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Updating the Furuno GP-150

Arno Luijten
 
Edited

For those suffering the week-rollover problem on the Furuno GP-150. I can confirm it is possible to update the device yourself.

There are a few annoyances. First you need to get hold of a 7-pin cable that connects to the DATA-4 connector. Furuno did not supply that with the unit
I bough one here: https://www.ebay.com/itm/185063928966
Next you need to use the software that Bill Rouse kindly provided us.
You will need the file with the name "201518-0405_RNMP-20-043(19,200bps)" enclosed with this post (GP150.zip)
Next you will need a USB to serial converter and a D9 plug for the Furuno cable (unless your Windows laptop still has a COM port available).
It connects with only three wires (RD, SD and SG, that is Receive Data, Send Data and Signal Ground)
On the D9 plug these are pin 2 (red wire)  3 (yellow wire) and 5 (blue wire)
Next you need to go into Windows device manager to set some parameters for the USB COM port (make sure the USB-COM cable is connected).
In device manager look up which COM number has been assigned to the cable (under properties), In my case it was COM4:
You need to set some properties as well: set baudrate to 19200 and flow control to "Off"
Now you need to change the file UPe.BAT :
There is a single command inside the Batchfile: "uppg Rload.bin gp100e.bin 0 0 100 0 1 0"
The last one (1) in the command is actually the COM-port number, I had to change it to 4 for my case.

Next follow the manual as enclosed in the ZIP file (GP150 UPDATE.pdf). For me that worked immediately. The update process is fairly slow, make sure you don't run out of power somehow.

Regards,
Arno Luijten
SV Luna,
A54-121
Re: Firefly Battery Update.

Arno Luijten
 

Hi Bill,

You did an excellent job in charting the way your batteries are behaving!

I guess I'm just disappointed by the expectations the Sales Blurb set for me about the the way these batteries behave. I consider a 0.1 C load on a battery not exceptional at least not to see voltages dropping to close to 23 Volt. This is a point where all the voltage alarms start sounding on our boat if it lasts longer then 10 secs or so. With an big inverter, a freezer and two fridges getting to these loads is not so hard. The loads are not continuous but long enough to set off the alarms. So in my case the set of batteries I had was not big enough to withstand an excessive voltage drop. When sailing it also means a lot of generator time as the solar panels we have is not be be enough to compensate all usage in the 24h timeframe. Charging was better then with AGM but still the last 20% takes a lot of time. And this is where I got into a catch-22 situation as I wanted the batteries at high SOC because of the voltage drop.
We are now on Lithium and that makes a lot of difference. But that was to be expected. Thanks to the dimensional aspects of the replacement it also allowed us to install 700Ah@24V. But as said before, the cost of this whole exercise is something I really want to forget.

I'm happy these batteries work good for you as I don't believe they are bad batteries but their use-case is different then I expected.

Regards,
Arno Luijten
SV Luna,
A54-121
Re: I ordered this on the 10 th from Amel

Sv Garulfo
 

Last time we ordered something from La Rochelle, we tried real hard to explain that FedEx was terrible at delivering to French Polynesia, but there was no other option. We ended up sending a friend at the Amel office to pick the part up, package it and send it via the French postal service. It arrived just fine, and we were able to carry on cruising around, knowing it would get forwarded anywhere with a post office in FP, which is anywhere with human beings.

Oh well...

Thomas
GARULFO 
A54-122
Rapa, French Polynesia



On 4 Feb 2022, at 10:20, CW Bill Rouse <brouse@...> wrote:

I ship my Amel Books worldwide. This is a problem everywhere and some places are much worse than others. All shippers use commercial airlines as either the primary source or a secondary source. The lack of international passenger flights has really hurt reliability.

I am afraid that there is no solution other than to wait.

Bill

CW Bill Rouse Amel Owners Yacht School
720 Winnie, Galveston Island, Texas 77550 
   
On Fri, Feb 4, 2022 at 8:34 AM Brian Riggs <7briggs@...> wrote:
I have found this becoming more and more of the norm with US Postal Service. It's like the barcode readers can't figure out what goes where, and people don't read labels in the postal system anymore. They just toss it in the next container. Ugh.

Brian Riggs
Future Amel owner


On Fri, Feb 4, 2022, 13:23 Patrick McAneny via groups.io <sailw32=aol.com@groups.io> wrote:
That is crazy! Nothing is working as well as just a year ago, I wonder why ! It may have been faster to sail over to pick it up.
Good Luck
Pat

Re: Firefly Battery Update.

