Gaffrigg, Livorsi or ??? [Archive]

bootdaddy

01-16-2009, 12:42 PM

I would go Livorsi. I ordered all new Gaffrig for big cig and half had water inside in first week, and 2 literally had a great deal of water sealed in them.:nilly:

To Gaffrigs credit they replaced the whole lot, but I still have additional costs in un-install and re-install...not pleased.

The Hedgehog

01-16-2009, 12:46 PM

I have Gaffrigs on mine because I like the 270 sweep. The quality is hit or miss. I did get a smokin deal though

I will probably do autometer or livorsi on my next project.

The Hedgehog

01-16-2009, 12:47 PM

I put some Hardin gauges in the cruiser. They are a nice looking product. They were going for around $180 a set.

KerrLake

01-16-2009, 01:09 PM

I like the Livorsi better too. I certainly don't want the Gaffrig if they have water issues. Do I need to order sending units too or can I use the stock ones?

glashole

01-16-2009, 01:12 PM

I have Livorsi in mine and they work fine however i noticed that it says on them made by Autometer

CHACHI

01-16-2009, 01:19 PM

Putting Autometers in the 22.

Ken

The Hedgehog

01-16-2009, 01:34 PM

I like the Livorsi better too. I certainly don't want the Gaffrig if they have water issues. Do I need to order sending units too or can I use the stock ones?

Not sure, if you have old school VDO's you need to look into the sender issue.

I had 97 vintage senders on my ZX and the gaffrigs worked fine.

mrfixxall

01-16-2009, 01:38 PM

WAIT!!! gaffrig is coming out with new guages...let me know if i can give you a price,im a dealer for them..

JustMercMe

01-16-2009, 01:41 PM

Putting Autometers in the 22.

Ken

Haven't heard anything bad about the Autometers and they look pretty good too.

The Hedgehog

01-16-2009, 02:13 PM

WAIT!!! gaffrig is coming out with new guages...let me know if i can give you a price,im a dealer for them..

Hey fix,

Tell me about the new gauges.

I also need a fuel gauge, volt meter and one other gauge in 270 sweep.

ITTLFLI

01-16-2009, 02:48 PM

http://www.sscompetition.com/
Best "value" by far!
I have installed numerous sets.....:yes:

Can't ever go wrong with Livorsi!!

VetteLT193

01-16-2009, 03:13 PM

I have a mixture of gaffrig and Livorsi, the standard ones with the old gaffrig logo. I mixed so I could get all "Gaffrig" logos on the dash even though they are slightly different.

Side by side the gaffrigs seem like better quality than the livorsi, which was shocking because I thought Livorsi were supposed to be the premium product.

Donziweasel

01-16-2009, 03:18 PM

Faria makes a cost effect guage. Excellent customer service.....

BigGrizzly

01-16-2009, 04:01 PM

I did Autometer. Just because it was a boost gauge and others that matched For my application. I am not going to side but all brands have some good and bad. The only time water is an issue is in closed dashes. In reality I just happen to like Teleflex. It is mostly subjective and what fits YOUR fancy.

gcarter

01-16-2009, 04:20 PM

I have a boxed set of Gaffrig platinum monster gauges because I got a killer deal on them. Would probably prefer Livorsi or Autometer, but money's important.
'Fix, I'll PM you next week with a short list of three more I still need.

show-n-go h2o

01-16-2009, 07:10 PM

Donzigo

01-16-2009, 07:41 PM

This is the story I heard...........it might not be true.

Mike LIVORSI met a guy who made a nice speedometer and his last name was GAFFRIG. Mike began to produce & distribute this product and eventually had even more things made with the GAFFRIG name on them. When the man died, his family said that Mike did not have the permission to use the GAFFRIG name and they sued him. Mike won the suit; but, decided to produce the line with his own name on it. I think Mike has since sold the company. The GAFFRIG family has, I think, started making their own guages too, under the name GAFFRIG.

.................this information is reported as "here-say".

The Hedgehog

01-16-2009, 08:33 PM

Livorsi all the way. i have all gaffrigg gauges on my 28 and when they aren't full of water they work about half of the time.. i tried a couple times for replacement but they were'nt trying to help very much, that was a few years ago though and i haven't talked to them since.

I can relate to that. If I did not have a gozillion gauges on the ZX, I would do something different. Funny thing is that some of them are just fine.

widowmaker

01-16-2009, 09:04 PM

I put all new Lavorsi instruments on my 1997 22 Classic. The only problem that I encountered was the GPS speedo. It would not read correctly regardless of where I mounted the antenna. Ultimately, after returning the speedo and antenna two times, one of the Livorsi techs told me that there was a compatability problem with some speedo/antenna combos. The speedo and antenna combo that they last sent works beautifully with the antenna located under the deck. I am very pleased with the set up now.

mjw930

01-17-2009, 07:54 AM

This is the story I heard; so, it might not be true.
Mike LIVORSI met a guy who made a nice speedometer and his last name was GAFFRIG. Mike began to produce & distribute this product and eventually had even more things made with the GAFFRIG name on them. When the man died, his family said that Mike did not have the permission to use the GAFFRIG name and they sued him. Mike won the suit; but, decided to produce the line with his own name on it. I think Mike has since sold the company. The GAFFRIG family has, I think, started making their own guages too, under the name GAFFRIG.
I stand corredted if anyone knows any other information about this.

