Forum Resource: Suzuki NMEA2000 Networks

[2014DF25ARS]

I bought an "SMIS Gauge Adapter" cable off Ebay for $47 + $5 shipping. I believe Suzuki P/N 990C0-88136. The cable has identical 4-pin locking connectors on each end, and one end of the cable had a sticker on it marked "Engine end".

I attach four photos.

One shows before/after under my DF25A cowling, showing the SDS connector in original position with rubber cap in place, and again after connection with the new Gauge Adapter cable.

Second photo shows my routing of the Gauge Adapter cable through the rubber bushing on front of my motor. Not bad, but if anyone has a more clever idea I'd appreciate hearing it. There is another unused rubber plug over near the idiot lights on my motor - I think it's used with tiller models. But I figured the cables best all come out in the same place.

Third photo shows the "Change Oil" message on my Suzuki gauge, which coincides with the flashing idiot light on the front of the motor (which proved not idiot-proof enough for me to know what it meant when it started flashing!)

Final photo shows the motor harness and my rats-nest of tees, etc in my NMEA network. You see three tees, with incoming Engine Interface, speed wheel, and yellow power cable. Terminator on one end, and an extension cable on the other end going forward to a final tee near my gauge at the helm, where there's another terminator. Main point of this final photo for me is all the UNUSED connectors on the provided motor harness. You can see that all I'm getting from the harness is 12V power for my NMEA network - along with the branch that goes to the remote control/ignition. I reckon I'll stuff this pile of cables and connectors under the seat that it's sitting on in the photo.

Good luck with your rig!

[keizerh]

I bought an "SMIS Gauge Adapter" cable off Ebay for $47 + $5 shipping. I believe Suzuki P/N 990C0-88136. The cable has identical 4-pin locking connectors on each end, and one end of the cable had a sticker on it marked "Engine end".

I attach four photos.

One shows before/after under my DF25A cowling, showing the SDS connector in original position with rubber cap in place, and again after connection with the new Gauge Adapter cable.

Second photo shows my routing of the Gauge Adapter cable through the rubber bushing on front of my motor. Not bad, but if anyone has a more clever idea I'd appreciate hearing it. There is another unused rubber plug over near the idiot lights on my motor - I think it's used with tiller models. But I figured the cables best all come out in the same place.

Third photo shows the "Change Oil" message on my Suzuki gauge, which coincides with the flashing idiot light on the front of the motor (which proved not idiot-proof enough for me to know what it meant when it started flashing!)

Final photo shows the motor harness and my rats-nest of tees, etc in my NMEA network. You see three tees, with incoming Engine Interface, speed wheel, and yellow power cable. Terminator on one end, and an extension cable on the other end going forward to a final tee near my gauge at the helm, where there's another terminator. Main point of this final photo for me is all the UNUSED connectors on the provided motor harness. You can see that all I'm getting from the harness is 12V power for my NMEA network - along with the branch that goes to the remote control/ignition. I reckon I'll stuff this pile of cables and connectors under the seat that it's sitting on in the photo.

Good luck with your rig!

Missed that cable on ebay :-(
Suzuki SMIS Basic Components "SMIS Adapter" (990C0-88136) | eBay
Suzuki brochure say's don't use 88136 for the small engines upto df30a but

http://www.brownspoint.com/store/pc/...Set-p69097.htm
Sot that is the one I ordered


Had to pay 160 euros
Building one myself for about 20, using easternbeaver connectors without labour
With the label engineside, cables must be twisted from one connector to the other. I will take pictures for the faq

Found my smis interface at ebay for usd 87 plus shipping

Yep, hole above lights must be for tiller.
I will use Cableater for the cables leading to the console.

Cable and trimsensor, will be in day after tomorrow.

I will follow the same cable route.
Configuration will be done on a Simrad plotter, the I will see what is best.
Simrad Is35 (is Almost Suzuki C10) or Garmin GMI10.
Will borrow IS35 from my other boat. If this is better, I'll buy another or C10

More pictures will follow

[2014DF25ARS]

Oops?

