Flushmounting a 12" MFD on a 265

[Bill_N]

There was an '04 265 for sale last year at Hobby Lobby Marine in Tom's River NJ that had a C120 flushmounted in the electronics box at the helm. I spoke to the guys there about the boat but never got down there to look at it as the '02 we ended up buying popped up a few weeks later.

My '02 has a Furuno 1850 in the helm cabinet and a Raymarine RL72 radar in the upper port cabinet. It drives me nuts looking up and down at the 2 displays at night and I'm not crazy about the zoom scales on the 1850 so I bought a C120 over the winter at the Boston show figuring on flushmounting it the same as the '04 that Hobby Lobby had. The plan was to use the C120 for chart, radar and weather. I have a Furuno 582 FF that I want to mount next to it.

I opted to have the dealer do the install as we have a trip planned for next week amongst other things this spring so I dropped the boat off yesterday. I got a call this morning from the installer saying it won't fit. Not sure what to do now but I'm going down there tomorrow to check it out with the installer. Hobby Lobby was closed today but I remember asking about the C120 when the boat was on the market last year and thought they did the install there.

Any thoughts on this?

Bill

 

[jekyl]

I have a navnet 2 10" display in my top box and we had to remove the perspex doors and replace with a colour matched composite glass section.
We did this on both sides as i didn't like the doors much.
I then flush mounted my stereo and vhf's and the navnet2 which i use primarily in Gps chartplotter mode.
I looked at mounting it on the dash but it was going to be more complicated and there didn't appear to be as much room.
It will not be simple but is probably doable and will require some glass work.

 

[Bill_N]

I've seen a Furuno 10" display flushmounted in the helm box. I hope we can make this work as I'm not sure if I can exchange the C120 for a smaller unit. Raymarine just came out with the widescreen C90 which might be an option to put inside the box but I'd much rather have the 12" display.

 

[SlimJim]

I've seen a Furuno 10" display flushmounted in the helm box. I hope we can make this work as I'm not sure if I can exchange the C120 for a smaller unit. Raymarine just came out with the widescreen C90 which might be an option to put inside the box but I'd much rather have the 12" display.

Thats what I have done with my 265 and its awesome. Works great in the helm box to the left side and I still have room on the right side with a top and bottom door to the right. My Furuno is a NAVNET VS2. I would hate having it in one of the two above boxes.

 

[Bill_N]

I met with the installer last night and we went over the issues. To mount the C120 directly in front of the wheel where I think most of us would want it, a portion of the floor of the electronics box has to be removed. And you have to remove the ceiling panel in the cabin to make sure there are no wires etc in the way while the cutting is being done. It seems doable but there won't be any "going back" to the old configuration once this is done. I'm not too worried about that as I don't like the electronics inside the box anyway so the installer is going to pull the ceiling panel down today to see what's under the electronics box.

It would be an easier fit on the right side as the bottom of the box is lower and might clear the back of the C120 and cables which stick out the back quite a ways.

Bill

 

[Hookup1]

MFD mounting

Not sure how large your electronics box is but here are two examples of mounting MFD flushmounts in 268's.

http://www.greatgrady.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9296

In both cases the bottom board of the box was not touched.

II could not find a template opening size for your C120. The units compare as follows:

C120 14.0 x 10.5 x 4.3
4210 13.4 x 8.9 x 4.2
4212 14.8 x 9.5 x 4.6

I considered the Garmin 4212 but went with the 4210. I borrowed a friends 4212 and tried to fit it in. The 4212 would have required more chainsaw work and may have looked too big. The 4210 was a project too but more in line with the sizes of the box.

In my case the extra 1/2" of height (4210 vs. 4212) would have required hacking the top of the electronics box because the unit couldn't be mounted any lower. I would have also needed to move the tube to/from the top electronics box.

Good luck!

 

[Bill_N]

Nice job on your Islander! The C120 fits on the face of my box with similar edge distance. It looks big but that's what MFD's are all about.
The cables are causing the clearance issue with the floor of the box.

As it turns out the intsaller has done quite a few flushmounts of 8" and 10" MFD's on older Grady's as electronics even 6 or 7 years ago weren't this big.

 

[SlimJim]

I did not have to have the bottom cut just the side on the left hand side had to be cut a little, the C120 must be bigger then the furuno. Mine is set so I can take her out very easy. You will love having the unit set right in front of you behind the wheel. Very nice for fishing and setting up on a spot or using the radar in fog when running the boat. Let us know how it turns out.

 

[Bill_N]

The floor of the box only needed to be cut near the front so there wasn't as much matl removed as I thought there would be. The installer was almost finished with it on Saturday and I will get a few pics when I launch this w/e. I like the panel he made and it should look sharp once it's installed.

 

[Bill_N]

Finally picked it up today and ran it over to my slip. The install came out great despite a 2 week delay due to the installer aggravating his hernia and having surgery.

 

[Strikezone]

Nice clean install!