Analogue v digital meters on console - back to the future

[george unthank]

This will come across as amateurish , Bolshi , gauche , and suggestive of a person of insufficient disposition and unsound mind , but I'm beginning to wonder . And so I’m going to stick my neck out .
Since I started having trouble with my Regal 2565 computer system I'm coming round to the idea that they should have kept the computer nerds well away from the drawing - design room when constructing modern boats.
My recent experience ie getting a '' CHECK ENGINE '' ALARM and trying to resolve same has rendered me a complete luddite
The EVC ( A completely new term to me as it applies to monitoring as distinct from running the engine )- well those EVC s , while they may make for all manner of clever mechanical adjustments TO RUN the engine AL all the smoother and more efficiently , in the hands if a professed amateur , what precisely does CHECK ENGINE ALERT mean ?
This alarm came on dash in my first outing of the season this week . I get the alarm to CHECK ENGINE and immediately seek a safe close by place to drop anchor. I cut the engine and hang on in substantial wind on anchor and lift the engine cover . What am I looking for ? The console will give me no further info. I try to scroll down on the particular and THEN scroll up ; - no information regarding the nature nor the location of the fault is revealed on EVC I then try one button singularly and then combinations of one and two in a vainglorious attempt to unearth what the fault is. Needless to say my endeavours were fruitless. The beeper has come on now and is driving me to distraction , and only when I change screens does the siren- beeb –beep settle down.
For the following 2 days I have been reporting my problem to various fora .the contributors were all extremely helpful and comprehensive ; insightful and inventive .but other than getting an exclusively Regal engineer with regal software it seems my boat is destined to remain on a waiting list until one of these much sought after gentlemen becomes free, then travels 150 odd miles to where my boat is berthed - Galway , W. Coast Ireland .
In the interim a friend of a friend of my car mechanic (..don't. tell me ...............told you so !) - he made contact with someone else who advised disconnecting both batteries simultaneously . He did this . The computer system reconfigured itself and all was well .He took her for a 1 hour+ trip uneventfully - the alert had rectified itself ; I took her out yesterday and on 2 occasions the CHECK ENGINE alert appeared - but reconfigured immediately giving me the SYSTEM CKEAR -signal.
I still don't know what enraged the EVC to hassle me so much with this CHECK ENGINE ALERT in the first instance other than arcane maybes - coulda- beens; might- have -beens etc
Why didn't they leave the old dials as they were , ie fuel guage , speed . oil , temp . voltage ?
In those bygone days even idiots like me were more conversant with what went on under the hood.

Is there a way of reverting to a non digital system , reading out all the vital signals whereby a 66 year old retired medical man , who incidentally had to make himself (me) far more amenable and infinitely more accessible than a marine computer specialist in the west of Ireland
Can I have the system reconfigured to the ''older'' system which made at least some sense to me , and gave me somewhere to poke at harmlessly without losing my dignity .
No ! this is serious .
Keep the Nerds away from boats - what did they ever do for us any more than the Romans .
Seriously , does my proposition of de -digitalising the system of a 2007 D3 5 cylinder 190 hp engine - does it make any sense and does it have.any

 

[jimmy_the_builder]

Not a chance. The EVC is more than just a monitoring system, it controls the engine.

Have you tried rtfm to find out how to get the EVC error code? That would take you towards the underlying fault. Apart from that, I suspect you won't have much choice other than to get a VP technician with a Vodia tool. Best of luck.

 

[curiouskb]

