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Steve Mitchell avatar image
Steve Mitchell asked

VE.Can to NMEA 2000 cable bad?

I just bought a new VE.Can to NMEA 2000 cable as I didn't have one on my current boat. I wanted it so I could leverage the CCGX 2.40 feature of sending data out on my NMEA 2000 network.

I've spent the last 45 minutes troubleshooting and can't get it to work. I've installed these several times before, and have a very documented and extensive NMEA 2000 network. I've tried both VE.Can ports on the CCGX, rebooting, power cycling, upgrading to v2.40 via SD card from the beta, moving the VE.Can to NMEA 2000 cable to four different NMEA 2000 ports on my network, and have validated everything else on the network is working correctly.

Either this brand new cable or my CCGX are faulty, or there is another setting I am missing. At the minimum, even without v2.40, the CCGX should be showing tank levels (I have multiple Maretron TLAs for tanks) as it has in the past, but I see nothing.

I've turned on the new CAN-Bus feature including Send Data to VE.Can, but something more basic is not working.

I also have Actisense and Maretron software and can see the devices on the network, and Victron has never shown up in any of the testing.

Is there a pin out diagram for the cable so I can test it, or another way to test the VE.Can ports?

NMEA 2000 - N2K
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3 Answers
Steve Mitchell avatar image
Steve Mitchell answered ·

Just got an RMA / replacement cable from Victron / PKYS and everything is now working perfectly! Bad cable!

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ur12vman avatar image
ur12vman answered ·

I made my own cable using cat5 wire, the data pins are 7 and 8, which if you are looking at the end of the plug, clip down, wires facing away from you, its the two pins on the left. 7 is CAN H and 8 is CAN L. I fed this into my N2K network, just the two data wires, nothing else, works great and practically free if you have the capability to build cat5 with RJ45 plugs. The pinout is available in the data communication whitepaper page 6. https://www.victronenergy.com/upload/documents/Whitepaper-Data-communication-with-Victron-Energy-products_EN.pdf

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tquigs avatar image tquigs commented ·

Thanks ur12vman for the tip.

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andyalford avatar image andyalford commented ·
I have spent more than an hour trying to find this information. Thanks for posting this.


FYI - I am trying to connect Raspberry Pi Venus OS to CANable, so I needed to work out the pinout. It seems to be very different from other manufacturers who have used RJ45 for CAN, perhaps to save clashes with VE.Bus if cables are misconnected.

Thanks again


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Steve Mitchell avatar image Steve Mitchell commented ·

I had considered making one given all of the spare Maretron ends and RJ45 cables I had, but I'm fine paying for one from the manufacturer too. Thanks for the details!

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Steve Mitchell avatar image
Steve Mitchell answered ·

Victron support has said that I need a Skylla, MPPT 150/70 or Lynx Shunt to power the VE.Can network, or this cable doesn't work. That is contrary to how this has worked for many previous installs. All I've ever done is use the VE.Can to NMEA 2000 cable directly from a VE.Can port on the CCGX and connect it to an existing, terminated and powered N2K network.

Has something changed with the CCGX that requires these products to use NMEA 2000?

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Matthias Lange - DE avatar image Matthias Lange - DE ♦ commented ·

Did you checked the fuse at the VE.Can to NMEA 2000 cable?

https://www.victronenergy.com/live/ve.can:nmea-2000:start
"In above example, there needs to be a fuse in the VE.Can to NMEA2000 cable. Without it, the VE.Can port in the CCGX will be left without power and therefore does not work."

For me this sounds like there is no fuse by default and you have to add the fuse yourself.

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Steve Mitchell avatar image Steve Mitchell Matthias Lange - DE ♦ commented ·

Not sure that would actually work. I checked with two other people who have a nearly identical setup to me, and they could not leave the fuse in because the NMEA 2000 network is already powered, and it would have caused a short circuit. The tag on the side of the cable at the fuse specifically says only to use the fuse if you want the VE.Can network to power the NMEA 2000 network, not the other way around.

I've swapped VE.Can terminators, tried to test other parts of the cable, but nothing seems to be working. I've installed these before, and they just work - either the cable is bad, the CCGX has broken VE.Can, or the new 2.40 software has broken something. I was running the beta, but am running the full release now.

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