replacing linc screen

[Jigsaw]

Hey all. Had a failure on our 2014 G25 Linc screen. Not sure if it is the screen or something else in the electronic system. Boat would abruptly shut off ( did this 5 or so times ) was able to reboot and restart until the screen went totally dark. Tried to restart and nothing. Once back to the dock via a tow I was able to restart by turning off the standby bilge pump off but screen still back. Any suggestions for a reset or are we on the pathway to new 4k Linc? Jeff do you have any??? Mine is silver framed like the one from Roberts post #21 on this thread. And of course we are or were leaving for our one week summer boat vacation tomorrow!!!! Thanks all.

[Jigsaw]

Just spoke to the dealer and they said to turn off batteries for 15 min and it may re-boot and it did. That leaves me to this question. Why did it fail to begin with? Overheating? it was Hot as **** yesterday and could that be the reason??? Any input would be greatly appreciated.

[hal2814]

Heat can cause data corruption. There’s an old trick for speed running an old Nintendo game where if you put the Nintendo on a hot plate you’ll get the “random” numbers that benefit you the most due to data corruption. If waiting 15 minutes fixed the issue then it was almost certainly caused by data corruption and heat is a possible culprit. There are plenty of other culprits though. You’ll probably just have to wait and see.

[Jigsaw]

Thanks Hal2814
At least we are heading north for the rest of the week, where temps should be in the mid 70s. Fingers crossed.

[robertsmcfarland]

jigsaw, mine took about a year to finally go blank, like you, I was on the water surfing, I got the the manual out and used that as a guide to put it in back to dock mode and drain tanks, I surprised my self and crew but it work ...

[LukeB]

Anyone have experience with this problem? Started up the linc and was greeted to this screen after the Booting…. It appears to be the boat loader update screen. I found a Murphy guide that shows the blue screen as the boot loader update screen and the black screen as the firmware update screen. I can not seem to get out of this screen. My assumption is that the linc lost / corrupted its boot loader. Anywhere to get the software to reload or any other suggestions?

Luke

[robertsmcfarland]

wish i could ,,your dealer should be able to help and send any updates free of charge...White Lake does....

[UFG8RMIKE]

We're just 10 years in to all the fancy screens and electronics. I come from the offshore fishing market where electronics, screens, etc are outdated and unserviceable/unsupported after just a few short years. These custom built in displays and gauges are going to be a nightmare. There's no way Nautique will service these things beyond a 10 year timeframe. It's impossible. I don't know about ya'll but I've never had a computer last much longer than 6 years before becoming a brick. In looking for a used wake boat, this "technology" is my #1 concern.

[UFG8RMIKE]

What's driving the move to automation and electronics is a desire for manufactures to expand the market so that any moron can operate a surf boat. A quick look at added features or features in development tells the story......

• Don't know or are are not willing to learn how to drive your new boat..... that's OK we'll throw on a set of $10K thrusters and a $10K steering system to compensate for your lack of skills.
• Don't understand how or are unwilling to learn how to set up your boat to surf.... that's OK we'll develop a $10K system to put on every boat to cover your lack of skills to do so.
• Don't understand how or are unwilling to learn how to lower your tower.... that's OK we'll develop a $15K power tower to cover you inability to learn how to do so.

It used to be that you had to have an understanding of boating to be on the water and to operate a boat properly. If you wanted to do any water sports past tubing there were things you needed to learn how to do to extract the best experience. What all these screens and electronics do is allow someone with virtually no skill or understanding of boating to get in and drive. Now moms or dads that have no interest in driving boats or boating can jump in their 25' $150K surf boat and pull the kids around the lake with the boat doing the thinking and work for them. True boating idiots looking like pro's through the wonder of electronics. First owners of these boats really don't care about maintenance or repair as 3 - 5 year bow to stern warranties have been built into the initial cost of the boat which probably adds about $10K - $15K to the initial cost and will cover everything a low skill boater will break during that period. When the warranty runs out they'll just trade the boat in or get out of boating altogether. While this is a high cost solution for the average boater, take a look at income demographic of who's buying these boats. This target group doesn't mind the added cost as long as it makes the experience easy and all worries about maintenance and repair are covered, the easy button so to speak.

As to repair-ability..... I do believe with any broken system there is an opportunity. In this case I can see where a specialty market or service sector business opportunity exists. Just as with the retro fit gauge packages from those early 2000s Nautiques were developed I believe you'll see similar solutions develop for these as well. As I posted above if I'm capable of repairing computers I'm certain of doing the same with these systems as well. The key and challenge will be to find the suppliers that are making the components and establishing channel for those repair parts.

Im afraid this will never work unkess a standard universal network like NEMA is adopted. These screens and components absolutely must be able to be upgraded over time. A 2012-2014 nautique at this point is nearing the scrap heap simply due to the electronics. The newer generations wont even run without them. If I owned one of these earlier boats, I'd be running for the exit as soon as possible with Covidiots still paying primo for them.

[Jeffers]

Hey All - I have a 2014 G21 and the screen starts of grey as the boat is booted up - and then gets a black stripe - and then goes to a dark grey after 20 seconds. Does this mean the screen is done? If it is, has anyone identified a source of after market parts or a used screen? Hoping someone's discovered sone new info on these. Thanks!
I've attached a picture of the front and back for reference,

[jpwhit]

I repair these screens on occasion. It just depends on how much time I have available and whether I have access to the parts required. Between my personal boats, and ski club boats I maintain, and lake friend boats there are a half dozen boats that I work on that have these screens. So, I started tinkering with them because I wanted to be prepared, when a boat I maintain had a problem. It also doesn't hurt that I was a design engineer for 35 years before I retired in the industrial products space and have designed and managed the manufacturing of many similar industrial electronic products similar to these screens.