JB Duler
 

Bill, I looked that up, that sounds awesome. I must have been in a cave, or work got in the way. I missed that functionality.
May I ask, does thing connect to wifi or do you need a router on board?
--
John Bernard "JB" Duler
San Francisco
Meltem # 19, Western Med
Re: Firefly Battery Update.

Bill Kinney
 

JD,

These graphs are taken directly from the Victron "VRM" website.  With our Cerbo system all of our data (collected every second) is sent to the Victron servers, and is presented on the VRM page in a wide variety of formats.  They store all of the data for six months, and some of it indefinitely.  It has been a real help in understanding our own system, and also to troubleshoot systems belonging to our clients. It can be downloaded and saved forever if you think that is valuable.

I can't be more enthusiastic about the way Victron has set up their systems.  From both a software and hardware standpoint I can't find fault with the route they have taken. Everything we have had from them has just plain WORKED.  They seem to walk that line between options and capabilities and simplicity as well as can be done. Just in the past couple days I have been able to remotely troubleshoot systems on two other boats because Victron is consistent on the way the implement things across their product lines.  I am a fan.

Bill Kinney
SM160, Harmonie
Hollywood, FL, USA
Re: Firefly Battery Update.

JB Duler
 

Bill, how do you get those charts?
They are great. I used the Victron app but I get limited data.
--
John Bernard "JB" Duler
San Francisco
Meltem # 19, Western Med
Re: B&G Forward Scan Transducer Install

Jose Venegas
 

It may be the size of the hull whole NOT the  diameter of the sensor 

jose
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

CW Bill Rouse
 

MolyKote
image.png


CW Bill Rouse Amel Owners Yacht School
720 Winnie, Galveston Island, Texas 77550 
   

On Fri, Feb 4, 2022 at 11:10 AM Bill Kinney <cruisingconsulting@...> wrote:
I'll double down on what Arnold suggests.  Silicon grease (I use Molykote 111) is the top choice here for its extreme water resistance.  Most PTFE greases are not highly resistant to water wash-out.  

A couple additional thoughts:  

On older SM's (like ours) the nut is restrained not by a plastic or metal tab, but by wire. I have found getting the wire off, and then reconnected, is virtually impossible without removing the rudder quadrant from the stock, so for us a specialized wrench is not much of a help.

I have been challenged with getting three rings of packing compressed enough to engage the treads of the plastic nut sufficiently to actually tighten it without stripping. Nothing I did worked.  I finally tried just using 2 rings, and that worked, but only for a while.  

Final solution was to use one standard ring of packing, adding a layer of "Dripless packing" a bit thinner than 8mm, and then a second ring of standard packing on top.  The slightly thinner middle layer gave me the room to get enough threads of the plastic nut engaged to actually torque it down. After a couple of iterations in tightening, this has solved our drips. I have had excellent results with this on props shafts so I have reason to be optimistic that it will have a VERY long and happy life as rudder packing. (this stuff comes with its own silicon lubricant.)

Bill Kinney
SM160, Harmonie
Hollywood, FL, USA

Re: I ordered this on the 10 th from Amel

CW Bill Rouse
 

I ship my Amel Books worldwide. This is a problem everywhere and some places are much worse than others. All shippers use commercial airlines as either the primary source or a secondary source. The lack of international passenger flights has really hurt reliability.

I am afraid that there is no solution other than to wait.

Bill

CW Bill Rouse Amel Owners Yacht School
720 Winnie, Galveston Island, Texas 77550 
   

On Fri, Feb 4, 2022 at 8:34 AM Brian Riggs <7briggs@...> wrote:
I have found this becoming more and more of the norm with US Postal Service. It's like the barcode readers can't figure out what goes where, and people don't read labels in the postal system anymore. They just toss it in the next container. Ugh.

Brian Riggs
Future Amel owner


On Fri, Feb 4, 2022, 13:23 Patrick McAneny via groups.io <sailw32=aol.com@groups.io> wrote:
That is crazy! Nothing is working as well as just a year ago, I wonder why ! It may have been faster to sail over to pick it up.
Good Luck
Pat

Re: Firefly Battery Update.

Bill Kinney
 

Arno,

I agree that the inability to fit a full complement of batteries would be a major problem.  But I am curious why you consider a difference of 0.2 volts a major issue? And it seems you consider 24 Volts an absolute minimum acceptable?  Everything onboard still works perfectly well down to voltages of 23 or so.

