Temperature Gauge

[Cat36Amoore]

New to a Universal 5411. Concerned with over heating the engine. The instrument panel does not have temperature gauge and don't believe a sensor for the engine. What is the process to install the needed equipment. More concerned with the engine piece sensor and placement. I can handle the wiring to the instrument panel. Panel does not have space, but I would remove the fuel tank gauge. Sailing on a lake with a 15 gallon diesel tank not too concerned with running out of fuel. Would appreciate any help

 

[Warren Milberg]

This is what I did on my boat (w/Yanmar 2GM20F) and would work on any boat: I bought an inexpensive indoor/outdoor thermometer at Walmart. The outdoor sensor is a wire with a small pad on it that I snaked into the engine compartment and wired tightly to the thermostat housing. I velcro'd the readout to a bulkhead in the lazarette. This readout will not produce the exact temperature of the engine, but it will tell you when you are headed for trouble and before the engine overheat alarm goes off.

 

[jviss]

No need, in my opinion

Having had two engine temperature gauges fail on my boat in 13 years, and having lived without one for most of that time, I can say from experience that you just don't need one. You will only spend time looking at it, worrying about it, asking questions about operating temperature, and enjoy sailing less.

What you need, in my opinion, is to make sure that, by design and implementation, that your engine is adequately cooled: that the heat exchanger is big enough, that you have adequate raw water flow, that your coolant is full, and so on.

In addition, you should have a high temperature alarm. This is very simple, and is usually wired along with a low oil pressure alarm. When you turn the engine switch on, does an alarm sound before you start? That would be the low oil pressure alarm.

A sensor is threaded into the thermostat housing, and wired to a buzzer, usually located where the key switch is. If the temp goes out of bounds, or the oil pressure too low, the alarm sounds.

Simple, inexpensive, and reliable.

jv

 

[jviss]

This is what I did on my boat (w/Yanmar 2GM20F) and would work on any boat: I bought an inexpensive indoor/outdoor thermometer at Walmart. The outdoor sensor is a wire with a small pad on it that I snaked into the engine compartment and wired tightly to the thermostat housing. I velcro'd the readout to a bulkhead in the lazarette. This readout will not produce the exact temperature of the engine, but it will tell you when you are headed for trouble and before the engine overheat alarm goes off.

That's brilliant!

 

[Cat36Amoore]

This is what I did on my boat (w/Yanmar 2GM20F) and would work on any boat: I bought an inexpensive indoor/outdoor thermometer at Walmart. The outdoor sensor is a wire with a small pad on it that I snaked into the engine compartment and wired tightly to the thermostat housing. I velcro'd the readout to a bulkhead in the lazarette. This readout will not produce the exact temperature of the engine, but it will tell you when you are headed for trouble and before the engine overheat alarm goes off.

Great idea for a new sailboat that wishes to send time sailing, with out a lot of major investment.

 

[Cat36Amoore]

Having had two engine temperature gauges fail on my boat in 13 years, and having lived without one for most of that time, I can say from experience that you just don't need one. You will only spend time looking at it, worrying about it, asking questions about operating temperature, and enjoy sailing less.

What you need, in my opinion, is to make sure that, by design and implementation, that your engine is adequately cooled: that the heat exchanger is big enough, that you have adequate raw water flow, that your coolant is full, and so on.

In addition, you should have a high temperature alarm. This is very simple, and is usually wired along with a low oil pressure alarm. When you turn the engine switch on, does an alarm sound before you start? That would be the low oil pressure alarm.

A sensor is threaded into the thermostat housing, and wired to a buzzer, usually located where the key switch is. If the temp goes out of bounds, or the oil pressure too low, the alarm sounds.

Simple, inexpensive, and reliable.

jv

Thanks follow Massachusetts sailor. The reason I feel I would like a temp gauge is because my maiden voyage with my 1983 Catalina 27 with a Universal 5411 this monday. I just bought the boat and had it delivered to Sebago Lake from Lake Champlain. The survivor said the boat was a great buy. We tested the engine and it ran great. After rigging the boat and putting it in the lake we started the engine, it started right up fine. However, no water was coming out of the transom thru hull,so we shut the engine down. We checked that water was coming into the impeller and out of the impeller, up to the thermostat. The thermostat was in rough shape so we removed the thermostat and plenty of water gushed out the transom thru hull. But stopped to a tickle. We needed to move the boat to another marina. So we ran the engine for about 5 minutes to get out of the channel to open waters. We sailed for about seven miles, great sail, into late afternoon and early evening. We started the engine and ran it for about ten minutes into the cove and our new slip. Really had no other choice no wind and dark.

