I have a much smaller boat. A 21 ft walk around. The charter, however, had a boat your size and the TR1 did a good job. The day we fished, it was 1-3's. I don't know how it performs in rougher water. Hopefully someone will chime in. I've never heard a TR1 owner say they are displeased with it. The TR1 connects to any GPS with NMEA 0183 input/output. Take note that this is older technology. The newer standard is NMEA 2000. TR1 Gold has remained relatively unchanged for some years. In 2007, Garmin bought out a company called Nautamatic which had two main products TR1 Gladiator which was an autopilot for the main motor and TR1 Gold which was an autopilot for kickers and small outboards. Garmin took the TR1 Gladiator product and repackaged/improved it into the current GHP line of autopilots. The GHP line of autopilots for your main motor have very modern user interfaces and remotes. The 'shadow drive' technology in the GHP autopilots has it's roots from Nautamatic. It lets you override the autopilot temporarily with the steering wheel and the autopilot resumes when you let go of the wheel. The TR1 Gold autopilot is basically unchanged with perhaps some bugs fixed in the computer module. You can download the TR1 Gold user manual and see for yourself how the remote works. I would not describe it as 'user friendly', but if you want something to hold a heading with your boat going slow, the TR1 can do it. A lot of people with boats your size go with an autopilot on the main and forgo the kicker. I like having a kicker because I have a two stroke outboard and I think trolling with it would eventually ruin it. My boat tracks straight with no assistance if you troll with the wind directly behind you. I'm installing the TR1 to give me the capability to go cross wind or into the wind on nice days.