This will come across as amateurish , Bolshi , gauche , and suggestive of a person of insufficient disposition and unsound mind , but I'm beginning to wonder . And so I’m going to stick my neck out .
Since I started having trouble with my Regal 2565 computer system I'm coming round to the idea that they should have kept the computer nerds well away from the drawing - design room when constructing modern boats.
My recent experience ie getting a '' CHECK ENGINE '' ALARM and trying to resolve same has rendered me a complete luddite
The EVC ( A completely new term to me as it applies to monitoring as distinct from running the engine )- well those EVC s , while they may make for all manner of clever mechanical adjustments TO RUN the engine AL all the smoother and more efficiently , in the hands if a professed amateur , what precisely does CHECK ENGINE ALERT mean ?
This alarm came on dash in my first outing of the season this week . I get the alarm to CHECK ENGINE and immediately seek a safe close by place to drop anchor. I cut the engine and hang on in substantial wind on anchor and lift the engine cover . What am I looking for ? The console will give me no further info. I try to scroll down on the particular and THEN scroll up ; - no information regarding the nature nor the location of the fault is revealed on EVC I then try one button singularly and then combinations of one and two in a vainglorious attempt to unearth what the fault is. Needless to say my endeavours were fruitless. The beeper has come on now and is driving me to distraction , and only when I change screens does the siren- beeb –beep settle down.
For the following 2 days I have been reporting my problem to various fora .the contributors were all extremely helpful and comprehensive ; insightful and inventive .but other than getting an exclusively Regal engineer with regal software it seems my boat is destined to remain on a waiting list until one of these much sought after gentlemen becomes free, then travels 150 odd miles to where my boat is berthed - Galway , W. Coast Ireland .
In the interim a friend of a friend of my car mechanic (..don't. tell me ...............told you so !) - he made contact with someone else who advised disconnecting both batteries simultaneously . He did this . The computer system reconfigured itself and all was well .He took her for a 1 hour+ trip uneventfully - the alert had rectified itself ; I took her out yesterday and on 2 occasions the CHECK ENGINE alert appeared - but reconfigured immediately giving me the SYSTEM CKEAR -signal.
I still don't know what enraged the EVC to hassle me so much with this CHECK ENGINE ALERT in the first instance other than arcane maybes - coulda- beens; might- have -beens etc
Why didn't they leave the old dials as they were , ie fuel guage , speed . oil , temp . voltage ?
In those bygone days even idiots like me were more conversant with what went on under the hood.

Is there a way of reverting to a non digital system , reading out all the vital signals whereby a 66 year old retired medical man , who incidentally had to make himself (me) far more amenable and infinitely more accessible than a marine computer specialist in the west of Ireland
Can I have the system reconfigured to the ''older'' system which made at least some sense to me , and gave me somewhere to poke at harmlessly without losing my dignity .
No ! this is serious .
Keep the Nerds away from boats - what did they ever do for us any more than the Romans .
Seriously , does my proposition of de -digitalising the system of a 2007 D3 5 cylinder 190 hp engine - does it make any sense and does it have.any

Agree totally.
Problem is VP will not sell us the lay boaters their precious diagnostic tools like the Vodia which are available only to their mechanics !

 

[spannerman]

Does it have an OBD-II port?
[Content removed]

No that's a protocol used by the car industry. The Vodia does work on Volvo vehicles however as there are many parameters in the live data list that are not marine applications, such as accelerator, brake switch function etc.

 

[jfm]

This seems to be a Volvo issue, not a Regal issue? Which generation of EVC is it (early version 1 is generally said to be buggy)? As jtb says above, there is no realistic prospect of un-digitialising the engine but you should note the error code (flashing LEDs) and rtfm or google to interpret it (the granularity of the data is generally good here), or get a Volvo agent with a vodia tool to diagnose it

Ref the "problem" mentioned in your post #3, the harsh fact is that you kinda signed up to that in buying a Volvo boat! Good luck!

 

[pmagowan]

We have been discussing similar over on the 'common rail diesel' thread. The problem is not really with the technology. It is doing its job and providing information that may save your engine. The problem is that the people that made it have selfishly guarded that information so that you need to go to them to decipher it. In my opinion this is bad behaviour and potentially dangerous but they will carry on until we all kick up a stink and stop purchasing from them if they are not prepared to give us access to vital information about our own boats.

 

[george unthank]

Thank you jimmy..
see under

 

[george unthank]

Right on ! ] pmagowan !! But they have un cornered
They know people like me are so enfeebled of mind and dexterity when it comes to engines and computers that we are an easy target .
It's a bit like the in-built obsolescence ruse they used to do with ''disposable instruments or household equipment ''
And the unscrupulous chancer is always just round the corner - making himself look indispensable and intellectual. We can all spot them from the 1000 yard mark , in the dark.
We are irrelevant to them , and the younger boaters have grown up with computers as much as we did with biro s
The fact that we've been round the track a few times renders us more remote and hardly worth bothering about .- except for taking our money .

But no one has told me why the engine construction engineers went along with these nerds and are the EVCS that indispensable (- ironic word use here - indispensable ) -are EVCs a quantum leap in technology .?
They are not in the same league as time- travel capsules for example . Couldn't we have done with out them ?- EVS'S I mean .
Great for nerds and little napoleon minded front of hour smart ass dumbo s you meet in a computer shop-
Ask them how a silicon chip and why silicon and not lead and they're flummoxed
But we have to move on - the tide will come in and go out and repeat the cycle endlessly as we complain , and we remain obdurate , but principled - but also stranded until we succumb

 

[george unthank]

Inhale read the f****ng manual. I find it as turgid and lacking in quality information especially on this topic
I had a EVC in my last car - Mercedes e 270 . something happened the brakes.
I was given one warning - ONE WARNING - and that was to get off the motorway , whereupon the whole thing shut down , for 15 minutes , \then you could start it - just start it and run engine to be greeted with shut down and consult a Mercedes mechanic immediately.
I wrote to Mercedes as the system was positively dangerous . I received a short reply stating that they had upgraded. In the newer model - ''- upgraded ' - never would they admit having incorporated a flawed system in the car .