Aaahhh! I see that now. I wonder if the difference between the two cables is simply a matter of length. Looks like I got the 1.8m cable, and you're getting a 7.1m cable. Perhaps the shorter cable is intended to plug into the motor harness at midships, and the longer one is intended to go all the way back into the motor. That would explain my gripe about the cable being short... But that seems a pretty steep difference to pay for an extra 5m of cable. I picked up a 5m NMEA2000 extension cable at a local shop, so that's what I'm using at present to reach my gauge at the helm. I may be able to get there without it once I decide where to put everything. My boat is only about 8 ft from transom to steering wheel! I'm small potatoes.

To be honest, I can't make heads or tails out of Suzuki's brochures and rigging guide. It seems that the brochures may still be catching up to the latest motor offerings. That's why I'm here... (Plus the fact that there's not a Suzuki dealer/shop anywhere nearby that I'm aware of.) I probably should have phoned Brown's before buying the cable... But mine appears to be working properly so far.

My original goal was just to get a tach on the motor so I could choose the best prop for my boat. I think I could have rigged a TinyTach for $50 or less and got that job done. Now I'm about $350+ into this boondoggle, and that last $50 was a painful surprise for me. If it had been $180 instead, that probably would have broken my will. I like the idea of having the warning/maintenance messages from the motor, and I'm really looking forward to seeing miles/gallon and fuel data. It all adds up to $350 in value to me. But I'm not sure it's worth $500. It's funny to say, but that's a significant % of my total investment in this little 60 year old boat! And I'm going to get beat up by my peers because the gauge isn't "vintage".

[keizerh]

We are up and running. Smis believes engine is a DF40
Engine had to be dismanteled to run the cable the right way.
Cable between connectors is not a 1:1 connection.
Price is a rip-off shame on you Suzuki
But easy and cheep build yourselve.
Cable has to run in the rubber above the main remote cable, there is already a prepared hole.
Trim sensor came without screw's, cable wrap and manual. Aigain bad job Suzuki.
To get the trim working, main harness trim plug has to be connected to the Smis n2k interface cable. I hope trim can be adjusted. Now it ranges from 78% full down, to 98% full up.
IS35 is working great, so I'll buy one extra for this boat.
We will tidy things up and then post pictures.

[keizerh]

Aaahhh! I see that now. I wonder if the difference between the two cables is simply a matter of length. Looks like I got the 1.8m cable, and you're getting a 7.1m cable. Perhaps the shorter cable is intended to plug into the motor harness at midships, and the longer one is intended to go all the way back into the motor. That would explain my gripe about the cable being short... But that seems a pretty steep difference to pay for an extra 5m of cable. I picked up a 5m NMEA2000 extension cable at a local shop, so that's what I'm using at present to reach my gauge at the helm. I may be able to get there without it once I decide where to put everything. My boat is only about 8 ft from transom to steering wheel! I'm small potatoes.

To be honest, I can't make heads or tails out of Suzuki's brochures and rigging guide. It seems that the brochures may still be catching up to the latest motor offerings. That's why I'm here... (Plus the fact that there's not a Suzuki dealer/shop anywhere nearby that I'm aware of.) I probably should have phoned Brown's before buying the cable... But mine appears to be working properly so far.

My original goal was just to get a tach on the motor so I could choose the best prop for my boat. I think I could have rigged a TinyTach for $50 or less and got that job done. Now I'm about $350+ into this boondoggle, and that last $50 was a painful surprise for me. If it had been $180 instead, that probably would have broken my will. I like the idea of having the warning/maintenance messages from the motor, and I'm really looking forward to seeing miles/gallon and fuel data. It all adds up to $350 in value to me. But I'm not sure it's worth $500. It's funny to say, but that's a significant % of my total investment in this little 60 year old boat! And I'm going to get beat up by my peers because the gauge isn't "vintage".

An obd2 cable for sds + an Elm327 bluetooth device and your phone would have done the job also.

[2014DF25ARS]

An obd2 cable for sds + an Elm327 bluetooth device and your phone would have done the job also.

