Hello, I have a 90s spectrum/bluefin 1906 19ft that was given to me along with a rotted fiberglass boat (I forget the hull make) with a good running low hour 1990 Force 150hp (1508X90D). After doing some bartering, a friend of mine will be doing the floor for the cost of materials only. With that, I plan on putting in new gauges as both boats instruments have seen far better days. I know Force isn't exactly the epitome of reliability but for the cost I have ($0 plus some wiring changes) it's impossible to pass up even if I get a few seasons out of it.
My question is, would I be better off using something like an Analog to NMEA 2000 signal converter and viewing everything on my 2 MFDs on the helm (2x HDS Carbon 9) or adding in dedicated gauges for tach/speed/trim/water pressure. The boat also will have 2004 yamaha 8hp kicker as well but that needs far less instrumentation. I have found devices that will run 2x engines off of one converter (
Amazon Link) but I do not know if this will be a better solution.
I am planning on running a Blue Sea M2 1830 to view my start/house/trolling bank as well as get my state of charge on the trolling bank. I also had thought about using one of their M2 1839 for fuel tanks or 2x of their mini 1739 for each tank. The reason I require 2x fuel tanks is the Force is a premix only engine instead of oil injected and thus I cannot run my 4 stroke kicker on that fuel all day trolling.
The things I want to monitor:
1) Speed
2) Tach
3) Voltage of start battery
4) Voltage of house battery
5) Voltage of trolling bank
6) Water pressure on main engine
7) Main engine temp
8) Main engine trim
9) Main tank fuel level
10) Aux tank fuel level
If I go the NMEA conversion box route it will do all of these things except voltage/SoC which would be handled with the M2 1830 and save a ton of real estate on the consoles we are fabricating. I would repurpose the oil pressure sensor (NMEA conversion box) to water pressure on the main engine and also gives me all the info from my kicker which is a bonus.
My question is, would I be better off using something like an Analog to NMEA 2000 signal converter and viewing everything on my 2 MFDs on the helm (2x HDS Carbon 9) or adding in dedicated gauges for tach/speed/trim/water pressure. The boat also will have 2004 yamaha 8hp kicker as well but that needs far less instrumentation. I have found devices that will run 2x engines off of one converter (
Amazon Link) but I do not know if this will be a better solution.I am planning on running a Blue Sea M2 1830 to view my start/house/trolling bank as well as get my state of charge on the trolling bank. I also had thought about using one of their M2 1839 for fuel tanks or 2x of their mini 1739 for each tank. The reason I require 2x fuel tanks is the Force is a premix only engine instead of oil injected and thus I cannot run my 4 stroke kicker on that fuel all day trolling.
The things I want to monitor:
1) Speed
2) Tach
3) Voltage of start battery
4) Voltage of house battery
5) Voltage of trolling bank
6) Water pressure on main engine
7) Main engine temp
8) Main engine trim
9) Main tank fuel level
10) Aux tank fuel level
If I go the NMEA conversion box route it will do all of these things except voltage/SoC which would be handled with the M2 1830 and save a ton of real estate on the consoles we are fabricating. I would repurpose the oil pressure sensor (NMEA conversion box) to water pressure on the main engine and also gives me all the info from my kicker which is a bonus.