Cannot find Simrad VHF "Black box" 2006 Azimut 43 fly.

Maybe it's next to the Sanlorenzo autopilot compass:

https://www.yachtforums.com/threads/compass-location-on-72-san-lorenzo-my-2012.33465/

Unfortunately J never shared with us if/where he found it.

I know where the autopilot compass is, between the bedside table between the two guest cabin beds.

Still looking for the black box, does anybody know if its possible to detect it if on transmit with a marine portable handset, a mobile phone, a walky talky, a mains ac detector or even a hand compass? A signal generator did not work.

We never did find it after tearing the entire boat apart, we ran a new wiring harness through the boat, installed the compass where it should be installed (waterline, midship), and then had to seatrial for 3 days re-calibrating the joystick system.......

Well that's sure an unexpected update. That's a boat you'll remember.

Doubtful about the gadgets, boat cabling is often bundled together too tightly to make sniffers usable. Many of them work on AC only, but some "inject" a signal that can be traced, but many require open circuits. I would maybe try it from the other end. Follow the antenna wire from the antenna back. It could be very near to the antenna. Be sure and get a very good idea of what the thing looks like when searching. Sometimes I've searched for a black component only to find that they're gray, now.
Another tip is to find the product specs to see how long the jumper cable that goes from the head to the black box is as supplied. It may be long enough to site the box in the flybridge arch, for example.

Yes, I tried that. The antenna cable comes out of the radar arch and disappears through the flybridge deck over the saloon. I have been advised not to take down the saloon ceiling panels as they are almost impossible to replace neatly. I also searched inside the flybridge arch. I suspect it may be above the guest panel ceiling and will try removing that next week when I visit the boat.

I have already had some other panels down and you are right about the velcro. However it was a very experienced surveyor of Azimuts who told me not to touch the saloon ceiling panels, he said they are a nightmare to get back correctly.

It seems unlikely that its above the saloon, although I understand it might be in the guest cabin ceiling as Azimut said it would be behind a vertical panel in the guest cabin.

Look under the lower helm, my guess is it's there. You just have to line up the first panel on a hard edge correctly and then go across. If you only pull one panel at a time it's not a problem, and then put it back. Not sure why Italian builders haven't switched to the ball and socket design that sunseeker has been using for ohhhh 15 years........ohhh yeah, cost.....they probably cost a few dollars more.

I have already looked under the lower helm, through the chartplotter opening and up from the guest cabin by removing the ceiling panel of that area. At least I now know where the Raymarine autopilot main box is buried! I hope that never needs attention!

I got hold of the correct Azimut hand book in Italian and it also said it was under the guest cabin ceiling which I removed with great difficulty and high hopes – empty!

I finally found under the port side dashboard, carefully hidden behind the Raymarine autopilot box and and cleverly painted matt very dark grey, exactly the same colour as the surroundings, rendering it invisible to a torch inspection!

This all took several days but I now know my boat even better!

Thank you for all of your comments, especially Pascal and Captain J who were, in fact, right.

Yeah well, imagine if you were paying a professional $75-150 hour to look for it for all of those hours. That is one of the reasons people hate the Italian boats. A job that should take a few hours and cost a few hundred $$$'s, ends up costing thousands because the owners manual and factory people are useless.

That's irregardless. How hard would it be to have an owners manual that showed where everything was? It's very low quality customer service. The factories are so un-organized that they don't even know where they installed the equipment. Has nothing to do with pinching pennies, it's a lot of frustration for owners and people who work on the boats that should not be there on a luxury item.

That's a misconception. This owner works on his own Azimut, we get questions from many Azimut owners on this very forum, asking where equipment is located.