Engine replacement = Gauge Replacement - Teleflex to SmartCraft/NMEA2000?

[rbryn]

We recently had the joy of replacing our 2003 engine with a 2014 5.7L engine equipped with SmartCraft. All of our original gauges work fine, but I've been really interested in getting some sort of display that will give me more engine information (specifically errors and fuel flow). My thought process was to either....

1. go ahead and bite the bullet and replace all of our gauges with new SmartCraft versions ($1500 in parts)
2. An alternate thought is to just replace the Speedo with one the the new mercMonitors and leave the other guages as is ($600 in parts)
3. leave all the gauges as is and add a SmartCraft to NMEA2000 gateway - then update my Garmin GPS to the 547xs and feed it the engine data (about $1000 in parts)

I'm looking for suggestions and also wondering if going option 3 would still give me the engine fault data when it occurs?

 

[Jeremygavin]

I had the merc gateway installed before I ugraded to vessle view 7. Worked great with my raymarine e95.

 

[rbryn]

Oh man... I didn't even think about vessel view. I guess that makes option #4 to consider too.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[dpmulvey]

we recently had the joy of replacing our 2003 engine with a 2014 5.7l engine equipped with smartcraft. All of our original gauges work fine, but i've been really interested in getting some sort of display that will give me more engine information (specifically errors and fuel flow). My thought process was to either....

1. Go ahead and bite the bullet and replace all of our gauges with new smartcraft versions ($1500 in parts)
2. An alternate thought is to just replace the speedo with one the the new mercmonitors and leave the other guages as is ($600 in parts)
3. Leave all the gauges as is and add a smartcraft to nmea2000 gateway - then update my garmin gps to the 547xs and feed it the engine data (about $1000 in parts)

i'm looking for suggestions and also wondering if going option 3 would still give me the engine fault data when it occurs?

MHO...

#1 is a lot of money to spend to replace working gauges with working gauges.

#2. If the MercMonitor is the ECO Screen model and you can get it for $600, do it. The cheapest I've seen them is just north of a boat buck.

#3. I do not believe the 5" screen will give it you the real estate you need for the information you desire.

Can an you run the info to a notebook or tablet?

 

[rbryn]

MHO...

#1 is a lot of money to spend to replace working gauges with working gauges.

#2. If the MercMonitor is the ECO Screen model and you can get it for $600, do it. The cheapest I've seen them is just north of a boat buck.

#3. I do not believe the 5" screen will give it you the real estate you need for the information you desire.

Can an you run the info to a notebook or tablet?

I did initially look for a tablet enabled version of something that could read the SmartCraft stuff... but that's a no-go. I could convert it to NMEA2000 then put it on a wifi bridge but I still would need an app to interpret it- by that time I've invested alot more than just plugging it into the GPS.

As for the MercMonitors - I've seen them for about $400 - with the additional materials and harness it's so far the cheapest option (sum total about $600). After looking at the VesselView last night I'm leaning more towards the Vessel View 4 (can find them on ebay for under a boat buck) - I had completely omitted that when I was looking at everything else and it seems to have everything I want/need plus more.

 

[Henry Boyd]

I've done a single engine SC upgrade on our 280. A couple of thoughts:

1. I think $ 1500 for the gauges is an over estimation based on Sea Ray Dealer list price. I did a SC5000 System View plus Link tach, speedo, oil, water, volts, trim, and fuel plus cables and misc hardware for about $ 800.00. I did spend a winter doing the shopping from places like eBay buying stuff a bit at a time. The gauges are not branded Sea Ray but Mercruiser. I did a quick look on eBay and there are a couple sellers auctioning new sets of system Tach, Speedo, fuel and trim with harnesses for about $ 500.00 The volts, water temp and oil gauges are about $ 35.00 each. Keep in mind the bezels of the gauges are removable and replacements are available. So you only have to shop for the gauge face color you want. If you want white bezels let me know, I'll drop them in the mail to you. The boss liked the look of the gauges with black bezels, so I switched ours to black.

A junction box and trunk cable will be about $ 150. You also will need a tank harness to connect to the fuel sender for the fuel gauge. As I recall that was short money as well.

If you can run a wire in your home, and connect the cables to a computer you can pretty much DIY this project.

2. When I did our conversion 7 years ago Mercruiser was pretty much against mixing analog gauges with SC gauges. Their concern was that traditional gauges operate on 12 VDC and SC works off the engine computer are 5 VDC. The risk was that with a mix and match set up 12 VDC could be back fed into the computer and fry it. I know some folks on CSR have mixed and matched and not had any problems. If you are thinking about keeping the analog gauges and just installing a VV4 you might want to give Mercruiser CS a call and discuss it with them.

3. I have found having the SC5000 display has a lot of engine data. Putting that up on the Nav display to compete with GPS, AIS and Radar would be a huge PITA because it would mean continual button pushing. I actually use the SC5000 mostly for following waypoints that have been fed into it from the GPS, and then historical info such as fuel consumption and trip history.

Henry