Mercury SmartCraft Gauge Question

[tpenfield]

Greetings . . .

I have wanted to get GPS input to my Faria/SmartCraft speedometer. The VesselView system gets GPS speed, and that is what I currently use. The factory set up the speedometer as a pressure/pitot input, rather than GPS. Of course the Mercury Axius/VesselView stuff has a GPS and I believe a GPS feed is available from it.

Through my prior research I believe the tachometers are getting a GPS input, but no way to display speed. I have tried to change the settings on the speedometer to 'GPS' and it says 'NO DATA'. It seems like the connector for the speedometer is missing a few wires, perhaps the GPS input. They may be in the wire bundle shown in the picture of the back of the gauges. All the extra wires appear to be white, so wire color is not helping.

So, I am wondering if anyone has worked this sort of issue with SmartCraft gauges and can point me in the right direction.

Pics below . . .

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It seems like the Speedometer connector does not have the 3 white wires . . . whereas the tachometers do. Not sure what the smaller connector is for ?? It has a single shielded wire connected.

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TIA for any guidance on getting the GPS signal to my speedometer.

 

[dingbat]

Gps is either a digital or serial input. I have both on my boat. Using digital as the network input

What are you using for a gps heading sensor?

 

[demarko210]

Your gps connection should be off the connection to the speedometer blue and white wires should have a small connection. Wires could be blue and one white or BL/W and the other W/BL

 

[tpenfield]

Thanks, guys . . .

I did come across this . . . Looks like it is the Faria MG3000 series of gauges (Not sure why the boat manufacturer did not use the Mercury branded gauges).

So it looks like the GPS signal is supposed to come in on the 6 pin connector. The speedo, has the depth sounder connector (whole lot of good that does).

I see that the tachometers do not have anything connected to the 6-pin connectors. So, perhaps I need to go hunting behind the instrument cluster to see if there is such a thing, or at least those colored wires.
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[dingbat]

Info on 6 pin connector

https://fariabeede.com/site_manuals/IS0307_D.pdf

 

[nola mike]

This looks like an "I got my other electrical gremlins sorted" type of problem? No solution, but might be fun to have pitot speed and GPS speed. You'd have both speed over ground and speed relative to water flow/currents...

 

[tpenfield]

Yes, I have done the pitot thing over the years . . . never seems to last very long as it usually gets clogged. I figure since my electrical gremlins of the past couple of months are behind me, I'll venture into the 'nice-to-have' items.

I think if I can find a 6 pin connector with the proper wires, somewhere in the electrical rat's nest that is behind the instrument panel, then it should be pretty straight forward.

It looks like the GPS plugs into the tachometer and the 'data' is fed over to the speedometer. Not sure why it is done that way, but I'll play along . . .

 

[tpenfield]

I sent an email to the boat manufacturer (Cruisers Yachts) to see if there is/was a GPS connector in the wiring harness, or if they have any advice on connecting to the Mercury GPS signal, etc.

 

[dingbat]

I sent an email to the boat manufacturer (Cruisers Yachts) to see if there is/was a GPS connector in the wiring harness, or if they have any advice on connecting to the Mercury GPS signal, etc.

How old is this system?
Looking for a 0183 serial connection to gps. Hard to find these days. Everything else is coming in via analog or Can

 

[tpenfield]

How old is this system?
Looking for a 0183 serial connection to gps. Hard to find these days. Everything else is coming in via analog or Can

2016