Transmission to NMEA 2000 / Seatalk NG

Before you start

Firmware version 1.3.30 or later is required. Install first if you want to use this this functionality.
Transmission to NMEA 2000 / Seatalk NG needs to be enabled explicitly. This guide shows how to.

By default the vyacht router is in receiving-only mode on the NMEA 2000/Seatalk NG network. Without enabling the transmission function you will only receive data from NMEA 2000 and Seatalk NG networks and translate them into NMEA 0183, SignalK and other formats (and transmit them via wifi and e.g. the serial NMEA 0183 output). But the router won't transmit any sentences to the NMEA 2000 and Seatalk NG bus.

In order to enable translating to NMEA 2000 / Seatalk NG and transmitting to these networks the router first needs to be configured to enabled NMEA 2000 writing. Like all other configuration this is easily done via the routers built-in configuration web service (see quick start guide).

The following screenshot shows an example configuration in order to enable transmitting to the NMEA 2000 / Seatalk NG bus.

enabling transmitting to the NMEA 2000 bus

The following settings need to be made in order to announce the router on the network and to transmit to it.

Check the checkbox "NMEA 2000" "Enable enable writing to network"

Once this is done the other edit fields will be enabled and can be changed according to the following table.

Manufacture Id

Choose a random 2 - 3 digit number.

While typing the edit field will tell you if the manufacture id is already occupied by any vendor. Take one marked as free/available.

133 is a good one.

Unique device id

Choose any random number.

Combination of manufacture id and unique id needs to be unique in the network.

E.g. 123456

Source id

Safely ignore this field.

You can also set the "Source id" with any positive number < 240. But it might be overwritten and re-negotiated with other devices on the NMEA 2000 / Seatalk NG bus when the router joins.

In the screenshot 12 is used.

You can also play around with then settings above. You can e.g. mimick another vendor's device by setting its manufacture id. This also means that you should configure two different vyacht routers with two different unique device ids.

The following screenshot shows how the vyacht router announces itself on the NMEA 2000 bus and transmits translated NMEA 0183 to it. You might identify the source id 12 as configured above. It was not used by other devices and not re-negotiated either.

Please note: procedures described here only apply to firmware version 1.3.30 and higher. Even in that version its still a new functionality which should be tested before relying on it. While it won't harm you instruments unwanted results may occur. Please report them.