FloScan, doing N2K right
FloScan has been measuring fuel flow for over 30 years, so I’d guess they have a darn good idea how to do it. It’s refreshing that their new NMEA 2000 Diesel Monitoring System focuses on what they know well and let’s the resulting data go wherever you want. The flow sensors and those “hubs” seen above, bigger here, are all you need. Yes, you can buy FloScan’s round gauge upper right, but you don’t need to. All data is sent in standard N2K messages, and the little calibration needed is done right in those boxes. The rest of this NMEA Conference booth had Simrad, Lowrance, and Raymarine displays all showing the gallons per hour, remaining fuel, etc. Note that FloScan’s site says that, “Furuno is currently developing NMEA 2000 products which will interface with our system.” But we knew that, right, and will know more when NavNet #d debuts (hey, I might live blog it, if there’s WiFi there). Note, too, how the port engine is “Instance 0” in the N2K system and the starboard engine is set as “Instance 1”. You can set that with a switch in the hub. But who the heck decided to start instances at zero instead of one. Wouldn’t it be better if, say, GPS #1 was instance 1, GPS #2 instance 2, etc.?
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I can only assume that because the first number in binary is zero the first instance becomes zero and not one.