Minn Kota i-Pilot

While doing a talk last night I got several questions about the Minn Kota i-Pilot.  When I am talking to a group and they have common questions about a product I usually take that as a hint as a subject that I need to do a better job explaining.  For those of you that have questions about the Minn Kota i-Pilot, here you go.

The i-pilot is a a GPS based trolling motor control system.  Essentially the i-PIlot integrates a GPS with your current trolling motor and is available as an accessory for Terrova, PDV2, RTST and RTSP.  It includes features like:

Record a Track
Spot Lock
Cruise Control
Advanced AutoPilot
CoPilot

Record a Track feature is pretty simple, you hit the record button and start to move.  The unit will track and record your trail for up to 2 miles.  If you want to retrace the track ou hit the Start or End button and i-Pilot will steer the boat along the same path.  The nice thing is you can store and recall up to 3 different tracks which is nice for livebait fishing offshore.

Spot Lock works like an electronic anchor holding the boat in place with the push of a button.  The Spot Lock feature automatically corrects for wind, drift and waves and will adjust you speed and direction to keep you on that spot-on-the-spot. Once again, you can recall up to three Spot Locked locations.

Advanced AutoPilot is similar to the AutoPilot many of us are used to except it uses GPS technology instead of a compass to keep you online by projecting a series of waypoints based on the motor position.  The i-Pilot will maintain the boats heading while compensating for wind, current and drift.

cruise Control uses the GPS to maintain actual "on-the-water" MPH rather than trolling motor speed. So now instead of adjusting your thrust constantly to maintain a speed, the Cruise Control feature will do that by entering a speed that is adjustable to 1/10 mph.

CoPilot gives you wireless manual control of the trolling motor using the standard CoPilot functions.

I have always used a cable driven trolling motor.  First the Minn Kota Maxxum and lately the Minn Kota Fortrex but I have to admit the features on the i-Pilot have me convinced to make the change to the Minn Kota Terrova next year.  When you look at all the benefits the i-Pilot provide it is easy to see why this is a "must have" feature on your boat!