Suggestion: Beep when there's a problem...

[IDBoating]

Had an interesting, albeit minor, "learning experience" on the boat yesterday. A friend had been driving and then my wife was taking over the helm. She turned the key - and nothing. No sound, no indication of problems, nothing. It literally acted as if the key had not been turned.

She fiddled with this a couple of times, then asked me what might be wrong. I walked over to the console and looked around. Gauges lit, engine light on (always true when the key is "on" but the engine isn't actually running), everything looks exactly the same as every other time she's started the boat.

So I start running through the possibilities in my mind, and check the forward-reverse lever. Sure enough, my friend had left it just off-center, so the interlock was preventing the engine from starting. "Click" and she was back in business.

The thing that occurred to me was that it would have been nice if there had been a beep or something that indicated the system was reacting to a known issue. With no indication, the initial reaction was "something is broken" when it was actually just a very proper reaction to a certain condition. If there were a beep, I think the driver's reaction would be less "uh-oh" and more analytical.

Finally, my previous boat did this exact thing and it dates from 2000, so this is not exactly a new idea. Just a good one.

My $0.02....

[Wakeman22]

Good idea. It could be integrated into the Tige touch screen with a message that says. Check shift handle for neural. Pretty simple.

[IDBoating]

Yes, I thought of the integration and text message but was trying to keep it simple. It would be easy to integrate as you suggest - however, it would mean the Tige Touch system would need an additional input (from the FNR lever) so it would know when to display the message. The beeper approach could probably just piggyback on what I presume is a single, simple switch in the lever.

Hopefully Tige or Medallion is paying attention!