Mia,
You should have an access plate in the cockpit sole that allows you to get at the sender. There should be a pink and black wire attached to it. Take a short length of wire, stripped on both ends, and touch the two wires together. Your fuel gauge should peg to full (do this with the ign key in the "run" position, you don't have to start the motor). That tells you your sender at least is working, sending a signal to the gauge. Don't worry about spark, your sender works on resistance, not voltage. Next, remove the 5 or 6 screws that retain the sender (don't lose them, they have a special thread size that is not common!) and pull your sender out. Yours probably has an "arm" type float. Move the arm throughout it's range while observing the fuel gauge. With the float all the way up, as you start to move it, the gauge will barely change until you get closer to the halfway point of it's travel. You've probably noticed on your vehicles that when you fill them up, the gas gauge reads on full for quite some time, but once the needle moves off full, it gets to empty much quicker.
Let us know what you observe...
I am hoping someone besides me has experienced this problem and may be of any help. I've taken my boat out three times since purchasing it on May 3rd. The first time, the battery gauge worked after I started it the first time. The second time, the gauge worked for the entire trip. And this past Saturday, the gauge never registered any voltage. All three trips we used the radio, bilge blower, and the bilge pump. I've checked all fuses and breakers and no dice. As far as the fuel gauge is concerned, I topped off my boat ( I know because fuel came out of the overflow port as I was fueling up) on Saturday and took her out on the lake. After cruising around for about 30 mins at about 15mph, I cut her off and let her drift as we fished a little. When I started her back up, it registered a half a tank. WTF? I've got a 31 gallon tank and it seems outlandish to think that I went through 15 gallons of fuel in 30 mins. Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide.
