Smartgauge Questions

[rusty69]

8 minutes ago, Naughty Cal said:

Or fit a simple volt meter and ammeter and learn how to read them.

Far cheaper and far easier to understand.

Indeed. But not as convenient if your batteries are in constant use like ours. 

[rupertbear]

Thanks for the answers to my questions and for re-opening the whole debate, which was, I suppose, inevitable!

[MtB]

On 23/08/2017 at 22:07, Richard10002 said:

I agree... on both points... but I didnt RTFM before I bought my Smartgauge, I relied on what I had gleaned from here, which was that it was an excellent fuel gauge for the inexperienced, and/or the electrically challenged.

Even when I bought my Smartgauge, I only read enough of the F Manual to get it up and running, which I dont think is an unusual way of doing things, (or how would the acronym have come to be?  ). It is a manual which is written in very small print, and perhaps goes into much more detail than many manuals, (I think Gibbo says this in the manual itself, IIRC), such that reading enough to get things going could be considered a feat in itself?

It is good that heated, and repeated, discussion takes place on this, as it makes it less likely that people deciding between a NASA BM1 type monitor, or a Smartgauge will be misled.

 

Very nicely explained, far more articulately than I have been able to. Like you, I bought mine as it was heavily promoted on here as a "fuel gauge for batteries" for people not that interested in, or not able to 'go down the mine' and learn how to interpret ammeter readings. This turned out not to be true. Detailed study of the manual is necessary to grasp that when the display first reaches "100%", it is probably lying.

But another point is a SmartGauge cannot be relied upon straight from the box, evidenced by my pair of SmartGauges which display wildly different readings from each most of the time, whilst connected to the same battery.

Now regular contributors here like to point out this demonstrates mine are incorrectly calibrated but how many more out there are the same? And where in the manual does it tell us they need calibrating? The manual certainly doesn't tell you how to recalibrate it.

My concern is most SG users will probably have no idea how accurate theirs is. There could have been any number of poorly calibrated SGs sold. I bought my two about six months apart, and they are each is wrongly calibrated, one high and one low. I very much doubt that by pure chance I bought the only two incorrectly calibrated SmartGauges ever sold. 

Only those users with enquiring minds will have thought to independently check the calibration of their SmartGauges. 

 

 

[cuthound]

3 hours ago, Tom and Bex said:

I suspect the one on my previous boat was also wrong - I always thought it read 0.15v low but never really bothered about it. I would strongly advise that anyone purchasing a new one checks the accuracy against a digital multimeter and complains if they differ. 

In a previous life I oversaw the commissioning of critical power equipment for data centres.

All instrumentation used in commissioning had to have an in date calibration certificate. Most "out of the box" DVM's, bought without requesting a calibration certificate were not accurate when I sent them for calibration.  Usually out by between 0.1 & 0.2 volts, so I assume that is the factory tolerance. 

Unfortunately the only way you can check for accuracy is with a calibrated meter.

Edited August 24, 2017 by cuthound
Edited to remove duplicate post.

[nicknorman]

40 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Very nicely explained, far more articulately than I have been able to. Like you, I bought mine as it was heavily promoted on here as a "fuel gauge for batteries" for people not that interested in, or not able to 'go down the mine' and learn how to interpret ammeter readings. This turned out not to be true. Detailed study of the manual is necessary to grasp that when the display first reaches "100%", it is probably lying.

But another point is a SmartGauge cannot be relied upon straight from the box, evidenced by my pair of SmartGauges which display wildly different readings from each most of the time, whilst connected to the same battery.

Now regular contributors here like to point out this demonstrates mine are incorrectly calibrated but how many more out there are the same? And where in the manual does it tell us they need calibrating? The manual certainly doesn't tell you how to recalibrate it.

My concern is most SG users will probably have no idea how accurate theirs is. There could have been any number of poorly calibrated SGs sold. I bought my two about six months apart, and they are each is wrongly calibrated, one high and one low. I very much doubt that by pure chance I bought the only two incorrectly calibrated SmartGauges ever sold. 

Only those users with enquiring minds will have thought to independently check the calibration of their SmartGauges. 

 

 

I think there are two points here:

One is that the design and principle of the SG is very good (if looking a little dated these days), it is the only device that gives a pretty accurate SoC on discharge when the actual capacity of the batteries is unknown. It is not as good on charge but it depends on where you are coming from. We still get posts on here saying "I can't understand why my inverter low voltage alarm beeps every night, I run the engine for at least an hour every day". From that position, a SG is a massive advantage. These are the reasons why several of us recommend the SG.

The other point is that the production of the SG has become pretty gash of late, with no care taken over the only calibration required - that of the voltage measurement. This is piss poor. But since there remains no alternative to the SG, we are stuck with that especially as certain people are reluctant to feed back the problem to the manufacturers! So they continue in blissful ignorance. Fortunately a badly-calibrated SG can be adjusted by the owner, but of course they shouldn't have to.

[Richard10002]

1 minute ago, nicknorman said:

Fortunately a badly-calibrated SG can be adjusted by the owner, but of course they shouldn't have to.

How?

[nicknorman]

8 minutes ago, Richard10002 said:

How?

Do you have a SG? Do you know it is incorrectly calibrated? If so, how? What are you comparing it to? If it's say a £20 DVM sourced from eBay with no calibration certificate, step one is to properly check it with a calibrated reference. If you can answer these questions satisfactorily, send me a PM.

