Floscan 9000 Fuel Flow Meter and Suzuki 90

J

Joy

New member
Does anyone have experience installing the Floscan Fuel Flow Meter with the Suzuki outboard? I contacted Floscan yesterday and was told that about 2/3's of the Suzuki's have a problem with the Meter due to the low pressure fuel pump in the motor!
I want to put a fuel flow meter on my boat, as I boat a lot by myself and want to do more ocean fishing, but am always concerned about fuel management. If floscan is not an option, does anyone know of another adequate meter?

Thanks
 
I installed a Navman Fuel 3100 in Journey On. The brand name has changed, but I'll mention a few things that have helped.

First, the investment has paid off. It let me cruise a "efficient" speeds by watching the MPG display, and it paid off big thyme when it let me know the mileage had decreased. However, that also means that I get to fix the engine. The accuracy in total fuel used is ~5%, which is very good. I measure this by comparing the fuel in at a gas station to fuel used via the meter.

Second, about the installation. The company said that the instrument was not for fuel injected engines. Their thought was that their sensor ( a paddlewheel/turbine pulse generator,) would not measure the fuel returned from the fuel injection system. That may be true in a car, where the bypass fuel is routed back to the fuel tank, but in an outboard motor, that return line is in the engine itself. This means that only one line goes from the fuel tank to the engine, and if you measure that fuel flow, you got it all.

The above discussion means that one needs a flow monitor which has an independent flow sensor, external to the engine. Then you don't care what the engine electronics does.

Second, I had a h--l of a time getting the flowmeter display to work with the GPS via NMEA 0183. This is needed for MPG, since the miles come from the GPS. I finally turned off every word in the NMEA sentence and turned them on one at a time until MPG displayed correctly.

I notice the Lowrance 4000 advertises that it'll display every bit of information, including a lot directly from the engine. I'd check to see if the fuel sensor is external to the motor, and if so, I think it'd be worthwhile. The Flowscan, if I read it correctly doesn't give you MPG. However it appears to have an external flowmeter, because of it's external return line warning. The MPG feature is great, giving instantaneous data, so I'd pick the Lowrance.


Boris
 
Boris,

I don't know if they ever corrected the NMEA wiring error in the NAVMAN Fuel Flow meter installation instructions. Transmit and Receive were reversed in the instructions.

Joy,

Take a look at this link about connecting the Lowrance LMF400 gauge to a Suzuki engine: http://continuouswave.com/ubb/Forum6/HTML/001411.html

I can confirm the issue on user interface on Lowrance equipment. They have found a convenient way to make doing many simple tasks complex on my GPS plotter/sounder.
 
The sensor Suzuki used in their older gauges was like the Navman (now Northstar) one.

What vintage is the motor? it might be possible to get the fuel flow data directly from the computer and use a Suzuki gauge (although this will probably be more costly).
 
I've got the Lowrance LMF 200 gauge which is the same as the Suzuki gauge. My engine is a 2007 Suzuki 90. It's connected by NEMA 2000 cable which comes with the gauge. Mine isn't accurate but I've still got to do some tweaking with it. Someone else told me they have the same gauge on a Honda 135 and they too find the gauge registers more fuel used than is actually used. I've heard others say the gauge works well.
 
Matt
Are you a Suzuki Dealer? If so perhaps you can give me some suggestions. From all of the replies it looks like no one is using the Floscan!
What I liked about that instrument was the digital display and the fact I could pop out my RPM instrument and pop in the Floscan!
So what would anyone one suggest I go with? I have not tackled a job like this, but am willing to try. Mention of the Lowrance was made. I have all Raymarine gear. Does that matter?
 
I have the floscan 9000. I have had it for a number of years and moved it from boat to boat. It has worked very well. At the time I got the CD19 I also got a Navman 4500 and put it on the 19 with a Yamaha 75. It also worked very well. When I got the CD 22 , I got the Suzuki 115 and had Wefings also add the Suzuki flow meter. The sensor looks to be identical to the sensor used by Navman. It worked well until Lake Powell then stopped giving me any readings. Marc has provided me with a replacement but I haven't replace it yet. In the interim I hooked up the Navman 4500 to the Zuzuki it has been very accurate. The Zuzuki does not have gps input so it does not give mpg. I like the digital tach of the floscan so may look at putting it on the CD22. With the flowscan I could tell within .5 gal how much fuel I had used on a 50 gal tank.

