Navico's Broadband Radar in the Real World

As well as being more sensitive to onboard obstructions, the BR24 also seems more sensitive to interference from other radars. This problem manifests itself as intermittent spokes superimposed on the target display when you're within a quarter of a mile or so of transmitting magnetron scanners. It's not a deal breaker, in my opinion, but it's annoying, especially given how automatically free of noise the target imagery coming from the BR24 and other modern radomes normally is.

What might be a BR24 deal breaker for some sailors, though, is its long-range performance. While my testing suggests that no other 18-inch radome beats its resolution at extreme close range and that it competes with the best up to about 3 nautical miles, its competitive targeting abilities taper off fairly steeply at distances beyond that. You can see what I mean in the screenshots (posted below) comparing the BR24 to the Raymarine RD418D at ranges of 6 nautical miles and an eighth of a mile. It's a bit ironic that Navico chose to put 24, the radome's theoretical maximum range, in its title, as the very farthest that I've seen it target even a bold granite island is about 12 miles. (Radome naming is often confusing; what Furuno calls a "19-inch" dome, for instance is 2.5 inches smaller in case diameter than Raymarine's 18-inch domes. The BR24's case, incidentally, is also 19 inches, though it's an unusual 11 inches high, due to its dual antennas.)

For many skippers, however, long-range radar performance isn't as important as it once was. GPS chart plotting has significantly reduced radar's navigational value; the Automatic Identification System has become the tool of choice for identifying far-off ships; and satellite live-weather systems, even Internet-connected cellphones, can often monitor distant storms and lightning better than the largest marine radars, at least along the U.S. coasts. Today, there are many sailors who rarely use their radar beyond the 3-nautical-mile range, and that includes me.
I should also note that the BR24's longer-range weakness stands in sharp contrast to the Raymarine unit's strength. More than one Gizmo guest this summer was amazed by how close the latest 18-inch magnetron radomes came to painting distant targets in ways like their more powerful cousins, the open-array scanners-but, more on this in my January column. The BR24-which lists for $1,850 to $2,100, depending on which Navico brand decal is on its casing-is a very welcome innovation in marine electronics, and I hope we'll eventually see more solid-state radars. And it's especially seductive if power efficiency and close-range resolution are high on your priority list and you happen to own or like any of the several Lowrance, Simrad, or Northstar multifunction displays with which it works. Otherwise, you have a lot of radars and related MFDs to consider. One thing for sure: Radomes aren't like they used to be.

Some sample radar screen shots:

Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison