Fixed my MSCAN digital display/gauge

[dew.man]

I want to post this just in case someone else might run in to something similar down the road

I bought my 2001 Wakesetter LSV with the digital MSCAN gauge in the middle (there's a speedo on one side, and the tach on the other). When checking out the boat, I saw that the gauge came on, and showed fuel, oil, temp, and pressure. Not knowing anything about it at the time, I figured that since it comes on and shows those parameters, it must be fine. So I get the thing home and start playing with it, and finally have a chance to read the owners manual which talks about depth gauges, alarms, and even a GPS. Only problem, is that I press the T button (which is suppose to toggle between all these things), and nothing happens! All the other buttons do something, but not the T button.

So I get some liquid courage in me, and decide to take the gauge apart. I figure I'll just take a look - worst case I'm back to buying a new one which should run a couple bills, right?

Rather than posting my entire exploration in to the depths of "what is MSCAN", I'll just talk about the fix:

The gauge has 4 long screws on the back that hold the face plate/cover on. That comes right off, and you can then get to 2 separate PCBs for the buttons (1 top with 3 buttons, 1 bottom with 3 buttons). The buttons themselves are just little copper, concave plates, that when pushed on with the rubber buttons in the face plate, complete the circuit between a couple of paths in the circuit board. They are sealed in a plastic coating/wrap to keep the water out, and this has to be peeled back with a sharp knife to gain access, at which point the copper plates just fall right off the board.

Anyways, in my case, time had taken it's toll, and the copper plate had oxidized enough that it would now complete the circuit when depressed. I used some contact cleaner and a sharp knife on the plate as well as the PCB contacts to clean them up, and then reattached the little plate with scotch tape. While the tape may not a permanent fix, it is all I had, and should hold for a year or two while I could easily do it again if need be.

Next I reassembled the gauge, plugged it back in. And now, I have all of the other neat stuff that the previous owner had paid for

[Chia]

very cool, i have had my display fade out in the past but it was just the connection in the inline fuse.