Fuel Computer
Printed From: The Fishing Website
Category: General Forums
Forum Name: The Boat Shed
Forum Description: Discuss all things boating.
URL: https://www.fishing.net.nz/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1385
Printed Date: 16 Jan 2025 at 12:16pm
Topic: Fuel Computer
Posted By: Naki
Subject: Fuel Computer
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 8:57am
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Hi all, Just wondering if any of you people have had any thing to do with fuel computers for trailer boats. Our boat has an under floor tank but no fuel gauge (no counting the calibrated dip stick), so I an interested in a fuel computer, possibly a Navman. Any ideas? Cheers |
Replies:
Posted By: Dino
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 9:37am
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Hi Naki I have been looking at the Navman also. They are the best option I think. A standard fuel gauge won't give you all the info a computor can. Also enables you to find your optomin running speed. I also look forward to others comments. Dino |
Posted By: Dead Ant
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 9:44am
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Naki, the Navman one seems to be the most common as I have ben looking around too. The latest propeller Magazine has a little bit about it in the Practical boating section. It sounds pretty easy to install, and provides the following: flow in lph, total fuel used and remaining fuel if you tell it where it started from. Price is $359 which doesn't seem like much fuel to me! Now if only we could get the road tax back! Cheers DA |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 11:19am
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http://www.navman.com/">http://www.navman.com/ Heres a site you might like to visit.......... |
Posted By: ohsif
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 12:30pm
| My boats under floor fuel tank is the typical long, narrow and shallow type. As standard the gauge sender unit was mounted right at the rear end of the tank and was thus worse than useless and highly misleading. I moved the sender to the centre of the tank and this improved things, but accuracy is still not great. I looked around for suitable solution that could be retro fitted and found several. Of them all the Navman unit was far and away the best. The disadvantage is that every time you add fuel to the tank you must manually update the unit. Due to the age of my vessel and my plan to update in the near future I haven�t purchased the Navman unit, but it is near the top of my wish list. |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 2:02pm
| Hi ohsif...... some of the new outboards that are coming out now have fuel computers built into them the sooner they do this with all models the better, my Merc has one and in im so impressed with it that i relay on it totally even though i have the Navman as well just for a backup, but the Merc is so accurate and is slightly in my favor by 7 liters you can run it till you just about run out, which i have done twice now just to make sure it was telling the truth... it so good every time you change something it tells you how much further or less distance you can go with the motor or trim tabs setup this way, and this has to be a great selling point for their sales...... |
Posted By: ohsif
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 3:26pm
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Thanks Lethal, I new some motors had this option but wasn't sure which ones. Navman also include it on some of their fishfinders and gps's. |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2003 at 7:42pm
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Yamaha also do a fuel monitoring module for their outboards - an extra guage that looks like the tacho and the speedo (now there's a seriously useless bit of kit). My experience with mine is the same as Lethal's with his Merc - bloody good. Accurate to within 2-3% and you can correct this by fiddling around with a few DIP switches on the back. From memory it was about $200 extra when I bought the engine - worth every cent. If I was doing it again I would have left the speedo off and had the fuel bizzo instead and insisted the price was $0. You can also retro fit it it onto any reasonably recent Yammie motor. obald |
Posted By: Naki
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 7:41am
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Hi, Obald: We have a 2001 Yamaha 115hp 4 stroke. Do you know if the fuel computer can be fitted to our motor. We don't have the fancy digital gauges, just to normal anolog ones. Any idea as to who I can contact to find out. Our Yammie dealer is next to useless and would charge me an arm and a leg.
Cheers ------------- President of the "Pontoon Owners Club". I started off with nothing and now I still have most of it left!!! |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 7:50am
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Naki, I have a 2001 200hp HPDI that does have the digital gauges but I would have thought (and this is a guess, not informed comment) that a simlar vintage 4 stroke should be no problem. If your local dealer is in 'ashtray on a motorbike mode' may I suggest contacting Yamaha (either NZ or USA) by email for feasiblity or talking to them at the Boatshow in a few weeks if you are coming up for that. Its dead easy to fit - just goes into the fuel line, but it must be mounted and fixed to stay as horizontal as possible. I had mine loose for a bit and just shoved it back in the lazarette any old how and it went mental. Bolted to the transom level - no probs again. obald |
Posted By: Naki
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 9:53am
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Thanks for Obald.
------------- President of the "Pontoon Owners Club". I started off with nothing and now I still have most of it left!!! |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 12:17pm
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FUEL MANAGEMENT GAUGE An engine synchronizer is included for dual engine applications. Single Engine |
Posted By: Naki
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 1:43pm
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Thanks for that Lethal. Pretty expensive. I think the Navman maybe a better/cheaper option, but I will check both options out at the boat show.
