xpost -- questions about trim position sensor, 2019 vp380

[scottst]

Hey folks,

My primary question is: how common is it for trim position senders to fail on the VP380s?

On Saturday, we were about to go out on the water and I did the brain dead thing of trying to start the boat with the trim up. It just "beeped". I finally realized that the trim was up (whew) and put the trim down and was on our way.

Immediately I noticed that the trim gauge was bouncing. Both the gauge on the screen as well as the gauge on the volvo keypad. Ran fine, but it was tough to see where the trim was. Yesterday we were back out, and the same thing happened (bouncing gauge). I trimmed it up a bit while on plane and it beeped at me throwing an error saying that it was unsafe to operate the boat with such a high trim. Didn't kill the engine.

Did I somehow break the trim sender by trying to start the boat in full-up? Is there some sort of calibration I need to do? Should I proactively replace the sender? Any advice appreciated!

Thanks,
Scott.

[Lifelongbtr]

I learned a few things about this, my 2019 430 went out a few years ago.

You can calibrate it on the small volvo screen, I have the instructions somewhere on how to do this, I'll look. If it's erratic I think it probably needs to be replaced, at least mine did.

When you buy one, you get two. in a pinch, you can unplug the one going to your drive and plug in one in the engine compartment as a backup and get moving again, you just don't know the actual position. In my boat, it's not possible to touch the swim deck with the drive all the way up.

[scottst]

Thank you! Super helpful. I'm realizing after thinking through this that my symptom (erratic measurement on the dash and the volvo keypad) is not likely to be solved by a calibration. I think the calibration just dials in "fully up" and "fully down". The flakiness/bounciness seems like a sensor going bad. Surprising on a boat that's only 4 years old.

I wonder if baking in the sun (boat is stored stern-out on a rack where the tail end gets sun exposure) could do this. Excessive heat? Just really odd to me.

Regardless, I'll report back re: what I find.