Plug and Play

With Mercury Marineʼs SmartCraft Gauges and Digital Throttle and Shift, You Can Rig Your Boat Faster and Easier, Have More Precise Control and Get More Information on Its Performance.

Our 22 Scarabʼs original dash had conventional Livorsi Marine instruments trimmed in red bezels.

If you can plug an extension cord into an outlet or if youʼve ever successfully connected your cable to your television set, you can rig a boat with Mercuryʼs SmartCraft gauges and Digital Throttle and Shift controls. Itʼs not something that “professional” riggers want to hear, but believe us, after we re-powered our project 22-foot Scarab with a MerCruiser 496 MAG HO Bravo XR, installing the SmartCraft instruments and DTS controls was easy.

After we spent a few hours on our backs loosening all those little brass nuts, the empty dash was ready to receive the SmartCraft instruments.

In the fourth and final installation on our project Scarab re-power, we proved how easy it is for a boat owner to rig the boat himself. Though an experienced boater, our boat owner certainly wouldnʼt be considered an expert rigger or even a marine mechanic, but by simply following the directions provided with the gauges, he successfully rigged the boat. Twenty hours later, everything was working fine.

The beauty of the SmartCraft system is the coveted combination of simplicity and abundant information. Because we were not replacing the entire dash panel, we filled the holes left vacant by the old Livorsi Marine gauges with SmartCraft instruments. Truth be told, the only gauges you really need are the tachometer and speedometer, because each has a small screen across the bottom that you can scroll through to obtain a plethora of data. Between the two you get oil pressure, trim, rpm, water pressure, battery voltage, engine hours, fuel flow, gas consumed, average fuel economy, tank level, depth, sea and water temperature, time and trip odometer. Each screen will also show an alarm for any faults detected in the engine. Because the water depth is displayed on the tachometer, we had an extra hole in the dash that we filled with a water-pressure gauge.

Each SmartCraft system link gauge is equipped with male and female plugs that either connect it to another instrument in the chain or get capped if it is the last gauge in the series. Conventional gauges have individual posts for positive, negative, signal and light leads. You can see the backing bracket thatʼs used to fasten the conventional-style gauge to the dash panel.

One of the added features of the SmartCraft system is that you can make that gauge that has been notoriously inaccurate throughout the years more reliable. For example, you can edit the fuel gauge by inputting the capacity of your tank and then adjusting the dial until it accurately reflects how much fuel you actually have on board.

Connecting to the engine is simply a matter of plugging the Main CAN Bus Trunk to the appropriately labeled receptacle on the motor.

Which would you rather use to link your dash panel to your engine? SmartCraft uses a single Main CAN Bus Trunk line (bottom) that plugs into the engine and to a junction box. Traditional gauges get connected with a bunch of individual wire terminals that all have to be categorized and fastened to the right instrument.

So how easy is the SmartCraft system to install? One cable links the gauges to the engine. Each end of the cable is clearly labeled as to where it should plug in, and each lead that comes off the engine is also pre-labeled. The end of the cable that reads “Termination Resistor” plugs into the terminal coming off the engine. If you can read, you can do this install. The engine cable actually connects to a junction box that is mounted near the helm. From the box, one cable plugs into the tachometer, and the leads on the back of each systemʼs link gauge plugs into the next, and voila, your instrument panel is finished. Total time to connect our instruments was about 10 minutes; no more lying on your back under the dash panel of your boat with a nut driver or small-socket wrench threading tiny terminal eyes and little brass nuts for the positive, negative, signal and light wires for each gauge!

Thanks to the threaded body of the SmartCraft gauges, you just spin the backing ring onto the body once itʼs inserted into the hole at the dash, and the gauges are ready to be wired.

Installing each gauge is also simple. Instead of those little backing brackets that bolt to each gauge and have to be installed with more of those little brass nuts that are way too easy to lose, the body of each SmartCraft instrument is threaded. Just slip it into a standard-size gauge hole and thread on the backing ring. Can you screw a bottle cap back on a milk bottle? Then you can install SmartCraft gauges. Okay, so the plain white plastic bezels donʼt look as cool as the shiny red bezels that trimmed our Livorsi gauges, but you canʼt beat the ease of installation.

This is an example of the junction box that the Main CAN Bus Trunk cable plugs into. The box mounts near the dash and another cable links the box to the instrument panel.

For our installation, we needed an extra jump harness to finish up the dash. Thatʼs just another bonus of the SmartCraft system: adding to the system is easy. You can install another junction box with a linking harness and just keep on going. Simple.

The junction box links up to the back of the tachometer with a separate wire harness provided with the SmartCraft system. The optional air temperature sensor plugs into an outlet on this harness.

A couple of notes that are important for proper installation: First, the system must have two termination resistors, which are cap-style plugs that fit onto the junction box, and each resistor must be located at the farthest ends of the main cable trunk. Furthermore, the primary cable linking the engine and junction box, which is known as the Main CAN Bus Trunk, cannot exceed 120 ft long, but that shouldnʼt be much of a problem with most boats.

In addition to SmartCraft gauges, our 22 Scarab was also outfitted with Mercuryʼs Digital Throttle and Shift engine controls, and talk about precise. With the DTS controls, shifting is smoother and clunk-free. Plus, you can make minimal rpm changes with just a minor bump on the throttle. That way you can avoid that situation when a water skier asks to go faster and then gives the quick thumbs down because now youʼre going too fast. DTS controls let a driver find that happy medium. After running the DTS controls all summer, our boat owner drove a boat with conventional controls and cables, and he had to readjust to keep the drive from grinding and clunking in and out of gear.

Once the tachometer is linked to the junction box, you connect the system link gauges together with the male and female plugs on the back of each instrument housing.

To make the final connection, we needed a short link harness. These come in numerous lengths and are available through certified SmartCraft dealers.

Like the SmartCraft system, DTS controls are easier to install than your kidʼs favorite DVD. Just plug them into the command module thatʼs mounted near the throttle and then link the module to the junction box of the SmartCraft system. The most difficult part of installing the new side-mount control was finding a drill big enough to handle the extra-large hole saw required to cut out the opening.

Our instrument panel is complete and provides more information than any conventional system.

With the DTS controls and SmartCraft system, you get a specially matched key and ignition switch that plugs into the system. Translation? Donʼt lose the key. You canʼt replace this one at the hardware store. Also, once the SmartCraft system and DTS controls are rigged, the propulsion package has to be calibrated by a facility or manufacturer certified by Mercury and equipped with the computer equipment to do it. The engine will not even start until itʼs calibrated.

With our dash panel updated, now itʼs time to get rid of the old-school side-mount control and install our DTS unit.

The provided template shows that the DTS control needs a much bigger hole, so make sure you have the room for it behind your inwale.

Time for yet another plug, this time connecting the control body to the control module for the DTS unit. Time taken? About two seconds.

A big hole saw and four drilled holes later, we bolted the DTS control in place. Looks cool, huh?

Read on to see how the quick and easy installation of the SmartCraft system and DTS controls went, and we hope you enjoy following the transformation of our 22 Scarab.