No fuel reading

[Sccala]

Post subject: Fuel Gauge​ Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2025 6:06 am​

Joined: Mon Jun 08, 2020 2:51 pm Posts: 17 Year: 2011 Make: Yamaha Model: 242 Limited

Hey guys. I have a 2011 242 limited. The past few years, The lenses on my tachometer have been getting glazed over and the LCD display has been getting sunburnt. Last year it was completely impossible to read anything on it, so in the off-season I sent them out for repair. They all have nice clear lens covers on them and the LCD screens are as good as new. I can cycle through all of my readings… Direction, latitude, longitude, water temperature, time, depth, fuel level, etc. They all are perfect except for the fuel level. Each tachometer will show “fuel level“… But it’s not showing me exactly how MUCH fuel I have. It’s been a couple years since I could read it, but I believe it used to be a horizontal bar that would get shorter and shorter as the fuel went down. i’ve just been filling up every third time I use the boat just to make sure I never run out of fuel, but I would like to know exactly how much I have in the tank… Especially since I got these gauges repaired primarily for this exact reason. And now it’s annoying because this is the only thing that I CANT see on the gauge. Any ideas on what would be causing this? I’m pretty confident that I did didn’t do anything wrong when removing them and installing them again. All you really do is just unplug the connectors and then plug them back in. Is there some kind of reset procedure or something?

 

[tdonoughue]

Fill up the tank.

On a number of models, filling the tank resets the sender. That might do it for you right there.

 

[Sccala]

Haha. That seems so simple, but we’ll see. I won’t have a chance to put gas in it until mid next week. Stay tuned

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Have you checked the fuel sender and or the wires on the tank for connectivity and or corrosion?

 

[Sccala]

Have you checked the fuel sender and or the wires on the tank for connectivity and or corrosion?

I haven’t.… I don’t even know what a fuel sender is or where it’s located or what it looks like. I do know, however… That last year, even though the gauge was very very difficult to see, I could barely still read out if I had gas or not. Only at a certain angle and in certain lighting. But it was very, very, very visible. This year… it’s completely gone. So I am guessing that has something to do with the fact that I unplugged the tachometer. Literally all I did was… With the batteries disconnected, unplugged, the wiring harness from the tachometer, unscrewed them from the mount, and sent them out to be refinished.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

That almost sounds like the LCD screen is gone.

The fuel sender is the device that’s in the tank that sends a signal to the gauge to tell it how full or empty the tank is depending on your outlook.


Well you need to get a service manual, and get on top of your fuel tank with an ohmmeter and check the fuel sending unit and check the wire connections. The most common failure of gauges that I have seen is the loss of the ground.

Seems to me I was reading a thread on here not too long ago were you guys original factory fuel gauge had quit working and they were unavailable so he looked at the fuel center and it gave the ohm range for its operation he found a universal gauge that use that same ohm range and was able to put that into use as a fuel gauge

 

[Sccala]

That almost sounds like the LCD screen is gone.

The fuel sender is the device that’s in the tank that sends a signal to the gauge to tell it how full or empty the tank is depending on your outlook.


Well you need to get a service manual, and get on top of your fuel tank with an ohmmeter and check the fuel sending unit and check the wire connections. The most common failure of gauges that I have seen is the loss of the ground.

Seems to me I was reading a thread on here not too long ago were you guys original factory fuel gauge had quit working and they were unavailable so he looked at the fuel center and it gave the ohm range for its operation he found a universal gauge that use that same ohm range and was able to put that into use as a fuel gauge

LCD is definitely not gone. I just sent both tachs out to have both of the lenses replaced because they were very foggy and glazed over much like an old headlight on a car… Plus, the actual LCD screen was super sunburnt due to the fact that it is a 2011 and we are now living in the 2025 and it has just been sun Burnt. The LCDs work great. I can toggle through all of the readings… Latitude, longitude, compass, heading, water temperature, water depth, and finally… Fuel level. The only problem is that when I get to the screen showing “fuel level“ the one thing that’s missing is the actual horizontal bar that gets shorter and shorter as your fuel level gets low. Everything else on the LCD works. You are the second person that has mentioned the possibility of it being a Fuel sender. Someone on another message board that I follow said the same thing. I’ll get my voltage meter out I guess. Thank you.