[Richard10002]

32 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

Do you have a SG? Do you know it is incorrectly calibrated? If so, how? What are you comparing it to? If it's say a £20 DVM sourced from eBay with no calibration certificate, step one is to properly check it with a calibrated reference. If you can answer these questions satisfactorily, send me a PM.

Just curious

[WotEver]

4 hours ago, Richard10002 said:

Just curious

It's pretty simple, if somewhat fiddly. 

6 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

Only those users with enquiring minds will have thought to independently check the calibration of their SmartGauges. 

And only users who can be arsed to let Merlin know if theirs is inaccurate can alert the manufacturer to the problem. As it is we're stuck with Merlin saying that they're unaware of a 'problem' other than with two units. 

[rusty69]

7 minutes ago, WotEver said:

It's pretty simple, if somewhat fiddly. 

And only users who can be arsed to let Merlin know if theirs is inaccurate can alert the manufacturer to the problem. As it is we're stuck with Merlin saying that they're unaware of a 'problem' other than with two units. 

I told Merlin about mine. They didn't want to repair it, fair enough,its an old one, but they also didn't offer a calibration procedure either.I expect they wanted me to purchase a new one, or just weren't bothered

[nicknorman]

14 minutes ago, rusty69 said:

I told Merlin about mine. They didn't want to repair it, fair enough,its an old one, but they also didn't offer a calibration procedure either.I expect they wanted me to purchase a new one, or just weren't bothered

Wouldn't surprise me if they were unaware of the process. The calibration done at the factory is a different process.

[WotEver]

I suspect they're not that bothered about SmartGauge these days. They make many tens of thousands more from sales of the Datacell. 

1 minute ago, nicknorman said:

Wouldn't surprise me if they were unaware of the process. The calibration done at the factory is a different process.

Good point. 

[MtB]

20 minutes ago, WotEver said:

It's pretty simple, if somewhat fiddly. 

And only users who can be arsed to let Merlin know if theirs is inaccurate can alert the manufacturer to the problem. As it is we're stuck with Merlin saying that they're unaware of a 'problem' other than with two units. 

 

In the big scheme of life the time and trouble of opening a dialogue with merlin, persuading them I have two, both faulty, uninstalling them, finding suitable packaging, packing them up and posting them off, just isn't worth the effort given I now know how they behave and can interpret what they tell me.

in addition, I know merlin are aware of mine as WotEver has told gibbo. So we know they know about at least four. 

The thing is, when reporting a fault manufacturers have a strong tendency to deny any knowledge of other identical failures and I think no matter how many merlin get back, they will continue to deny there is a problem.

[WotEver]

Just now, Mike the Boilerman said:

I know merlin are aware of mine as WotEver has told gibbo. So we know they know about at least four. 

However, their response was words to the effect of "Let's see them then". They haven't seen them so they've forgotten about them. 

[MtB]

1 hour ago, WotEver said:

However, their response was words to the effect of "Let's see them then". They haven't seen them so they've forgotten about them. 

They are more than welcome to collect them from me if they wish. 

[WotEver]

1 minute ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

They are more than welcome to collect them from me if they wish. 

Why should they care? They've sold two Smartgauges. You claim they're faulty. The onus is on you to prove it, effectively by returning them to them. 

[MtB]

1 minute ago, WotEver said:

Why should they care? They've sold two Smartgauges. You claim they're faulty. The onus is on you to prove it, effectively by returning them to them. 

 

Indeed, why should they give a shit about a customer to whom they have sold a faulty product?

 

[WotEver]

Just now, Mike the Boilerman said:

Indeed, why should they give a shit about a customer to whom they have sold a faulty product?

So you say. 

So far you haven't given them the opportunity to confirm or deny your claim because you've not sent the units to them. If they could test them then they could ascertain the problem and offer a solution. (Or not, which would then confirm your suggestion of poor customer service.)

[MtB]

20 minutes ago, WotEver said:

So you say. 

So far you haven't given them the opportunity to confirm or deny your claim because you've not sent the units to them. If they could test them then they could ascertain the problem and offer a solution. (Or not, which would then confirm your suggestion of poor customer service.)

 

As i said. I'm not that bothered and neither are they. So I don't know why you get so exercised about me recounting the facts.   

[mrsmelly]

I luv my NASA Bm2.

[WotEver]

5 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

I luv my NASA Bm2.

Shame it can't tell you an accurate SoC on discharge but you can't have everything I guess

[mrsmelly]

15 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Shame it can't tell you an accurate SoC on discharge but you can't have everything I guess

Seems its more accurate than the not so smart gauge though. Anyway I use the NASA as its got a superb readout display and tells me voltage plus amps in/out and that's all I need to know where I am.

[WotEver]

25 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

I use the NASA as its got a superb readout display and tells me voltage plus amps in/out and that's all I need to know where I am.

I totally agree (for anyone who wants to take the time to learn what it means). 

[smileypete]

14 hours ago, rusty69 said:

Indeed. But not as convenient if your batteries are in constant use like ours. 

Yeah but batts are largely killed by inadequate charging, not somewhat deeper than ideal discharging.

If people can 'get' tail current and the importance of correct charge voltage, and 'get over' the need for accurate state of charge 24/7 then they'd be doing themselves a big favour.

Edited August 24, 2017 by smileypete

[Richard10002]

46 minutes ago, smileypete said:

Yeah but batts are largely killed by inadequate charging, not somewhat deeper than ideal discharging.

If people can 'get' tail current and the importance of correct charge voltage, and 'get over' the need for accurate state of charge 24/7 then they'd be doing themselves a big favour.

and charging on a daily basis, rather than leaving it for a few days.