I am heading back up this weekend with a new thermostat and prepared to check for any blockage. Impeller looked good. Having researched and read the many blogs on the issue of raw water cooling systems hopefully I can figure out the problem. These sailboat forums are terrific. I've learned a lot about marine diesel engines in two days. Hopefully it's the thermostat or blockage in the lines.

It seems as if the Universal 5411 has some issues with this. So to have a temperature gauge would provide a little piece of mind. Perhaps I'll try the Wal-Mart temp gauge solution for this season.

I do not believe my boat has a high temperature alarm and can't remember an alarm sound when starting the engine. The model 5411 does not have a heat exchanger. I'll check it out this weekend.

 

[Alan Gomes]

The behavior you are describing (i.e., no water being discharged initially) sounds perfectly normal for the 5411. I don't own one myself but I understand this is characteristic of how the cooling in these engines is supposed to work, and that it does cause some confusion to people who are not familiar with this.

Post your question on the Catalina 30 list (Yahoo.com), where there are folks who have this engine installed in their C30s, and you can get a more definitive answer on what to expect in this regard. But I'd recommend that you do this before messing with thermostats or anything else because if I'm not mistaken there's nothing wrong with your engine and you may actually screw something up.

 

[sailaway78]

I disagree

I strongly disagree with the post saying you don't need a temp guage. I don't even want to depend on just a buzzer. A temp guage, doesn't need to be watched continually, but a glance every once in a while can be useful. I know where my engine runs within a couple of degrees. In mid summer it runs about 5 degrees warmer than winter. ( Raw water cooled) A good working guage will give you some advance warning before it is too late. A couple years ago, I had a brand new Yanmar impeller spin the hub, so anything can happen at any time. I do like the indoor outdoor thermometer idea.

 

[jviss]

I strongly disagree with the post saying you don't need a temp guage. I don't even want to depend on just a buzzer. A temp guage, doesn't need to be watched continually, but a glance every once in a while can be useful. I know where my engine runs within a couple of degrees. In mid summer it runs about 5 degrees warmer than winter. ( Raw water cooled) A good working guage will give you some advance warning before it is too late. A couple years ago, I had a brand new Yanmar impeller spin the hub, so anything can happen at any time. I do like the indoor outdoor thermometer idea.

Different strokes. Your method requires constant monitoring. When things get hot, at least in my experience, they get hot in a hurry, like sucking a plastic bag, or spinning an impeller hub, etc. Even with a gauge it's likely the buzzer will let you know, unless you have your nose glued to he temp gauge.

I think I'd prefer a raw-water flow sensor with a buzzer over a temp gauge.

Am I wrong, or are most over-temp issues on inboard diesels related to raw water flow in one way or another? I had a coolant circulating pump fail once, but it made a ton of noise on its own and the engine never overheated. I guess you could lose the coolant because of a leak and that would show up on a gauge, but the buzzer would sound pretty quick, too.

 

[mr c]

I received this info from reading posts. Finding the right threading for a temp gauge is difficult (yanmar). Someone offered this solution. I am just passing info on.

https://www.pegasusautoracing.com/p...//www.pegasusautoracing.com/keywordsearch.asp

 

[Allan12210]

I have had good success with analog monitoring devices that I installed in tandem to the on/off alerts that the boat came with. Sort of like a preference I have to gauges in my cars versus idiot lights.

The gauges I installed are close enough to my tachometer that things can just catch one's attention without have to stare at it constantly. Examples include long distance motoring up the coast of California and seeing the temperature start creeping up slowly. It didn't go from normal to overheat in an instant. Not wanting to bury my head in the engine with a rolling seaway I could manage the temperature by backing off on the throttle until we arrived at Half Moon Bay. There I found a partial clog in the strainer. Another time I began to notice that the engine constantly ran a few degrees warmer than normal. I needed to ream out the heat exchanger as a thin layer of deposits were reducing its efficiency. I like to foresee issues before they result in potential failures. Analog monitoring helps. I still have the audible alert. Its just useful to have the additional capability. Knowledge is power.