Cheers ------------- President of the "Pontoon Owners Club". I started off with nothing and now I still have most of it left!!! |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 30 Apr 2003 at 8:17pm
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I certainly paid nothing like US$593.55 for my 6Y5-W0088-53-00 (as I always call it). That's certainly him in Lethal's picture and equally certainly that was not his price. A ferret around at the Boat Show sounds just the job, Naki obald |
Posted By: Martini Max
Date Posted: 02 May 2003 at 9:39am
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I have the 200HPDI as well, and all that gear came with it- there was no option(I think).Would've had it even if it was an option. I have mine set (at installation) to litres/hour, and Kilometeres/litre (just because). Not long after buying this all, we were off The Aldermans trolling, and knowing how much gas I had put in , and our total usage, found that if we kept trolling, we wouldn't make it home on the main tank. (I did have a spare 30l stored). We were using about Between .9 and 1.1 L per kilometer at between 6.5 and 8 knots(from the GPS and depending on the swell/sea) At this rate, and the distance from home ,we would've been in the poo. I called Capt. Aspers to wait at Ohinau for us J.I.C. At cruise, and trimmed properly, I can make between 1.3 and 1.5 kms per liter. Depending on a few other things as well. So cruising at about 45 and 50 kms, we easily got back in. So these "tools" in your boat are VERY helpful. Navman are a good product, I would install one without doubt, if I didn't have the Yam gear. I also now have a 330 liter tank which easily covers the range needed. Cheers fellas. ------------- "I do nothing..I do it well.. I then move on to doing more of nothing" |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 02 May 2003 at 5:30pm
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Hi Mr MM, I'm sure you don't do the rest of your boating in kilometres - why don't you change your guage to nautical miles with a little bit of DIP switch fiddling? It will stop you having to do 'hard sums' at the end of a long day. If you have lost the Yamaha bit of paper that tells you what to switch where, PM me and I'll scan the relevant bit for you. obald ps I think you are right now I think of it - the Fuel Management stuff was included with motor price. The $200 was for an extra hours meter I put on. Sorry if I've misled folk. |
Posted By: Martini Max
Date Posted: 02 May 2003 at 9:44pm
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Gidday Obald, I just like the Yam. gauge to read km's, I know it is simple to change, still have all the manuals for everything. It is, though, much simpler to change the required distance measurements on the chartplotter... nm, stat ml,km etc. There aren't any 'hard sums' tho, I know the approx. distances in kms,stat.mls,and nautical. But if I know I've put in say, 250 litres, if I average 1 litre/km,(as it has averaged over the last year and half) then it just seems easier to know I can get around 250kms out of that. The speedo, flow meter,totalisator?(litres used) etc with my gauges seem fairly accurate,(and consistent) and when used with the c/plotter-GPS and radar (if/when needed) keeps everything simple enough. As an aside, when trolling/fishing, I have the c/plotter and radar in nm's, so if an emergency or whatever arose, its' simple enough to put the cursor or rings to where-ever, to get range etc. and to make any calls. ' Just like it that way. Cheers. ------------- "I do nothing..I do it well.. I then move on to doing more of nothing" |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 02 May 2003 at 10:17pm
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Hi MM, Fair enough, life would be very dull if we were all identical! I do everything in nautical miles and knots - just the way I was taught. Had any problems with your HPDI and what do you have bolted on to? obald |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 02 May 2003 at 10:40pm
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the optimac tells you distance to go on whats left in the tank also, do you guys have this option? i also now have a laptop in the boat that tells me how long at this speed will it take to get where im heading and it even gives you the time of arrival plus all this is running over the normal maps you purchase in the shops, dont think im trying to justify the Merc i still love Yammies they are so quiet compared to the Merc, im just making a comparison with the fuel gauges, please......... |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 8:18am
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Hi Lethal, The Yammie stuff does not have the 'distance to go on what's left in the tank' option (or if it has, I haven't found it). I carry 240 litres, and on my biggest days gamefishing so far (11 hours on the water) have not used more than 175 litres - and I ALWAYS leave the ramp with a full tank. All the ETA and 'how long to go to destination' stuff is done by my chartplotter/sounder - a Lowrance LCX-15MT. I reckon this is the best monochrome unit arouund - but that's another thread (any bites??) obald |
Posted By: Martini Max
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 9:23am
