Flaky Trim Gauge

[hansie21]

Ok here's the story. I hope someone can lead me in the right direction. Last year I purchased a Four Winns 170 Freedom. We have had multiple problems with the boat but the one that has not been fixed is the trim gauge. Sometimes the trim gauge will work, sometimes it doesn't. We have had the boat in three times for it. They replaced the gauge, sending unit and cable (from sending unit to gauge). The shop seems to be full of slackers so I don't know if the cable was actually replaced. When the boat is out of the water the gauge seems to work fine. Most of the time the gauge is pegged showing the trim is all the way up when the trim is down. Sometimes if you turn the steering wheel you can get the trim gauge to register and if you hit just the right wave the gauge will also register. This leads me to believe that there is some sort of wiring problem (short). Most of the time the needle is just bouncing around. The gauge seems to work best at full throttle. If the boat is out of the water it seems to work except when I am turn the steering wheel back and forth. Does anyone have any suggestions? Seen this problem before? Know the right part of the boat to kick? Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks

 

[Boatin Bob]

Re: Flaky Trim Gauge

Hans...you don't say what kind of engine/drive you have but since Four Winns was owned by OMC I'll take a guess and say OMC. The way the trim guage works is that the sending wire is actually the ground for the guage, if you removed the sending wire and put a jumper wire on from ground you guage will peg all the way over or up. An open circuit will cause the needle not to move at all. The sending unit is a variable resistor that goes from 0 to 200 ohms on an OMC, since it's under the water it's the most common component to go when you have trim guage problems. Given your symptoms it does sound like a bad connection, again on the OMC the sending unit wires come through the transom bracket and plug into a 2 wire rubber connector around the back of the engine, I know this was suppossed to be changed? but it's got to be either sender or a bad/flakey connection. Of the 2 wires that come from the sender, 1 goes to a ground connection on the engine and the other wire goes to the engine wiring harness and makes it's way up to the dash to the guage.

 

[hansie21]

Re: Flaky Trim Gauge

Thanks Boatin Bob! I'll take a look at the wiring.<br /><br />Hans

 

[njprofit]

Re: Flaky Trim Gauge

I have a similar problem with my 1992 FW 200 Horizon. My problem is that when the outdrive is trimmed up, the gauge needle stays there for a short while and then it shows that the outdrive is all the way down. I basically go by feel now.