handfulz28

Gino, good seeing you on Saturday; one of the pictures I snapped...it looked like you & George were cutting up the bay real good that afternoon!
I'm no expert on SmartCraft yet, but the sensors don't know what engine they're mounted in. The "incompatibility" probably comes from the fact that the SmartCraft "display" is actually fed from the ECU, not the sensors. Are the Merc 1075s SmartCraft compatible?
Just a thought that I have no idea if it would work, and it would be a Frankenstein way of rigging it...but you could use a "compatible" ECU as your black box to convert the sensor signals to SmartCraft-compatible data. It would be more involved than just swapping sensors and connecting wires; just an idea...

Audiofn

I was thinking along the same lines. I think the problem lies in the fuel injectors. I beleive that all smart craft motors are fuel injected. If they are not firing injectors they will toss a code and screw everything else up. I think if you can find the correct computer guy it should be fairly easy. We used to pull motors out VW Corrado's for the supercharged set up and get them working with all the guages. Also took a Vette Motor and put it into a S-10. You just have to figure out the code structure. If you can figure out how to get it to ignore the fuel injectors you are set.....

handfulz28

Yeah...I could see the ECU going nuts when it doesn't get all the feedback it's expecting. It'll throw codes all over the place and think it's putting the motor in Guardian mode, when it's not even really attached
But would it keep outputting the data stream to feed the display, or does it freak out? I would think it's like a car with a message display...all the gauge data still works, it just throws a specific "Check XYZ System" message. The issue comes in if the SmartCraft display insists on overriding gauge display to flash the warning message.

Audiofn

Don't know. How about you send me a system and I will play around with it for ya

handfulz28

Well I was willing to go in halvsies with you Now all we need is a display, sensors, and ECU. I've got a motor in the garage. I wonder if the "marine" sensors are the same as the truck sensors...if so, I've got the sensors covered already I also wonder how similar the marine ECU is to the truck ECU? I've got a spare one of those too...
So who wants to sponsor a little R&D?

Ted G

iTrader: (1)

It would be a monumental task to adapt all the Smartcraft stuff to another engine. Now, you can shut off some inputs to the ecu, but it would still be difficult to make the ecu happy enough to work. Another option is to look into Lowrance Lowrancenet gauges, readouts, etc. They seem to be the farthest ahead with NMEA 2000 stuff. They even have a build it program on their website. Kinda nice to only have one wire running the length of the boat. But it has fuel flow sensors-and you really don't want to know that number

handfulz28

As air, fuel & spark is to an engine...copper, volts & ohms are to an ECU You think it would be that flaky that it wouldn't send gauge data through?

I've been looking at Lowrance's GPS units with fuel flow capability. Any idea how accurate their sensors are?
I think I'd prefer Floscan's sensors feeding a Garmin GPS, but I'm not sure how to convince Garmin to add their fuel software to their marine units

Audiofn

Just tell them the cometition works with it so they better get on the ball......

Inspect putting a man on the moon is a monumental task that is why it has never been done!!!

LubeJobs42

iTrader: (2)

Thank you for looking!!!! I'll tell you what, You figure out how to make another system work with other motors, I'll do the backing and we will market it. I'm sure there is a hell of a market for a Smartcraft type system for other motors!!

Audiofn

My cousin did all my computer work. I will ask him what he thinks.

Jon