Although the apparent pinnacle of my sailing career is long gone after a summer pram sailing class in grade school, I still find the idea of harnessing “free” power to glide a boat or ship across water intriguing. Once you get past dinghys, or even small catamarans like Hobie Cats, the things you need to worry about seem to go up exponentially.
Fortunately, we don’t have to rely solely on analog instruments anymore. With various electronics and sensors having been implemented over the last 30 years, having all your information in one place is possible but can be a challenge. The KBox steps in to fill this void as an open-hardware and open-source solution for anyone who would like to have all of his or her boat data in one place.
The KBox takes information from NMEA0183 and NMEA2000 (standards by the National Marine Electronics Association) devices as well as information that it can collect directly, and displays it via WiFi on your tablet or smartphone. It’s a very powerful way to managae the information to make the voyage easier. It first needs to be configured to your boat.
Be sure to check out the setup page to see if you’re comfortable with taking on something like this!
