The most tedious part of the install was attaching all those skinny alarm, gauge, and tach signal wires seen on the EMU-1 terminals (top photo) to the appropriate wires on the back of the old gauge panel. This is a semi-redundancy I like! (The three trouble lights and their associated audio alarms are a different deal, which I’ll explain further down.) If the old coolant temperature gauge (upper left) fails, for instance, the EMU will still deliver the temp information if the sender is working, at least theoretically…and if the EMU or N2K network fail, the gauge will still work. Incidentally, one neat nuance of the EMU-1 is that each of its 6 gauge channels can automatically sense the presence of an analog sibling, adjusting its calibration curve to suit and also sending power to the sender if needed.
I’m too conservative to totally remove Gizmo’s old gauges (like the set above at the lower helm), but I’m already confident enough of the EMU-1 data that I plan to move them to an obscure location when I do a “glass bridge” makeover this winter. I’m going to be better informed about my engine’s health, which is very important, while also gaining some scarce helm panel real estate for better uses than dumb analog gauges… That Actisense EMU-1 is now converting the analog gauge data from the boat’s 14-year-old Volvo Penta diesel into NMEA 2000 messages that can be displayed in multiple ways on most any MFD or instrument screen on board and can also be custom alarmed and logged. It’s great to test an unusual device that promises to do something new and desirable for the good vessel Gizmo and find out that it installs fairly easily and works quite well.
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