Home / About
About The Refit Brief
A new, independent guide site for boat owners who do their own upgrades. Systems first, product second.
What this is
The Refit Brief is a small, new publication about marine electronics and 12-volt systems on recreational boats: bay boats, center consoles, and small cruisers. It starts with five guides (late 2026) and will grow from there.
Most gear advice online comes from stores ranking what they sell. That has its place, but it skips the part that decides whether an upgrade goes well: what is already on your boat. A new display draws from the same batteries, sits in the same dash cutout, and talks over the same network as everything else. So each guide starts there.
What it isn’t
- Not a dealer. We don’t sell anything, and we don’t hold inventory.
- Not sponsored. No manufacturer has paid for, reviewed, or approved anything here.
- Not a substitute for a marine electrician. These are planning guides, not installation instructions.
How guides are put together
Model names, sizes, and specs come from manufacturers’ current product pages, manuals, and catalogs, checked when each guide is reviewed. Standards references point to the American Boat & Yacht Council (ABYC), the FCC, and the U.S. Coast Guard. When a price or number couldn’t be confirmed from a current source, it was left out. Product lines change often; each guide shows the month it was last reviewed.
If you spot something wrong or out of date, we want to hear about it. Email hello@refitbrief.com.
Contact
Corrections, questions, and suggestions: hello@refitbrief.com. We can’t diagnose a specific boat by email, but we read everything and fix what’s wrong.
Affiliate disclosure
Right now, no links on this site are affiliate links, and there are no paid or featured listings. In the future, some product links may become affiliate links, which means the site could earn a commission if you buy through them, at no extra cost to you. If and when that happens, this page will say so, and so will the guides that use them. It won’t change the advice: a product that doesn’t fit your boat’s system won’t be recommended because it pays.
Electrical work and safety
Battery, charging, and wiring work can damage equipment or start a fire if it’s done wrong, and lithium systems add their own rules. Follow ABYC standards (E-11 for AC and DC systems, E-13 for lithium-ion batteries) and the equipment maker’s instructions. When in doubt, have a qualified marine electrician design or check the work. The guides will tell you what to ask; they won’t pretend to replace the person who signs off on it.
About the name
The Refit Brief is a short planning guide for a systems upgrade on a boat you already have — electrical, helm electronics, and the gear that has to fit both. It is not a shipyard project document.