You can buy a surplus magnetron for under $100 bucks, perhaps $5. You can
fix it yourself. What is the magnetron number?

Your depth sounder is experiencing a form of "double ring echo". It has to
do with the timing gate not allowing for the signal travel time in deep
water. You may see the same with a new depth finder unless it is
specifically designed for deep water.

Your GPS is probably a six satellite model. The only thing bad about it is
the lock up time. For sailing the accuracy is just fine.

Sounds like you just want new stuff. Save your money and buy new curtains
for lady sailor instead. She'll be happy, you'll be happy too.

Jax


"Mike" wrote in message
...
Been pondering for awhile how to upgrade the electronics on the boat. I
guess they were state of the art in 1979 (loran, ancient GPS, Raytheon
R10X
radar, etc) but the radar is broken, loran is kind of an old joke, and the
GPS probably has wooden components. The radar needs a new magnetron tube
that would cost over $600 just for the part, so that's out of the
question.
The old depthsounder gives good readings in shallow water, but tends to go
crazy in deep water, sometimes showing very shallow depths for no
particular
reason. I was thinking I had a submarine 20' under me quite often on the
trip up Baja!
Was leaning a little towards the whiz-bang mapping GPS with radar overlay
technology, but after reading about split screen mapping GPS/sonar units
in
Practical Sailor, I'm now thinking of going that route with a stand-alone
radar. I really like the idea of seeing bottom contours next to the "you
are here" GPS display right at the helm. Any thoughts? What would you
do,
and why?
Mike