 

[george unthank]

Thanks pmagowan..see under

 

[Chris_d]

Sorry this is not going to be very helpful, but if you are complete technophobe why did you buy a boat with a Volvo D3. A quick google would have revealed that it is probably the most troublesome engine Volvo have ever made. Unfortunately it is fact of life that if you are no good at fixing stuff you shouldn't buy a boat, even an analogue one.

 

[jimmy_the_builder]

Sorry this is not going to be very helpful, but if you are complete technophobe why did you buy a boat with a Volvo D3. A quick google would have revealed that it is probably the most troublesome engine Volvo have ever made. Unfortunately it is fact of life that if you are no good at fixing stuff you shouldn't buy a boat, even an analogue one.

I think there's a flaw in your reasoning...

 

[prv]

They know people like me are so enfeebled of mind and dexterity when it comes to engines and computers that we are an easy target .

It's nothing to do with your technical competence or lack thereof. I'm a professional software engineer, but I'd still be scuppered if presented with an engine with an electronic management system and no, or only proprietary, diagnostic facilities.

It doesn't matter how good you are at reading if someone won't let you see the book.

Pete

 

[Croftie]

I think the point is that in the auto market there are dozens of low cost diagnostic tools that can read the ecu and reset fault codes, it seems that volvo on the marine side have it all to themselves. They are not bothered if you have to take it to a VP service centre and will not be until new boat buyers say "Volvo engines NO WAY because....." and the boat manufacturers feed it back to Volvo in large numbers.

 

[julians]

When I read the manual for my D4 (ages ago so I may be mistaken) , I thought it said that if you get a 'check engine' type error, you could press a combination of buttons, which would result in the EVC light flashing in a sequence that you could then look up and translate into a description of the actual thing that was causing the problem. Did I imagine that?

 

[jfm]

No you didn't imagine it. That's basically what it does. That's what people are referring to above when they say check the error code and google it or rtfm it

 

[jfm]

I think the point is that in the auto market there are dozens of low cost diagnostic tools that can read the ecu and reset fault codes, it seems that volvo on the marine side have it all to themselves. They are not bothered if you have to take it to a VP service centre and will not be until new boat buyers say "Volvo engines NO WAY because....." and the boat manufacturers feed it back to Volvo in large numbers.

You gotta look at it in the round. For example when I bought my last but one boat, Squadron 58, it was £700k with Volvo D12 and £750k with Caterpillar (C12 or C15, I can't remember), for the same horsepower. The Volvo D12 engine is ok, so it was a no brainer. Volvo's business model is then to reap more cash over the lifetime of the engine, and they're welcome to in my book.

 

[george unthank]

Chris-4
I have. Had boats for 35 + years .
My relationship with boats has never been through the unifocal lens of the mechanical prism . Yes I complain about nerds messing round where they don't belong .
Your generation , as I take. some pains to illustrate is light years away from me attitudinally , aesthetically ,emotionally , and logically ,
There is room for everyone on the water . I just hoped they kept making boats which served all my requirements in say 1980.
If they had I can assure you I would have stayed well out of your way , as I couldn't disagree more with your final conclusion , which certainly not based on ANY fact .
De gustibus non EST disputandem .

 

[george unthank]

Jimmy ,
Is there even reasoning in his ( Chris ) flaw ?
I can't see it

 

[george unthank]

Juliana
If you had any clarification on this point and could possibly unearth the'' how to '' guide re EVCs and if you could possibly steer me in the direction of any data relating to this I would be most grateful
In my case the regal manual is completely different to the console in my boat ,
One dial , for example is blank - nothing in it .
I get the impression that Volvo decided that they would circumvent the analogue system for some specific unidentified purpose . My fuel gauge on the dash is frequently in conflict with analogue . The depths given on my GPS is frequently different to the analogue reading on the dash .
The problem is that they are using ''old money'' and new and using one manual .
I don't have a separate manual for Farina ( spell ?) EVC system which was installed in my boat . it seems almost as if the EVC was added as an afterthought .
That's my beef Why did they do this .- To retain all post purchase services unto Volvo exclusively ?