Simrad Launches New Cost Effective AIS

Simrad has released a new Class A AIS unit designed to reduce the overall cost of ownership, in order to meet the budget demands of owners and operators required to install this technology by the end of the year. The AI80 features full AIS functionality but takes a ‘no-frills’ approach in order to keep costs as low as possible.
Though a lower cost option, the AI80 offers identical functionality to more expensive systems. In addition to the features listed below, the AI80 can be connected via NMEA to chartplotters and Radar in order to offer navigators the full advantages of the AIS information available, in a graphical navigation based display.
AI80 features include:

• Ship name/Call sign/MMSI/IMO number
  
• Date and time in UTC time of composition of message
  
• Position WGS84; Latitude/Longitude degrees & minutes
  
• Course over ground (COG) in degrees
  
• Speed over ground (SOG) in knots and 1/10 knots
  
• Destination/ETA
  
• Actual maximum draught in 1/10 of meters
  
• Ship/Cargo (Static and voyage related data)
  
• Length/Beams
  
• Number of persons on board
  
• AIS Messaging (Free)

The AI80 is a Simrad ‘black box’ product. It consists of an AIS Class A Mobile Station that can be placed anywhere on a vessel and a Minimum Keyboard Display (MKD) with a 4 line LCD display and dedicated keypad. With deadlines for the largest of vessels already passed, Simrad has taken into account that users of the AI80 may be limited by bridge space, so has reduced the size of the MKD to reflect this and to reduce costs and simplify installation.