I first tried to figure out how to do exactly that, but I'm not clever enough. I use my Garmin NUVI GPS in my boat anyway, and I have Bluetooth gauges on the Nuvi. Couldn't figure out how to get OBDII out of the engine, so I started down this "supported" path. I would rather use my phone or Nuvi than this gauge, because I don't really have a nice place to install the gauge. Not willing to cut a 4" hole in my riveted aluminum dash to install it.

Have you made that obd2 path work? Can you provide details? Is such a cable available, or do you need to make it yourself?

Congrats on your success.

Jeff

[2014DF25ARS]

Not there yet?

Well, it looks like I may still have some work to do. Tonight I changed the oil in my engine. Ran it in a tub of water in the driveway to get it warm, then changed the oil and filter. While it was running, I got good RPM values @ idle = 900. But when I looked at the fuel consumption on the gauge, it said it was burning approx. 1.3 gal/hr while idling at 900. I used the fast idle lever on my remote control to get up to about 2500 RPM, and the gauge said I was burning 3 gals/hr. And although I used the gauge function to REFILL my 2 3-gal tanks, the FUEL REMAINING value is just flashing 0. Based on my experience with the engine, I believe it burns about 1 gal/hr at 4000-5000 RPM. So the fuel numbers aren't working properly. I'm getting good RPM and voltage, but fuel and temp are wrong. Maybe I need to upgrade the software after all.

All this with the 2015 40HP engine selected in the Engine Interface setup, for my 25HP motor. Curious to know if you're getting reasonable values on your end.

Good news is that after changing the oil, I cleared the 20-hr maintenance flag as described in the owner's manual. When I started the engine, the gauge flashed a message "Low Oil Pressure", which quickly disappeared as the new oil found its way through the engine.

[keizerh]

I first tried to figure out how to do exactly that, but I'm not clever enough. I use my Garmin NUVI GPS in my boat anyway, and I have Bluetooth gauges on the Nuvi. Couldn't figure out how to get OBDII out of the engine, so I started down this "supported" path. I would rather use my phone or Nuvi than this gauge, because I don't really have a nice place to install the gauge. Not willing to cut a 4" hole in my riveted aluminum dash to install it.

Have you made that obd2 path work? Can you provide details? Is such a cable available, or do you need to make it yourself?

Congrats on your success.

Jeff

Have to try is, sometime this weekend I guess. Got a sds diag tool for Suzuki with an obd2 connector from ebay. Had an elm blutooth already.

[keizerh]

Well, it looks like I may still have some work to do. Tonight I changed the oil in my engine. Ran it in a tub of water in the driveway to get it warm, then changed the oil and filter. While it was running, I got good RPM values @ idle = 900. But when I looked at the fuel consumption on the gauge, it said it was burning approx. 1.3 gal/hr while idling at 900. I used the fast idle lever on my remote control to get up to about 2500 RPM, and the gauge said I was burning 3 gals/hr. And although I used the gauge function to REFILL my 2 3-gal tanks, the FUEL REMAINING value is just flashing 0. Based on my experience with the engine, I believe it burns about 1 gal/hr at 4000-5000 RPM. So the fuel numbers aren't working properly. I'm getting good RPM and voltage, but fuel and temp are wrong. Maybe I need to upgrade the software after all.

All this with the 2015 40HP engine selected in the Engine Interface setup, for my 25HP motor. Curious to know if you're getting reasonable values on your end.

Good news is that after changing the oil, I cleared the 20-hr maintenance flag as described in the owner's manual. When I started the engine, the gauge flashed a message "Low Oil Pressure", which quickly disappeared as the new oil found its way through the engine.

Ours is also set to DF40.
Rpm is ok
Temp looks ok
Voltage ok
Trim could be better
Hours are ok. 3 hours now.
fuelrate 9.9liter/ hour at 5438 rpm

[2014DF25ARS]

Finally done with DF25A NMEA2000?

