Spot Trace for family boat tracking?

[O C Diver]

There was a recent thread on family tracking your boat through an AIS web site. Was looking at different offerings for Satellite tracking and came across this.

Spot Trace

In a nutshell, it's Satellite tracking for vehicles that can be viewed on a computer or smart phone app. The pings can be set at 2.5, 5, 10, 30, or 60 minutes and there is some decent software to save battery life for when the boats not moving etc. This is tracking only. No emergency call button or text messaging. Being on the East coast, I can live without cell service for a day or 2. Have an EPIRB for real emergencies and VHF for everything else. Admiral would probably be happier knowing where I was.

The units on sale for $50 and the service plan is $100 per year. Seemed like a very inexpensive way for people to know where you are.

Anybody have experience with this unit or Spot in general?

Ted

 

[Old deckhand]

Yes have used one but now use a Delorme.

 

[O C Diver]

Yes have used one but now use a Delorme.

Any opinion? Did it perform as advertised?

Ted

 

[HenryD]

Ted,
We have a SPOT Trace onboard. We bought it in January at the Miami boat show.
We are on our second unit - the first one was replaced under warranty by SPOT after it sometimes would stop working.
We like the Trace because it runs on 12v and can be wired directly into the boat to eliminate having to power it on/off each day. BUT the unit notices we have stopped moving for the day or even in a lock and stops transmitting. The "Dock mode" feature we thought would re-activate the unit when we moved again but that has not been working for us.
Unfortunately, we have contacted support many times and are still trying to determine if this is a problem or the way the unit is designed.
We moved the boat from FL to Kingston, Ontario over the last 2 months and our friends and family have followed us on the SPOT web site. If I forget to power off the unit and power it back up after a lockage, we get a text message or call from one of our friends asking "what happened".
When I tried to contact SPOT via their support web form, I got back a message that said "If you are still having a problem, call our 800 number".


The support person I have talked to several times, has suggested my boat does not move fast enough to trigger the movement switch and I need to shake it violently each time the unit thinks we have stopped. She also mentioned that TRACE was primarily designed to "trace an asset".


Just - FYI - Henry

 

[Al]

I await Deckhand's response to O.C. As DH is from Sitka and somewhat a neighbor his detail will be of interest. I have a SPOT that I have not activated due to confusion on the contract. While it is an annual contract, use is marginal and during the summer months when longer trips are in play. Delorme sounds as though it married SPOT with other features. Hope DC includes the cost of contract. I see these units for sale on both Amazon and Ebay.

Al