[TG] can a a9 a and a ACU autopilot follow tracks

[Tom - Raymarine - Moderator]

Hello Don,

Raymarine autopilots always require acknowledgement of a change of course for safety reasons - the pilot has no way to know that there's not another boat in the way of the course change. For example, if two boats are following a channel, one overtaking the other coming up to a bend. At some distance from the bend the arrival radius around the waypoint on the bend will be reached, which automatically triggers the advance to the next waypoint. This would lead to one boat potentially turning towards the other unexpectedly and without warning, at close quarters and against international anti-collision regulations and practice. I'd like to be able to say that people wouldn't use the pilot under such circumstances, but unfortunately we know that's not the case.

All this being said, we have received the request a number of times for users to be able to turn off the requirement to acknowledge each new waypoint in a route, and this feedback has been passed to our product managers for consideration.

Regards,
Tom