After installing my SDS adapter cable and getting my MFD400 working, I found that the default fuel consumption shown for my DF25A motor was approx. 1.2 gal/hr at idle, while my experience shows that the true fuel consumption at idle is probably somewhere around 0.1 gal/hr or lower, and approx. 1 gal/hr at 5000 RPM. A week ago, I spent the weekend riding around with my DF25A, trying to use the fuel calibration function to get the consumption readings within 5-10% of expected values. I was not able to do this. I would ride around for about 10 mins at WOT, then "re-fuel" with the gauge and say I had put 0.1 gal fuel (the smallest possible amount) into the tank. I was never able to get the consumption to the desired level. I could get it down to about 1.5 gals/hr at 5000 RPM, but when I tried to adjust any lower via a re-fuel, the gauge would jump up to something like 37 gal/hr.

Today I went to a local retailer who sells Lowrance fishing instruments, and the manager agreed to help me upgrade my s/w using a Lowrance HDS7 fishfinder. I drove my boat over to the store with an SD card containing the latest s/w from lowrance.com/Suzuki, and we sat in the parking lot upgrading the system. Main thing I learned is that the SD card containing the s/w *.luf files must be formatted with FAT32 filesystem rather than NTFS, or the HDS7 will not see the SD card. Another thing I learned is that the HDS7 shows the s/w version of the Engine Interface cable, while my LMF400 does not show any such detail. In fact, the HDS7 showed a lot of general engine data that I have not seen my LMF400; I guess you get what you pay for.

We sat in the parking lot and upgraded the Engine Interface Cable from V2.2 to V2.9, and we upgraded the LMF400 (Suzuki) from V2.0 to V2.6.

Before the upgrade, when I configured the engine in the LMF400 menus, the smallest engine that appeared in the engine list was DF40. After the upgrade, the engine list includes DF25/30. And after the upgrade, the default fuel consumption value is 0.1 gal/hr, which is somewhere near correct. In the next week or two I will find out how close to correct it really is. Based on Lowrance's documentation, I'm hoping it is within 3-5% of the truth.

So I'm hopeful (again) that I've got this thing licked, and can start enjoying the data provided by the LMF gauge!

Main thing I've concluded already is that my motor is probably slightly over-propped. When I'm alone in my little boat at WOT, I can hit about 5850 max RPM with my standard 11-pitch prop. With a second person in the boat I max at about 5750. I've started looking for a 10- or 9-pitch prop that will let me hit the rev limit of 6200 RPM. Based on what I've read about props and RPM, this is probably a better match for my boat.

[keizerh]

Nice it's working.

We had issues with readings going and coming. Seemed to be a second phantom Smis on the system ??!! Did a hard reset and fresh config on the plotter and then it was ok again.
Smallest engine is DF40A on our 2.9.0 MR449A Model 3.0.0 SMIS software/hardware. What exact version do you have?

[Moonlighter]

After installing my SDS adapter cable and getting my MFD400 working, I found that the default fuel consumption shown for my DF25A motor was approx. 1.2 gal/hr at idle, while my experience shows that the true fuel consumption at idle is probably somewhere around 0.1 gal/hr or lower, and approx. 1 gal/hr at 5000 RPM. A week ago, I spent the weekend riding around with my DF25A, trying to use the fuel calibration function to get the consumption readings within 5-10% of expected values. I was not able to do this. I would ride around for about 10 mins at WOT, then "re-fuel" with the gauge and say I had put 0.1 gal fuel (the smallest possible amount) into the tank. I was never able to get the consumption to the desired level. I could get it down to about 1.5 gals/hr at 5000 RPM, but when I tried to adjust any lower via a re-fuel, the gauge would jump up to something like 37 gal/hr.

Today I went to a local retailer who sells Lowrance fishing instruments, and the manager agreed to help me upgrade my s/w using a Lowrance HDS7 fishfinder. I drove my boat over to the store with an SD card containing the latest s/w from lowrance.com/Suzuki, and we sat in the parking lot upgrading the system. Main thing I learned is that the SD card containing the s/w *.luf files must be formatted with FAT32 filesystem rather than NTFS, or the HDS7 will not see the SD card. Another thing I learned is that the HDS7 shows the s/w version of the Engine Interface cable, while my LMF400 does not show any such detail. In fact, the HDS7 showed a lot of general engine data that I have not seen my LMF400; I guess you get what you pay for.