I've had the on/off oil pressure sender fail. The back up oil gauge was useful as I could see adequate pressure and knew it was still safe to run the engine. These things don't fail at the dock, but rather in a busy channel or somewhere where it results in elevated stress. I'd also like to know if oil pressure is dropping or fluctuating before the alarm sounds as damage is happening even before the alert goes off when the only choice is to shut down immediately.

 

[Ralph Johnstone]

Had to Ask ....................

.................... is that a rotometer (in your last photo) I see coming from the sea water strainer ? ?

Don't think I've seen anything that exotic even on 10 MW units used as plant standbys.

 

[woodster]

.................... is that a rotometer (in your last photo) I see coming from the sea water strainer ? ?

Don't think I've seen anything that exotic even on 10 MW units used as plant standbys.

looks like a perko sea water strainer with a rain gauge mounted on top of it or a check valve of some kind to me

regards

woody

 

[Allan12210]

Ralph,

Pretty cool isn't it? Being an ex-process engineer with water systems experience I was familiar with flow meters. One day I was scrounging around in a surplus store and found that 10 gallon per minute flow meter for 10 bucks. Now I can tell on start up that idle is 2.2 gpm and wide open is 7 gpm. I've caught problems on seveal occasions when flow isn't quite right. Usually I fix it by pulling off the input hose to the strainer and give a couple of honks on the air horn to blow out mud or other stuff.

Woody, A raingauge might work. Just stick a ping pong ball in it and good to go.

 

[Ralph Johnstone]

Aw Crap ........................

One day I was scrounging around in a surplus store and found that 10 gallon per minute flow meter for 10 bucks.

................... I should have installed one of those ! ! ! ! !

Instead, I opted for an idiot flow detector which only sounds an alarm when the flow is down to about 1 GPM and by then it's too late and time to shut down.

If truth be known, I installed the flow switch because I always had some inebriated crew member starting the engine without opening the thru hull. Combine that with the fact that the exhaust outlet is under water, and you don't find out about these things until the hi temp. alarm goes off.

 

[Old Skool Neil]

I have a flow sensor on my Atomic 4 that's compatible with the standard Cole-Hersee temp and oil pressure alarm system. It's intended to alert the skipper when raw water flow has stopped for whatever reason (blockage, impeller disintegration) long before an overheat event occurs. I've got it covered every which way, gauges AND enhanced alarm system. I wanna know BEFORE there's costly damage.

 

[nolasafari]

I built a complete engine gauge panel for a 2GM20F, this was about 20 years ago. I used standard marine gauges and just teed them into the oil port and the temp sensor port. I think they were all NPT (National Pipe Thread). I forgot how I did the amp meter. Even added a push button to light them up. The panel was mounted below next to the MDP. Main function was so I could watch the gauges when someone else was at the Helm and I was below. I was main propulsion in the Navy and believe gauges tell you a lot more than idiot lights, and often help to diagnose an issue before it becomes a serious problem. The combination of gauges and alarms is the way to go, as stated you can't stare at the gauges coastally. When the alarm goes off the gauges can help to solve the problem.
Jim

 

[nolasafari]

Put the engine keys around the handle of the thru hull.

 

[Ralph Johnstone]

If You Saw Some of my Crew Members ...........

Put the engine keys around the handle of the thru hull.

..................... it's surprising they could even find the ignition key let alone remember to open the thru-hull. Mind you, I wouldn't trade them for the world .

Yes, I keep the key around the thru hull but still have the ocassional crew member who forgets to open the valve.

The flow alarm is one further "fool proof", "idiot proof", "child proof" protective device to ensure the sea water keeps flowing.

 

[nolasafari]

..................... it's surprising they could even find the ignition key let alone remember to open the thru-hull. Mind you, I wouldn't trade them for the world .

Yes, I keep the key around the thru hull but still have the ocassional crew member who forgets to open the valve.

The flow alarm is one further "fool proof", "idiot proof", "child proof" protective device to ensure the sea water keeps flowing.

I need all the reminders I can devise. My problem is not booze I am just getting to old.

Jim