DOWNLOAD INSTRUCTIONS FOR FREE NOAA CHARTS
[To PRINT THIS PAGE - Right Click and then Left Click on "Print"]
Click
HERE to take you to the NOAA web
site that has the FREE CHARTS. This is the same link on the
NAVIGATION PAGE titled "FREE CHARTS".
Go to bottom of the page and click on the bar that says "Proceed to NOAA
RNC (BSB) Downloads".
Click on the blue "TEXTUAL" button to see a
listing of the available charts to to download. The "GRAPHICAL" button
requires your computer to have Java files installed to make it work so I
ignored it. If you know the chart numbers you can easily go to the
charts you want to download in the "Textual" section. If you do
not know the numbers then you need to use trial and error to get to the
section that contains the charts you want.
In this "sample" case I wanted to download chart #18007 "San Francisco To Cape Flattery" and I found it by using the "Go to" box at the top of the page. I selected section 761-780 after a few tries at other section numbers.
Select the chart(s) you want to download by
clicking the box(s) at far right of chart(s) you want to download.
Click "Review Selections>>" at top of page
when you are through selecting chart(s). You will see a listing of the
charts you selected.To continue click "Order Selections".
You should then get a page that gives you
information about what you are going to download. My sample
download page had the following information:
--- The selected BSB charts have been packaged into a Zip file.
--- The name of the Zip file is NOAA_BSBs319034.zip.
--- The size of the Zip file is 2.62 MB.
--- To unpack the Zip file after downloading, you will need 4.68 MB of free disk space.
NOTE: The zip file name, the size of the file and the free disk space needed will probably be different for each download you do.
To download, click the blue button
"Download". You then get a Dialogue Box titled "File
Download" In the File Download Dialogue Box click
"SAVE" Now you get another Dialogue Box titled
"Save As" where you select the directory in your computer that you want
to put the Zip file. The selection area is at the top of the
Dialogue Box. At the bottom is the name of the Zip file - in this case
NOAA_BSBs319034.zip.
The information below is related to
extracting the files from the downloaded Zip file.
I set up a temporary directory I named
"Tempory" and extracted the files to it using WinZip. The
extraction automatically set up a sub-directory named "BSB_ROOT".
In "BSB_ROOT" was the file "Readme.txt" and
another sub-directory named "18007". 18007 is the chart number that I
downloaded. In the sub-directory "18007" were the
following files: "18007.BSB", "18007_01.KAP",
"18007_00_32_01_145_NTM_BSB.ptc", and
"18007_01_32_01_145_NTM_BSB.ptc".
The
information below relates to setting up the downloaded files in the
SeaClear and Maptech software on your computer.
".KAP" files are the charts and the ".BSB"
files have additional information in them that SeaClear does not seem to
use but are used by Maptech Chart Navigator Pro. They are
not necessary, however, to use the Maptech Chart Navigator Viewer which
is what you download for free.=====================================================================
For SeaClear - the
chart files (".KAP") should be installed into the SeaClear "CHART"
folder and the SeaClear program
"MAPCAL.EXE" needs to be used to
AUTOLOAD the files.
When I copied the "18007_01.KAP" chart file into the SeaClear "CHART"
folder" and used the MapCal.exe
program to Autoload
the files the chart showed in the SeaClear program
list of available charts and displayed correctly when selected.
=======================================================================
For Maptech - I
installed the ".KAP" and ".BSB" chart files into the Maptech folder
titled "DATA". The path on my computer after installation is --
C: Program Files\Maptech\Chart
Navigator\Data\. To get the charts to display in the Chart
Navigator Viewer when you click the "Chart List" (which is on the Main
Menu at the top of the screen under "Charts") you need to take the
following steps after placing the downloaded charts in to the "Data" sub
directory.Click "Charts", then "Chart List", then the tab
titled "Advanced Chart Management".Next to the box titled "Chart Directory To Add"
make sure that the directory path - C: Program Files\Maptech\Chart
Navigator\Data\ - is listed. If not, then use the "Browse" button
to navigate to the Data sub directory and click the "Add" button.
I believe, however, that the directory path is already there.Then, on the right side of the screen (as you look
at it), about half way down, is a section titled "Chart List" with a
button titled "Rebuild".Click "Rebuild"
and the charts in your Maptech "Data" sub directory will show in the
"Available Charts" section that is part of the "Chart List" screen.NOTE: Click on "Help" in the bottom - right of the "Chart List" screen. This takes you to a screen titled "Opening Charts: The Chart List". Scroll down to the bottom of the screen and click on "Advanced Chart Management" (it is a link that is underlined and in blue type). The next screen explains how you can use directories on your computer to control what charts are included in your "Chart List".
I hope this page has been of help to you.