AIS Project

We did not have an AIS system on our boat when we got her, but we did use a internet one that works fairly good called Boat Beacon.  It is great if you have Internet, but once you loose that your blind.  The big question is what I wanted for an AIS system.  Looking around there are a ton of choices, but we decided on The Vesper XB-8000 with the wireless system.  It does wireless, along with NMEA 2000 which will crossover to many systems.  With more and more systems going wireless this just really seemed to stand out from older technology and moving into the newer technology.  The Vesper only uses 3.5 watts which is one of the lowest power hungry systems on the market.  Price, size of unit were also big factors for choosing this product.  We did use the VHF antenna slitter to use only 1 antenna on our boat versus another stand alone antenna. 
This is the Vesper XB-8000                   
Screenshot of Watchmate from Vesper.  Very fast loading of Data.                    
I Sailor has become a favorite for me for a chartplotter.  The Vesper overlays on the charts.                  
Screenshot from iSailor showing our position and the AIS overlay.  I really like this product for it's ease of install, flexibility to work with several systems makes it a great product in my boat.

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