We sat in the parking lot and upgraded the Engine Interface Cable from V2.2 to V2.9, and we upgraded the MSF400 (Suzuki) from V2.0 to V2.6.

Before the upgrade, when I configured the engine in the LMF400 menus, the smallest engine that appeared in the engine list was DF40. After the upgrade, the engine list includes DF25/30. And after the upgrade, the default fuel consumption value is 0.1 gal/hr, which is somewhere near correct. In the next week or two I will find out how close to correct it really is. Based on Lowrance's documentation, I'm hoping it is within 3-5% of the truth.

So I'm hopeful (again) that I've got this thing licked, and can start enjoying the data provided by the LMF gauge!

Main thing I've concluded already is that my motor is probably slightly over-propped. When I'm alone in my little boat at WOT, I can hit about 5850 max RPM with my standard 11-pitch prop. With a second person in the boat I max at about 5750. I've started looking for a 10- or 9-pitch prop that will let me hit the rev limit of 6200 RPM. Based on what I've read about props and RPM, this is probably a better match for my boat.

Nice work. Yes, the key to getting correct fuel flow is to have the interface software and the SMIS software all compatible. Of these the most important is the interface.

I'd be confident that your fuel consumption is now on the money. Congratulations!!

If you find you are now within about 10% or so, calibrating (perhaps a few times) it after filling the tank will get you very close to perfect. Just so you know, I filled my tank yesterday after burning 28.6 litres (yes Australia got with the plan and went metric in the 70's) and i put 28.3 litres in at the bowser. Could easily have got a bit more in if I wanted to. So you can see just how accurate it is. 300ml is just a small cupful.

A couple of things to note as you go forward. If you are testing actual vs predicted fuel used, then you'll need to use a decent amount of fuel first, because the system won't allow you to calibrate with very small amounts. I'm not sure if the exact minimum figure but I think it might be around 5 gallons?. So just be aware of that when you're doing it - if it doesn't work then that might be the reason.

And, remember, when you reset to full, you don't input the amount added at the same time. You only ever input an amount added when you do a partial fill (ie add fuel but not enough to fill the tank).

And the prop issue - yes, getting a more suitable prop will be worthwhile, especially noticeable when you've got a load on board. With these smaller HP motors, many people have 2 props, one for when lightly loaded, the other when more load is on board.

Well done for persisting! It can sometimes take a bit of messing around but the results are worth it!

[2014DF25ARS]

SMIS upgrade details for DF25A rig

Nice it's working.

We had issues with readings going and coming. Seemed to be a second phantom Smis on the system ??!! Did a hard reset and fresh config on the plotter and then it was ok again.
Smallest engine is DF40A on our 2.9.0 MR449A Model 3.0.0 SMIS software/hardware. What exact version do you have?

I attach some photos from my upgrade. The before/after details for the Engine Interface Cable (EIC) are taken from the Lowrance HDS7 display we used for the upgrades, because my LMF400 gauge does not show any version info for the EIC. And you see before/after photos of the LMF400 version info, plus the engine configuration screens from the LMF400 after the upgrade. I choose Year = 2015, and then I see DF25/30 in the engine list. Prior to the upgrade, the smallest engine in the list was DF40. I don't know which part of the system builds this engine list, i.e. whether it comes from the EIC or the LMF400, or maybe some mumbo jumbo between the two.

Regards,
Jeff

[Moonlighter]

The engine list comes from the interface cable software. It also calculates and stores fuel data.

By and large, the SMIS/LMF displays are just that - a dumb display that simply shows data from the interface. Same applies to other MFD's such as the Lowrance HDS7 that you used - they simply display data that is sourced from the interface.

The displays also do a few functions such as configuring the interface, and also does any calculations requiring 2 or more data sources - such as mpg, and they allow the interface to be updated with duel data such as when you fill the tank.

That is why I try to just refer to them as "displays" rather than gauges.

[keizerh]

Jeff,
You've got 2.90 MR449R ours is MR449A. So calls for an upgrade