forecast length and also the information you want to download.

Please refer to the the photo below to verify your TZT2 setup using Sirius Satellite Weather. After verifying your settings, if you are still having issues please let us know and we can work through the next steps.

Sirius Weather Setup.JPG
 
Thanks for the reply. Upon closer inspection, I see that the forecast days slider is under the NavCenter download section, and has nothing to do with Sirius weather. I also took a closer look at the capabilities of the offshore package, and you are correct -- I only get 48 hours of wind forecasts and wave information. So I guess that is the answer -- Sirius weather has limited capability, even when one chooses the most expensive offshore package. At least I theoretically get roadside fuel prices and sports scores, though I have not seen them yet. The other drawback of this system is that you can never turn off the TZT2, or it will have to begin the long process all over. This morning, for the first time, the TZT2 spontaneously rebooted for some reason, wiping out all the data that had been so painstakingly gathered over the past few days.

On another issue, I am still wondering why the wave period is always 1 second everywhere on the chart.

I should have investigated this upgrade more carefully, although there is almost no information (other than the feature chart) on the Sirius website.

Thanks again.

Jay
 
I continue to play with the Sirius weather and the NavCenter weather and still have questions on the Sirius weather. Maybe someone who is using this can explain what is going on.

Waves Period: This clearly does not work, but the behavior is odd. No matter where on the chart, it displays the wave period as 1 second or 2 seconds. If one zooms in, one can see dividing line between the Coastal Wave data (24 hours worth) versus the offshore wave data (48 hours worth). (The dividing line is a blank area with no wind barbs.) If the progress bar is within the first 24 hours, the coastal wave period is always 1 second, and the offshore wave period is always 2 seconds. Both obviously wrong. Then if one moves the progress bar to -- say -- 30 hours out, the coastal wind barbs disappear altogether and the offshore data now shows wave periods of 1 second. This is obviously a Sirius, not Furuno problem, but it seems to be a significant omission from what Sirius advertises. Anybody else experience this?

Animation: Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't I have not determined the pattern.

Spontaneous reboot: This almost never happened before, even when the electronics were on for days a time on passages. It has happened 3 times in the past 2 days. Recent changes include upgrading the operating system to the latest version, 5.03 and installing the Sirius weather hardware. Normally this would not be a big deal, but since it takes so long for Sirius to download the data, it is annoying.

I'm beginning to think I made a mistake with this so-called upgrade of Sirius offshore weather. Hope someone can help while I'm still in port trying to learn the new system.

Jay
s/v Airborne
Mason 44
 
OK folks, I need your help in determining whether I am an idiot, or whether the Furuno BBWX3 is either faulty or a poorly-designed piece of equipment.

If you have read my previous posts, you know I never got things working satisfactorily while in port, though the equipment appears to be properly installed and working. I just completed a 3 day offshore passage. During the entire passage, the Sirius weather proved to be totally useless, giving me no information whatsoever.

1. The unit simply refused to download any significant information. On only a few occasions did I get any wind barbs (which would then disappear for some reason) and I never got anything on wave heights. My frequent visits to the Sirius weather diagnostic page in "Settings" showed very low numbers (single digits mostly) for the various categories. And then the downloads of information packets would stop. I rebooted both the TZT2 display and the entire network several times, but the outcome was the same. (I should add that there were 2 spontaneous reboots as well -- another irritation.)

2. I have never, repeat never, received the marine zone forecast. I can see the marine zones on the chart, and the description of the waters is there, but under "Bulletin" it always says no bulletin. I have tested this repeatedly in port and at sea.

3. I am now in Florida on a mooring, and the weather module is working -- at least with respect to the main components that I am interested in, wind and wave information. As noted in my previous post, there is no information for wave period.

My Theories:

1. Since the Sirius weather module more or less works in port when the TZT2 processor is not engaged in navigation and course computations, perhaps there is just not enough processor power available to handle the weather data at sea, when the entire system is working hard.

2. I have 2 TZT2 displays, one at the helm and one at the nav station. For reasons I do not understand, they do not share the weather data, but work independently. At sea, I'm using both displays (with a lot going on in electronics) but while testing in port, I generally have just the one display (the "master" at the nav station) running. Is it possible that the two displays are competing for the satellite data to the point where they overwhelm the BBWX3?

I hope someone can help. I have two 12 inch TZT2 displays and am operating with the latest update -- 5.03. When I updated the system, I followed the instructions and did a factory reset before and after the update, and then reloaded my saved settings.

There has to be an explanation for this, other than the Furuno BBWX3 may be a piece of crap. Help!

Jay
s/v Airborne
Mason 44
 
Jay,
You will find that the longer and more complex the post; the longer it will take to get an answer on the forum. I wanted to let you know it isn't being ignored. The forum is staffed as time allows. Longer cases/posts just take more time for someone to focus on. Official support cases and calls are priority over the forum. The intent of the forum is to allow users to help each other. Our moderators are more active than most forums so we try to assist as much as we can. Given time, me or one of the moderators will try to digest your post. (if another user doesn't help you out) In the meantime, if you need help right away you might open official dialog with tech support.
 