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Gidday Obald, No, absolutely no probs with the HPDI so far, only have done about 750 hours on it tho. My boat is a Challenger Walkaround. You can see it at http://www.trailerboatandyacht.co.nz/, click on Challenger boats, and mine is the 680 WA pictured. That day we were on our way back in with the boats' first 2 Y/fin - a good "blooding" for the boat , as far as gamefish go. Asparagus man has a 680 HT ,with a 225Yam 4 stroke. As you say, no distance to go on fuel.. , on the Yam elecs. I have Furuno elecs on board, 1712 Radar, GP1850F sounder/c-plotter. Only put the radar on as a nice to have, and as its turned out,has been very useful. Asper.man has JRC sounder and Radar I think, not quite sure of c-plotter-JRC,Raytheon or Simrad- I'm sure he'll pipe in. So could well be a good bite in another thread!!heh heh. BTW, thanks for the offer of the scan re speedo. Cheers. ------------- "I do nothing..I do it well.. I then move on to doing more of nothing" |
Posted By: Martini Max
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 9:33am
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Hi lethal, not sure how long my laptop would last on board! Sounds like a neat programme tho. But on my (if not all) GPS and c/plotters, as you prob. know,if you enter your destination as a temp. (or permanant) waypoint, and hit 'go-to', you also get all that info. At least you do with Furuno.  Cheers Guys.------------- "I do nothing..I do it well.. I then move on to doing more of nothing" |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 2:17pm
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Hi Guys i run the Furuno 1850 but now i only use it as a sounder and the lap top is plugged into the back of it, the Capt A knows what im talking about i first saw it on a 65fter have a look at it here http://www.nobeltec.com/products/prod_suite.asp">http://www.nobeltec.com/products/prod_suite.asp i have the 5-0, fishing has never been the same i can now not only save a waypoint but write everything about it in a form like a memo to myself for later referance, you can lay out a route then right click on the track and it will tell you the distance of it, but best of all is i have it on my computer and do everything before leaving home or bring anything up i wish anywhere around the country...... all i needed was a cheep laptop which cost me nothing and a inverter to power it when at sea $130 and a cable to the Furuno $75 i have mounted it on 1 inch foam to take out any knocks it might get when out at sea, if you can get The Capt to call in on me i could lone him the CDs the next time hes in AK..... OH im running 6-5 meter MkLay hardtop so we are like in the same boat except mine is Ali ..... Cheers Lethal |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 3:03pm
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Oh Dear, oh dear , oh dear. I'm in big trouble. I now know (well sort of) a bloke who has a lap top on his trailer boat, I'm a gadget junky, the gamefish season is winding down, I've time on my hands and the Boat Show is only a couple of weeks off. Here was I trying to convince myself that all this stuff was dificult to do and not worth putting on a trailer boat and look what happens. Lethal, your posts should come with a Govt. Health Warning. I'm going to fit new outriggers to my boat this winter and I am NOT putting a laptop with sexy navigation software on - OK. obald PS Lethal, can I have a squizzl? |
Posted By: Lethal
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 3:24pm
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odald for $200 its cheep mate you ask around bet you can pick up a old laptop for next to nothing $500 is a good one, this one i have was a throw away......... What type of Out riggers you looking at? i have some mini Reflex ones set up on mine with the 14ft stiff poles from Killwell made up by Rod Works set up with roller trollers and stingers with return weights both system are ready to go at all times without changing anything so depending on how you want to fish..... it gives me a spread of about 30feet.... Cheers Lethal |
Posted By: obald
Date Posted: 03 May 2003 at 9:47pm
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Outriggers. I've settled on the 16ft Kilwell Longreach stiff poles. Not sure of what bases as yet (no firm decisions until Boat Show at least). Its obvious for this length pole you need three point anchorage and the choice is between the sort of thing Lethal has on his boat (made by Chatfield, Lee, Reelax etc) or small versions of the type you see on big boats like the Pakula OR4 . There are three of us who are looking at the same poles so we may go into a bit of SS fabrication for three sets. If I can get really good bases, and there is no hurry at all in mid May, I might even go to 18ft poles- my boat will handle them easy. When I rig them I'll probably go roller trollers, Black's clips and tag lines with returns - but that's ezy pezy - 20 mins work. obald |
Posted By: Naki
Date Posted: 05 May 2003 at 8:21am
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obald: Thats good to know about the Yammies not having "distance to go on fuel left". I will now probably go with the NavMan. Maybe we should get Kerren to setup another Forum for electronics. Pleased to you use Lowrance. We just installed a Lowrance LCX15ci Sounder/GPS, cant' rave about it enough, big step up from a cheap Hummimbird Wide 100. The neat thing about the LCX15ci is you can save your soundings to memory card and replay it at home on your computer, if you find an interesting spot it gives you lat/long and you have a waypoint. These plots can also be saved back to your computer for latter reference. Also they have a 1000watt transducer, which is one of the most powerful in it class. Lethal: I am in the computer industry and am very interested in what you have done with your laptop. Might be worth looking into. cheers ------------- President of the "Pontoon Owners Club". I started off with nothing and now I still have most of it left!!! |