2019 Nautique G23 - Lync screen Gauges going out but not entire sync screen.

[Ryan_2018_G23]

Check out the videos... I can't even explain it:

https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B2I5idkMwo78Yl

In second (shorter video) the gauges do come back on at the very end of video.

This has been going over for about 2 years now and can't figure it out. Dealership can not get it to repeat on water test, but happens to us every time we go out. When surfing the wave with drop out completely ,as well, and all gauges drop out and cruise control drops out. No changes in throttle action. Surfer runs into boat... It is dangerous.

[Ryan_2018_G23]

My previous post trying to explain: https://www.planetnautique.com/vb5/f...uges-drop-to-0

[jpwhit]

I'm fairly certain you're experiencing a CanBus fault. On the newer generation Nautique's they have really overloaded the single CanBus in the boat. They really need a much more resilient and fault tolerant design such as is used in automotive with multiple buses where safety critical systems such as throttle and boat speed are on a separate bus from non-critical systems such as ballast pumps, tab actuators, lighting and such. That would also make diagnosis much easier. Building some logging and diagnostic tools into the system would also go a long way.

Unfortunately, given the number of devices on the single bus, this is difficult to diagnose. Especially remotely. If I were at your boat in person, I'd connect up a CanBus logger and bus monitor to figure out what's going on. Given the cost of these boats, maybe Nautique can send someone to your location to diagnose the issue.

[Ryan_2018_G23]

Thanks for these thoughts, jpwhit . Will these show on a fault screen anywhere as we are not getting fault popping up? We have had terrible issues with batteries / low voltage / failure... Have replaced the batteries 4 times in 4 years with only 240 hours on the boat. The battery tender also went out so had to buy a new one of those. Not sure if any of these are related but thought I should bring it up.

How challenging / costly is the CanBus fault repair? I am down on Lake Keowee in South Carolina.

[NautiqueJeff]

jpwhit is absolutely on the right track.

I ran your issue by a friend of mine who is an engineer at Nautique, and he said you're likely losing CAN communication. He suggested starting by checking the CAN wiring to the LINC screen. It may be as simple as a loose connection.

[jpwhit]

With issues with the CanBus, they often do not show up as faults on the LINC screen. That's partly due to the limited diagnostics and error checking built into the LINC screen for problems with the CanBus. There are many different issues that can occur with the CanBus.

The two most common fault conditions fall into two general categories. First is a CanBus wiring issue. Simply a break in the wiring or connectors somewhere along the bus. The bus consists of a pair of wires designated as Can High and Can Low. At each end of the pair of wires are 120 ohm termination resistors. If there is a point where there is an electrical break in either Can High or Low, the bus won't operate.

The second general category of CanBus fault is a device on the Bus somewhere that has failed in such a way that it's blocking the bus by either shorting it out or generating electrical signal that disrupts the bus. In theory, devices should really be designed such that they shouldn't fail in this way. But in theory really depends on the diligence of whoever designed the overall system. It's extremely rare for example to see this kind of failure in the automotive world. Otherwise, the car companies would get a big black eye for building cars that were unreliable or really hard to repair.

It even worse when you have a CanBus fault that intermittent such as this case. That can be due to an intermittent wiring fault or a device on the bus that failing and disrupting the bus intermittently. That's were having very good logging and data recording built into the system for diagnostic purposes can really help. Otherwise, you can only look for the problem while the intermittent condition is happening, or you can just start disconnection or replacing CanBus devices on the bus until the problem just stops happening. But that can get expensive quick.

Given the limited diagnostics built into this system, and the level of complexity and number of devices on the bus in these newer boats, it's pretty much impossible to predict how long it would take to find the issue, It's the proverbial needle in a haystack. A lot depends on the experience and skill of the technician working on the problem.

It also doesn't help with the limited technical documentation that's available on these boats. For example, you would assume it would be easy to get a list of all the devices on the CanBus in your boat. But I'm not aware of the availability of that information. I'm not even sure the dealer service technicians have a clear definitive list. I can take an educated guess just based on my experience with boats. This would be a partial list off the top of my head.

Engine ECU
LINC Screen
Keypad
Joystick / Aux LINC Control
PDM 1
PDM 2
PDM (not sure how many PDM in this model)
GPS Puck
Zero Off or Cruise Control black box
AirMar Biducer
NSS Actuator left
NSS Actuator right
Center Tab or Gate Actuator
Various Stereo Components (sometime these are on a separate NEMA 2k Bus)

[bturner]

I'm in awe of jpwhit 's technical skill set. Great information as usual.

On another somewhat related note.....

Saw an article a couple weeks back discussing classic cars in which the author lamented that there will be no "next generation" of classic cars due to the nature of the electronics currently being utilized and the near impossible task of restoring or finding replacement parts for cars 10 - 20 years from now. I think the same will be said of boats past 2010 depending on the features of the boat.

Right now you can still buy boats that are 20 years old and make them work as designed and reliable. How are you going to do that with one of these electrical nightmares? I guess where there's a will there's a way and maybe the aftermarket will develop and step in but right now that next generation of used boats is not looking promising to me. Am I alone in thinking the used boat market could see some serious challenges in say 5 years when these electrical beasts age out of warrantee?