The voltage curve you present from Firefly is NOT a zero load curve, but is voltage at the C10 discharge rate, or pulling 50 Amps out of a 480 Amp hour battery bank.  That's a pretty extreme load, and is the one we see only during our deep discharges when we duplicate that curve pretty much exactly. 

We also never discharge below about 60% SOC in normal use.  (About 190 Amps-hrs discharged).  If you need more than that, and on a 54 you likely do, I'd certainly agree that 8 Firefly are not the right choice.

This is our SOC, voltage and current draw graphs from a couple days at anchor. Some sunny, some not :)  Lowest seen voltage is 24.4v on the early morning of the 20th at a SOC of 57% while pulling about 5 Amps. Our generator autostarts at 0630 if the SOC is below 70%, runs to about 93% SOC, and then we let the solar panels take over.
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

Bill Kinney
 

I'll double down on what Arnold suggests.  Silicon grease (I use Molykote 111) is the top choice here for its extreme water resistance.  Most PTFE greases are not highly resistant to water wash-out.  

A couple additional thoughts:  

On older SM's (like ours) the nut is restrained not by a plastic or metal tab, but by wire. I have found getting the wire off, and then reconnected, is virtually impossible without removing the rudder quadrant from the stock, so for us a specialized wrench is not much of a help.

I have been challenged with getting three rings of packing compressed enough to engage the treads of the plastic nut sufficiently to actually tighten it without stripping. Nothing I did worked.  I finally tried just using 2 rings, and that worked, but only for a while.  

Final solution was to use one standard ring of packing, adding a layer of "Dripless packing" a bit thinner than 8mm, and then a second ring of standard packing on top.  The slightly thinner middle layer gave me the room to get enough threads of the plastic nut engaged to actually torque it down. After a couple of iterations in tightening, this has solved our drips. I have had excellent results with this on props shafts so I have reason to be optimistic that it will have a VERY long and happy life as rudder packing. (this stuff comes with its own silicon lubricant.)

Bill Kinney
SM160, Harmonie
Hollywood, FL, USA
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

Arnold Mente
 

I use SILICON GREASE like for the C-Shaft 
--
Arnold
SY Zephyr SM203
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

Arlo
 

Bill or others, would a marine grade ptfe grease be acceptable to use? Or perhaps a white lithium grease? I seldom have good results with anything on a boat that is not marine grade. 

Thoughts?
Re: Firefly Battery Update.

Arno Luijten
 

Hi Bill,

The point we had was that we planned to put 10 batteries in the boat but this simply did not fit. The Firefly is just a bit bigger then most G31 batteries, making it impossible to put more then a single row of 9 (incl. starter battery) in the compartment.
I had the system even equipped with 2 Victron battery balancers and each battery tested fine. The graph I got from Firefly showed me the voltages are slighty under "normal" AGM levels:



So to me it seems the batteries are not the best for higher loads when partially discharged. Maybe my set was from a bad batch or whatever but the remark I got from Firefly was:

"...  A couple things you might note, it is fairly normal for the voltage to drop from a 50 amp load at 60% SOC.  It is an inherent characteristic of lead battery chemistry that the voltage is below 12 volts on a 12-volt battery below 50%, and if any load is applied well before reaching 50%. Here is the SOC vs V chart for the FF.  You can see that at 65% SOC the V would be 12.25V with no load applied.
It seems as though lithium might be a better solution for you.
..."

They also told me that a float of 13.3 is too low, but I used 13.3 on my shore charger and 13.5 at the solar charger to minimize the shore power usage. It still did not explain the high voltage drop at higher discharge rates.

So all in all I can't recommend these batteries for an Amel 54 based on my experience.

Kind regards,
Arno Luijten
SV Luna,
A54-121
Re: B&G Forward Scan Transducer Install

CW Bill Rouse
 

Jose, yes I had a typo...42 mm housing for the B&G Depth, but B&G specs are 50.8mm (2 inches) for the Forward-Looking Transducer...see below. I cannot figure out how you replaced the B&G Depth Transducer with a B&G Forward-Looking Transducer without enlarging the original B&G Depth Transducer hole of 42 mm.

The only reason I bring this up is that some people reading this may have an issue with installation.