Hello Jay,

Sorry for the delay. There is never enough time in the day. I hope you were able to take your case to Furuno Support for assistance. (410-479-4420 or 360-834-9300) They are normally the fastest way to get answers and ideas if your in a hurry. Your post was tacked on to an existing thread so it is hard to know what questions have been asked already. I look over your postings and made the following notes and I thought I would provide you comments/suggestions to consider. Hopefully you are already up and running but if not, maybe you will find my ramblings useful.

We had a customer call in last week (maybe that was you?) concerning the wave period issue that you are finding. This was the first report we had. We are currently testing but at this point, I would say that the finger is on Furuno. It looks like something is wrong with how we are showing that. We are verifying our findings with Japan but I would expect a software solution to that in the future.

Concerning your animation. You must be careful that you are looking at Sirius animation and not the NavCenter. Sirius has only forecast information for a few items that will animate and not too long into the future. I have found that the animation works pretty well with TZT and TZT2 as long as you are running the current software (which you are). I have to say the Sirius items offers little to be wild about when it comes to animation. I like the NavCenter better in that respect.

Not having Marine zone forecasts or intermittently getting data can be caused by several factors that I can think of. 1. NOAA changed the marine zones several times over the last 5 years. In turn, we had to redraw the zones in the MFD. If your MFD was older and the marine zones haven't been updated, they should be. (not updated with the normal programming). 2. Antenna might be losing signal 3. Data wires might be receiving noise (check that all Network cables are speed rated for CAT5e or CAT6 with SHIELDED cable and metal connectors) 4. You might have an older hub101 (some of the older versions of the hub101 don't like the high burst rate of the BBWX3) or any hub that has an issue switching the data. 5. You might be looking at one of the areas that has no data currently being provided by NOAA or Sirius 6. You might be looking at one of the areas that just got redrawn by NOAA. Please note that the next version of system software (v6)will be making some improvements to Sirius weather. (sorry, can't discuss until it arrives)

You said spontaneous reboot. If a NN3D, TZT or TZT2 reboots it is for a reason. Typically it is a problem with a bad NMEA 2000 network, noise on your data or power lines, running a 24v boat with non-isolated 12v power on your NMEA 2000 , bad chart card, or some other reason. It is almost never associated with the MFD but the problem is just reflected there. I would talk to your installer who put it together. Tech support will normally want drawings of your system to look for these install problems.

I appreciate that you had some theories. It would not be a problem with the processor being too busy. For example you might see the marine radar disappear for a few minutes and then you have it back. This is a Sirius refresh of data. The new data message starts coming in so the old data is removed as the new data replaces it. During this period the data wont show. Sometimes items missing is based on how often Sirius provides it. For example SST (Sea Surface Temp) is transmitted by Sirius roughly every 72 mins. This means if it just transmitted before you turned on your system, it might take over an hour for you to see SST on your MFD. Nothing wrong with your hardware, that is the way it is. If you happen to turn on the MFD and then Sirius SST comes down you might get it right away.

Each device works independently for redundancy. They don't share Sirius data with each other. Each unit would need to be on to catch the data or wait for the next transmission of said data. NavCenter weather is shared over the network to other stations.

I would recommend working with our support over the phone because many times they can pinpoint the problem. If not, you might need to get a dealer involved. Based on the reboot and the data issues you might have something larger on the boat that needs to be addressed like a grounding loop. I am sure it will get resolved, if not already. Keep us posted. Again sorry for the delay in getting comments here on the forum.

Johnny
 
Johnny, Thanks for the comprehensive reply.

I have contacted Furuno support, and learned that they recently discovered that the Hub101 was having trouble passing all the data packets from the BBWX3. There is a new board available for the Hub101 with more processors and better isolation between circuits. I have sent the Hub101 off to Furuno to have the new board installed. I am optimistic it will solve the problem.

BTW, I did not call anybody about the wave period issue, so apparently others have noticed the same thing.

Thanks for the excellent support.

Jay
 
Update: The new circuit board in my HUB101 seems to have fixed all the issues with the Sirius Weather module BBWX3. The Wave Period data is still missing, but I am guessing that is not a Furuno problem.

Jay
 
The wave period data shown on the Furuno water area is apparently "Wave Period Forecast". If you click on a weather buoy, the wave period shown there would the actual Wave Period. Furuno Japan is looking into editing the terms and how it is shown. Thanks for reporting it. I am glad to hear that Tech Support got you fixed up.
 
I had the same issue with the HUB101. After replacing the BBXW2 with a BBWX3 I still had issues so we traded out the Hub with Furuno and that fixed my issues.
 

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