Roger

Joy":91tmn0zv said:
Does anyone have experience installing the Floscan Fuel Flow Meter with the Suzuki outboard? I contacted Floscan yesterday and was told that about 2/3's of the Suzuki's have a problem with the Meter due to the low pressure fuel pump in the motor!
I want to put a fuel flow meter on my boat, as I boat a lot by myself and want to do more ocean fishing, but am always concerned about fuel management. If floscan is not an option, does anyone know of another adequate meter?

Thanks
Click to expand...
 
Here's a link to the Suzuki gauges. They read off of the computer on the motor. They will give you a good reading even at idle. I also have a Northstar formerly Navman it works good but not at idle, not enough flow to turn the turbine at that speed. If your motor is capable I would use the Suzuki gauge. Combined with the gps puck it will give you range and mpg.
I bought mine from this site and they have lots of info about it up there.

http://store.brownspoint.com/suzuki_page_31.asp
 
You use the 990C0-88034 SMIS Engine Interface Cable that connects to the computer in the motor. The interface cable will allow you to read the motor data. You can build screens on the gauge for the data you would like to display. Fuel flow is measured at the injectors by the computer. If you add the gps then it will calculate range and mpg. Up on Browns Points website there is a list of all the data points that it will read off of the motor. To answer your question you don't need the flow sensor, the computer is much more accurate.
 
The Lowrance Guage and the Suzuki guage are the same. You can use the Lowarance 400 and it will probably fit where the current guage is--and read lots of information--with a Lowrance or any other NMEA 2000 unit, you can get MPG. However, I don't bother with miles per gallon--I want to know how much fuel I have used--and gallons per hour. Just a personal thing.

I have both Lowrance guages and Navman--both measure accurately and are cheaper than the Floscan.

However, I don't know if the 2004-2005 Suzuki is NMEA 2000 complient in the output--I think this started in the 2005/2006 era??? But the fuel guage (using the external sensor) will work--you just cannot read off the engine computer in the earlier engines.
 
The SMIS Interface cable is the part that makes it nmea 2000 capable. The motor itself isn't nmea 2000. I mostly watch range and flow. It can be connected to any nmea 2000 gps and get range and mpg. It was just easier to add there gps puck to do it. I didn't mind being a little redundant. It fits DF 40 to DF 300 - 2005 and Newer and DF 200 to DF 250 - 2004 and Newer. Here is a link to the install pdf.

http://www.c-brats.com/viewtopic.php?p=124013#124013
 
Thanks for the link to the PDF for the cable and the years when the output was NMEA 2000 complient.

One of the problems is that although Suzuki uses the standard Lowarance NMEA connectors--some of the other units do not. (even though they are all susposed to be standard) Also at one time Lowrance (and Suzuki) was using a different red connector to the network backbone. There are adaptors which will allow use on the various other connectors bus.

There was also a software upgrade which had to be done with some of the engines and systems to get the proper fuel flow. The Hull Truth, Electronics forum has had multiple discussions about these issues.
 
Just to post a followup-

Parts to install the Suzuki NMEA 2000 backbone is around $450. Add adapters to either get position to that network, or install an additional GPS antenna.

One note-

We had a customer with a Lowrance system, so we thought we could just plug his Lowrance display and GPS antenna into the NMEA2000 network.

Problem was, the network was powered by the Ignition switch- so when he was trolling with his kicker, the GPS antenna was off. Powering the network seperately from the ignition switch meant that all the gauges were live when the engine was off, causing oil pressure alarms to buzz constantly.

This is only an issue if you want to have position data while the main engine is off. In the setup this gentleman has, we will be able to use the Raymarine to send position to the NMEA2000 network, and when the network is off, the plotter will still have position.

This NMEA2000 is great stuff, but can create some interesting issues.
 
Getting back to basics==maytimes on the 22, one can see how much fuel is in the tanks. Either the Navman/Northstar or Lowrance fuel flow transducer can give you all of the information you need for about $120, less the miles per gallon, which are not essential (that requires a GPS--and you may get it from the RayMarine).

The next level up would be the EP 20 with either the Suzuki or Lowance 400- The Lowrance appears to be significantly less expensive.--probably be into this with the 4" guage for about $350--including a separate GPS antenna, which will give you a back up GPS, in case the chart plotter is lost (we carry at least two chart plotters). Also with the Lowrance or Suzuki, you have more engine information (temp, oil pressure, etc)

Or--you can just be aware of the amount of fuel you have aboard and just go. Many of us did that for years before all of these fancy gadgets came along. We just watched the tanks and how far we had gone. Never ran out of fuel.
 
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