Bill
image.png

image.png


On Thu, Feb 3, 2022 at 11:04 PM Jose Venegas via groups.io <josegvenegas=icloud.com@groups.io> wrote:
Here are views of both sensors
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

Randall Walker
 

Thanks Bill and Martin,

Greasing makes sense as my problem came to be apparent in the middle of the Atlantic while I was alone for the crossing. I had checked all the compartments and there was no water inside the boat. Hearing water around a sailboat is expected. Over the course of the nonstop Gibraltar to Granada 5 week trip I checked below the floorboards regularly but not below the aft cabin bed, My place of rest was the saloon. One trip into the aft cabin was not so good as there was water sloshing out from under the bed as the boat rocked. even the linear drive was completely submerged. (still works great) Bucketed the water out and gave the nut a snugging/twist but it continued to leak 1-2 litres per hour.
I like the idea of some form of grease. Salt water friendly, not sure if salt water will break the Vaseline down quickly. good idea, I will do this for sure.
Bill has sent a pic from his Amel guide and it appears that I need 8 x 8 mm packing. I m having a wrench made at 70 mm and will file it to 73 mm if its not correct. haven't heard the exact size for the 54.
Thanks for the reply guys.
Cant wait to get Albedo back in Bristol shape, and sail somewhere.

Randall
A54#56  

On Fri, Feb 4, 2022 at 4:44 AM Martin Birkhoff <mbirkhoff@...> wrote:
Hi Randall,

when we renewed the packings end of 2020, we received the recommendation from Amel to grease the packings intensively with Vaseline. 

The packings had been changed two years earlier (2018) by a German shipyard. The guys of the shipyard had not greased them sufficiently with the result that the stuffing box always leaked. When we took out these packings they were completely dry and disintegrated into fibres.
 
Regards

Martin
SY Mago del Sur - 54#40
Re: I ordered this on the 10 th from Amel

Brian Riggs
 

I have found this becoming more and more of the norm with US Postal Service. It's like the barcode readers can't figure out what goes where, and people don't read labels in the postal system anymore. They just toss it in the next container. Ugh.

Brian Riggs
Future Amel owner


On Fri, Feb 4, 2022, 13:23 Patrick McAneny via groups.io <sailw32=aol.com@groups.io> wrote:
That is crazy! Nothing is working as well as just a year ago, I wonder why ! It may have been faster to sail over to pick it up.
Good Luck
Pat

Re: I ordered this on the 10 th from Amel

Patrick McAneny
 

That is crazy! Nothing is working as well as just a year ago, I wonder why ! It may have been faster to sail over to pick it up.
Good Luck
Pat
Re: Rudder Post Packing #replacement

Martin Birkhoff
 

Hi Randall,

when we renewed the packings end of 2020, we received the recommendation from Amel to grease the packings intensively with Vaseline. 

The packings had been changed two years earlier (2018) by a German shipyard. The guys of the shipyard had not greased them sufficiently with the result that the stuffing box always leaked. When we took out these packings they were completely dry and disintegrated into fibres.
 
Regards

Martin
SY Mago del Sur - 54#40
Re: Firefly Battery Update.

Michael Winand
 

Thanks Bill,  we have a sm2000, early one, eight battery bank. Installation is 3 years  old now. 
I would say the bank has 700 cycles through it.
I am noticing the morning voltage is around 24.3 with the normal loads 10-12amps, and uses 120 amps  overnight.  2 refrigerators and a freezer.  
We normally have to charge in the morning to make breakfast , go to absorption around 90%and let the solar panels do the rest of the day. 
Will see what happens when I get to do the restoration charge cycles. 
Michael Nebo sm251

On Fri, 4 Feb 2022, 3:50 pm Bill Kinney, <cruisingconsulting@...> wrote:
Michael,

As one of the "pre-2K" Super Maramus, our battery box only holds 8 G31 batteries, so our bank has a 480 Amp-hour capacity. Our system allows us to run both generator AND shore power chargers, so with shore power available, we can pump 200 Amps into our batteries, which is very close to the optimum 0.4C charge rate recommended, so no need to think about splitting things up.  

For our battery bank a 120 Amp Charger would be right at 0.25C, which Firefly documents indicate is close to, but above, minimally acceptable.  I assume you have the 12 battery box, so your capacity is 720 Amp-hours, and now the 120 Amp charger is 0.17C, below the minimum recommended by Firefly (0.2 C).

My suggestion would be to contact Firefly Tech support. In the manual they suggest they can recommend an alternative procedure if your charging system is limited to less that 0.2C.  I do not know what that procedure is, but I am curious...

I don't bother turning off the refrigeration units during the draw-down.  They turn themselves off near the end of the run when the voltage drops below about 22.5  Doesn't seem to cause an issue.

Bill Kinney
SM160, Harmonie
Hollywood, FL, USA

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