Engine hour meter

[Guest]

I have hull # 53 and I did not get an engine hour meter as advertised in the motor spec. I have been unable to get an answer, only that J/Boats has the right to change the eqpt. without notice. Every motor spec. lists an hour meter every year. How many boats came with an hour meter or furnished later?

[Posted by: walter prater
]

[crash]

Walter,
I have hull #58, and it did not come with one from the factory either. I had one installed as part of my electronics package by my dealer. Went into the hole for the warning alarm, which now hangs in back of the panel, but is still plenty loud to be heard on deck.
Pete

[jerry]

I just purchased Hull#44 last month. It has the Yanmar 3GM30 engine and Panel B for the instruments. Like you everything I read stated an hour meter was provided, but they weren’t in the older models. My understanding is the newer Yanmar 3YM30 engines from this year have an instrument panel with an hour meter. I will be adding one shortly. There are the simple older analog ones I’ve seen at West Marine, but I also found on the web an electronic digital hour meter as well. If you want more details let me know.

[Guest]

I think you missed my intent. If an hour meter is standard, then it should be on the boat. You should not have to add it later at your expense.

[Posted by: walter prater
]

[Guest]

New question.

When I start my engine I get a really horible smell from the exhaust. Does anyone elese have that issue?

Thanks
Frank

[Posted by: Frank Albert
]

[ctsailor55]

Hi Frank. I'd suggest starting a new thread for this so it doesn't get buried in the prior thread.
What kind of smell is it?

[Vento Solare]

The engine hour meter on Vento Solare, hull #266 did not work when I purchased the boat. I did some research and found this is a common problem with the Yanmar / VDO meters. It turns out that there is a silicone seal applied to the circuit area near the LCD that absorbs moisture and causes the failure. The meter actually still records the engine hours, it is the display that stops working. The attached solution was found on the Sailboatowners.com forum. Attached is the document that explains how to fix the meter. This is a photo of the repaired meter for Vento Solare showing the real engine ours accumulated.



I cleaned the surface per the instructions using a toothpick I cut with a razor blade to a chisel tip. I then tested it.
The connector pinout and wire colors that I obtained from Vento Solare are as follows (pins as marked on the back of the white tachometer case):
1 Red/Black +12V
2 Red +12V
3 Black 12V return
4 Orange tach input from alternator
5 Black 12V return

The recessed yellow button above the Tach/Hours label is used to program/calibrate the tachometer. Use the procedure in this document to accomplish that.

Yanmar VDO Programmable Tach with hourmeter.pdf

(1.03 MiB) Downloaded 2588 times

[cercole]

Great find! I'm going to pull my tach this weekend and give this repair a try.

-Christopher
sweet caroline # 239

[cercole]

Bill,
How did you remove the tach from it's case? I have it sitting on my desk and I removed the three Torx screws from the back. Does the front clear plastic shield pry off?

Thanks.

[Vento Solare]

Christopher,

Once you remove the 3 Torx screws, the front lens can be pried off. It is a snug fit and there are two layers of acrylic lens separated by a hard rubber gasket. Once the lens is removed, the guts are removed from the front of the case.

[cercole]

Thanks that worked. I was able to get the gauge apart and the old silicone cleaned out. The hour meter appears to have gone from working around 20% of the time to around 70% of the time. I left it on the test bench running for a while yesterday. I might mess with it a little more when I get a chance next week to see if I can get it working 90% of the time.

Thanks for posting the repair.

[cercole]

Hour Meter 3.jpg (73.55 KiB) Viewed 37274 times

Hour Meter 4.jpg (73.52 KiB) Viewed 37274 times

Here are pics of my hour meter working and sort of working.

Now if I only knew how to make the boat go fast...