Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Moonlighter]

Hi Team

The development of the technology platform on the new Surtees is now just about complete.

The latest project was to establish a NMEA 2000 network on the boat and connect the 2 x HDS5 Lowrances to the Suzuki engine.

Its actually a pretty simple exercise.

The critical component is a Suzuki engine interface cable that you get from Suzuki (I got mine from Brownspont Suzuki Marine in the USA). To that I added an adapter cable, 4 x network T pieces, an extension cable, a network power node (fancy name for a power cable) and 2 x short cables to connect the 2 Lowrances up to the T pieces.

Once this is all plugged in and powered up, this creates the "network". All you have to do then is to go into one of the Lowrance's menus, go to system, find the newtork bus menu and configure the network - what this really means is that you tell the network what year and HP Suzuki you have, how big your fuel tank is, and that's about it.

What does this all achieve?

Well the Suzuki engine management system now "talks" to the Lowrances. allowing you to monitor a whole range of engine perameters that includes the following:

Engine RPM
Alternator Voltage
Engine Hours
Fuel Flow
Engine Trim
Fuel Used
Trip Fuel Used
Seasonal Fuel Used
Real time Fuel economy in whatever format you like ie l/hr; km/l etc
Speed over water (DF300 Only)
Water Pressure (DF300 Only)
Current Gear (DF300 Only)
Plus Standard Diagnostics including Overheat, Low Oil Pressure, Over Rev, Low Battery Voltage which all give warnings on the Lowrance screens.

In addition, the Lowrances now share some data - ie the sounder can also display GPS and course data, and the GPS can display digital depth readings etc. This provides a degree of redundancy should one of the diaplays fail.

The existing Suzuki gauges still work the same - but to do this you have to connect the interface cable to the engine diagnostic port which requires the plug on the interface cable adapter to be changed from a male to a female plug. Pretty easy to do. Hardest part is running the cable back thru to the boat from the engine.

Let me know if you're interested in any further info.

Cheers

Grant

[gofishin]

Sounds pretty fancy Grant...but...can it predict the weather? 

Seabreeze has just done a complete 180 for this weekend, predicting great weather.  BOM is still crappy.  Looks like more home jobs.
cheers
Brendon

[Moonlighter]

Hi Brendon

Yes, its able to predict the weather at least as well as the BOM..... and makes a nice cup of tea, too!

I was hoping to get out on the Bay this weekend to give it a real test out and see what the fuelk economy on the 115 Zuke is like so I have a better idea about what I will use next weekend up at Rainbow. Hopefully the forecast will improve and we'll be able to get out there and give it a run.

Grant

[salty]

Hi Grant ,
Glad to see you are savvy on the Zuk Nmea 2000 thingy, I would like to get that working on my boat but alas only 0183 available. Time to save up as the only hour meter I have is the tacho when it starts up, rough at best, time for a trash and treasure at the club, only problem is trying to sell fishing gear to fisherman is like selling rice to the chinese[ no offense ].
Those new Garmins sure look nice, $$$$$$$$$$$$ though, will be interested to see how the HDS goes in the near future, I would really like a HDS8 but am remiss after various problems, time will tell.
Cheers Salty

[Moonlighter]

Hi all

An update on the Suzuki NMEA stuff, and my "learning experiences"....

My network was set up and everything was working fine ... except for the one thing that I really wanted - fuel data - which was there, but nowhere near accurate. And despite recalibrating the fuel flow several times, it made no dscernable difference.

Thank heavens for the internet though - The Hull Truth (USA equiv of Ausfish) and Ausfish - a number of us have been collaborating and sharing our frustrations. I eventually talked to a Lowrance tech in Sydneywho was helpful and there I learnt of 2 potential problems with the way I had installed and set up my network:

1. The length of cable from a "device" - such as a display unit, engine management computer, transducer etc - must not be more than 6m to the network "T" connector.  If they are longer than this there can be a voltage drop and the network doesn't work properly. In my case, I had the engine interface cable connected to the motor and then to a 15ft extension cable, then to the network T, so it was too long. Easy fix - just move the T piece so that the interface plugs directly into it and put the extension between that T and the next one.

2. When setting up the interface thru the Lowrance HDS, you need to have really good voltage otherwise strange things can happen, so they recommend either the battery be on a charger or the engine be running. In my case, I found that every time I set up the engine configuration on the interface, when I turned the engine off, the settings had been lost.

So fixed these 2 things but still found that the config settings were not being retained and every time the engine was turned off it would default back to the factory settings which were for a 2007 or earlier 40 hp engine - and that's why the fuel data was then being incorrectly calculated in the HDS and was so far wrong. But when the settings were right and the engine was running, the fuel flow readings looked right.

Finally, one of the guys on Ausfish rang Lowrance in the USA and when he fiunally found someon who knew what they were talking about in this area, they sent him the latest software update for the engine interface cable. We've all now installed this update file and finally the problems many Suzuki interface users were having disappeared. So next time out, I will calibrate the system and we should be away!

If anyone is using the Lowrance/Suzuki NMEA 2000 interface cable and would like the latest software upgrade for it, send me a message and I will e-mail it to you. It would be well worth doing!

Cheers

Grant

[blu]

Hey Grant as i told you on ausfish Trymax marine fitted mine and i haven't had a problem and have over 200 hours up. If you still have problems with it i would give them a call. From memory it cost $180 to buy and fitted.Cheers Steve

[Moonlighter]

Hi Steve

Thanks again. I am pretty confident that this software fix will sort the problems out, but if they persist I'll give Trymax a call.

In any case you might still like to consider the software update for your system - if you like I can e-mail it to you, if you don't want to install it just hang onto it "in case". Do you know what version software your interface is running?

Cheers

Grant

[blu]

Hi Steve

Thanks again. I am pretty confident that this software fix will sort the problems out, but if they persist I'll give Trymax a call.

In any case you might still like to consider the software update for your system - if you like I can e-mail it to you, if you don't want to install it just hang onto it "in case". Do you know what version software your interface is running?

Cheers

Grant
[/quote
    I will let you know later what it is running ,i am all cuddley next to the fire with a BLACK RAT can (rum & coke)and it is to cold out side to go and look,and not to mention i might fall down the stairs.
Cheers Steve

[blu]

It is the NMEA 2000 that it is running ,i just remembered i see it come up every time i reset the fuel.Now back to my drink .
Cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeers Steveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[blu]

I went down and had a look (it got the better of me)and the soft ware is 2.0.0 fd691D.I would be greatfull if you could send me the up date (rosbartram@bigpond.com). Untill something goes wrong i won't change anything.
Cheers Steve