The main challenge in repairing these screens is sourcing the LCD / touch sensor panel / front glass assembly. In industrial products such as these, that assembly is almost always a custom assembly that is optically bonded together. In the case of these screens, Murphy - Ennovation Controls has that part manufactured for them from a vendor that specialized in that domain. Because that custom assembly was designed for Murphy - Ennovation Controls under contract, the vendor that makes the part isn't allowed to sell them to anyone else. It's considered Intellectual Property of the company that paid to have them designed. These assemblies are optically bonded to provide good viewing angles, daylight visibility, as well as durability in harsh environments.

Anyway, I do happen to have the parts I would need to repair this particular screen. PM me if you're interested.

[jpwhit]

I looked back through this thread. To answer a few questions posted earlier.

The firmware on these screen can be updated outside the boat if you have the right connectors and wiring setup to run them outside the boat. The firmware is specific to boat models and if you're buying a used screen from someone, you almost always need to update the firmware before installing it into a different boat. What's often challenging is getting the correct firmware for your boat. Nautique only let's certified dealers have access to the repository of firmware files. If you have a good relationship with a dealer, you can often get them to send you the required firmware. In some cases the screen hardware is slightly different between boat models. But in many cases that can be things as small as the labeling on the buttons. I have for example, taken screens intended for the direct-drive ski boat, changed the firmware and installed it into a v-drive wake boat of the same generation.

[jpwhit]

Im afraid this will never work unkess a standard universal network like NEMA is adopted. These screens and components absolutely must be able to be upgraded over time. A 2012-2014 nautique at this point is nearing the scrap heap simply due to the electronics. The newer generations wont even run without them. If I owned one of these earlier boats, I'd be running for the exit as soon as possible with Covidiots still paying primo for them.

These screen do use industry standard protocols. They use NMEA 2K for communications with all the "nautical" components in the boat that are covered by the NMEA 2k standard. That includes things like speed and depth sensors, GPS modules, audio equipment etc.

They use J1939 for engine control and power management modules.

[jpwhit]

What's driving the move to automation and electronics is a desire for manufactures to expand the market so that any moron can operate a surf boat. A quick look at added features or features in development tells the story......

• Don't know or are are not willing to learn how to drive your new boat..... that's OK we'll throw on a set of $10K thrusters and a $10K steering system to compensate for your lack of skills.
• Don't understand how or are unwilling to learn how to set up your boat to surf.... that's OK we'll develop a $10K system to put on every boat to cover your lack of skills to do so.
• Don't understand how or are unwilling to learn how to lower your tower.... that's OK we'll develop a $15K power tower to cover you inability to learn how to do so.

It used to be that you had to have an understanding of boating to be on the water and to operate a boat properly. If you wanted to do any water sports past tubing there were things you needed to learn how to do to extract the best experience. What all these screens and electronics do is allow someone with virtually no skill or understanding of boating to get in and drive. Now moms or dads that have no interest in driving boats or boating can jump in their 25' $150K surf boat and pull the kids around the lake with the boat doing the thinking and work for them. True boating idiots looking like pro's through the wonder of electronics. First owners of these boats really don't care about maintenance or repair as 3 - 5 year bow to stern warranties have been built into the initial cost of the boat which probably adds about $10K - $15K to the initial cost and will cover everything a low skill boater will break during that period. When the warranty runs out they'll just trade the boat in or get out of boating altogether. While this is a high cost solution for the average boater, take a look at income demographic of who's buying these boats. This target group doesn't mind the added cost as long as it makes the experience easy and all worries about maintenance and repair are covered, the easy button so to speak.

As to repair-ability..... I do believe with any broken system there is an opportunity. In this case I can see where a specialty market or service sector business opportunity exists. Just as with the retro fit gauge packages from those early 2000s Nautiques were developed I believe you'll see similar solutions develop for these as well. As I posted above if I'm capable of repairing computers I'm certain of doing the same with these systems as well. The key and challenge will be to find the suppliers that are making the components and establishing channel for those repair parts.

While I don't have inside knowledge of what has driven Nautique, MasterCraft, Malibu and others boat makers to move to these screens, I have worked with other manufacturer including car companies and understand what has driven similar changes in their product design. I'm pretty confident the same motivations are at play here in the boat market.

By far the biggest reason is design and manufacturing cost and flexibility. For the sake a brevity, I'll reframe from getting into the why that's the case, and because it takes a pretty deep understanding of the realities of large-scale product design and manufacturing. If anyone wants to really get into this, it would be a good topic for a whole separate thread.

Offering features to the end user is certainly on the list of motivations, but it's typically 3rd or 4th on the list of motivations. And as a user, here's a short list of features that would be cost prohibitive to offer without this type of electronics, that I personally find very useful and it's why every boat I own now has a screen.

- User profiles - I just counted on my ski and wake boats - I have profiles for 37 unique people I pull - I could never remember all their preferences w/o profiles
- Speed dependent audio volume control
- Ability to read engine fault codes at any time at the touch of a button. I have Rhinda Diacom, but I don't carry it with me at all times
- Dynamic switching of surf side
- Auto Launch

The other reality is that any boat built after around 2010, even if it has tradition gauges, has multiple "computers" in it anyway. And when something does go wrong with one of these, it's typically harder to diagnose and fix the problem without having a screen vs having a screen. That's because it typically takes more special tools to figure out what's wrong. Good examples of this are the power mgmt and engine diagnostic utilities built into the boat display screens.

[srock]

I use to show up at the dock with a rope and barefoot suit and all the driver had to do was run between 38 and 40. We used a boom box because built-in radios were such a hassle to keep operational. So much for simplicity... But some things never change, the bass fishermen complained about our massive wakes.