I've heard variations on the same story and can remember a time when it was Gaffrig by Livorsi..... I used Livorsi on my '87 dash replacement and have been very happy. Had I not gone with Livorsi I would have done the marine Autometer's. It's my understanding that Autometer makes a lot of what's behind the faceplates on all gauges.

I have used Faria and find their basic gauges to work fine but I've had problems with tachs and speedo's reading correctly. The old addage, you get what you pay for comes to mind.

http://marine.autometer.com/

egauges is a great source for both old and new replacements: http://www.egauges.com/

Mr X

01-17-2009, 08:18 AM

I do like either one......
Nordskog are THE best IMO, full stepper motor and mil. spec.
Pricey but the best quality available.

http://www.nordskogperformance.net/

mjw930

01-17-2009, 05:29 PM

I do like either one......
Nordskog are THE best IMO, full stepper motor and mil. spec.
Pricey but the best quality available.
http://www.nordskogperformance.net/

That would be the Titan Series and I agree, they are about the best. I think their Viking series is comparable to the Autometer and Livorsi.

show-n-go h2o

01-18-2009, 03:22 PM

I can relate to that. If I did not have a gozillion gauges on the ZX, I would do something different. Funny thing is that some of them are just fine.

yep, same thing here. i just talked to a guy at the boat show today and he had all the same problems on his PowerQuest, he put all autometer in his and has had no problems.. if these company's would spend as much on quality controll and customer service as they do on advertising they wouldn't need to advertise

BigGrizzly

01-19-2009, 07:20 AM

Since I worked for a marine engine manufacturer and we have gauge vendors. I can tell you in some situations ALL get water even the fog free. It all depends on location and dampness in the boat bilge. We even took a set of wet gauges and put them in a different boat, the problem went away. What I don't understand is that one day the tach next day the speedo. The oddest thing is Teleflex and VDO do seem best. Autometer is not a direct vendor of ours so I could not comment on them as for moisture except in my own boat.

zelatore

01-19-2009, 11:47 AM

Since I worked for a marine engine manufacturer and we have gauge vendors. I can tell you in some situations ALL get water even the fog free.

Change that from 'marine engine manufacturer' to 'yacht dealer' and I could have written the same thing.

I don't know how many times I've had a customer complain about fogging gauges on a new boat. Sometimes I replace them under warranty if it's going to make a big difference in customer satisfaction, but it's still 50/50 as to the new one fogging as well.

VetteLT193

01-19-2009, 01:45 PM

I agree about VDO too. Even though they aren't the hottest looking gauge by any means, they just plain work and are pretty much problem free.

I have had them on many boats and I only had to replace 1 gauge because I accidentally cracked the face and it died after a while.

KerrLake

01-19-2009, 09:24 PM

mjw930

01-19-2009, 09:33 PM

I see Livorsi has a depth sounder that fits a 2 1/16 cutout. Has anyone had any luck with one of these? I'm thinking that I can take my hourmeter space for the depth sounder and get a tach and hourmeter combo.

I use that one, I mounted the puck just forward of the bilge pump pad on the 22 and I get usually can get reading all the up to WOT (63 in my case). I'm 99% sure Livorsi doesn't make it, they just use their own face plate. It's identical to the Hummingbird unit

KerrLake

01-19-2009, 09:39 PM

I use that one, I mounted the puck just forward of the bilge pump pad on the 22 and I get usually can get reading all the up to WOT (63 in my case). I'm 99% sure Livorsi doesn't make it, they just use their own face plate. It's identical to the Hummingbird unit
Does the face match the other guages?

CHACHI

01-20-2009, 06:25 AM

I have a Hummingbird depth sounder, looks like the Livorsi one except mine says Hummingbird.
No the faces do not match the other gauges.

Ken

VetteLT193

01-20-2009, 07:10 AM

I see Livorsi has a depth sounder that fits a 2 1/16 cutout. Has anyone had any luck with one of these? I'm thinking that I can take my hourmeter space for the depth sounder and get a tach and hourmeter combo.

My brother has one. Works well, the white face is cracking. probably started when the gauge was about 5 years old.

There are plenty of depth sounders that fit that size hole and they look so much different than the rest of the gauges you can get away with a different brand entirely.

widowmaker

01-20-2009, 07:53 AM

Kerr,
The Livorsi instruments match as well as a digital unit and analog units can match. You have a choice of faceplate color, trim ring and bezel, if you so choose.

KerrLake

01-20-2009, 01:43 PM

Found these. Does anybody know if the face is illuminated?

KerrLake

01-21-2009, 12:30 PM

I'm ordering new sending units with the guages. Does the oil pressure warning light use the same type sending unit as the oil pressure guage? I should be able to use a dual guage sending unit?

VetteLT193

01-21-2009, 12:57 PM

are you re-doing the dash panel too? I got rid of the lights all together on mine. If you like having them, I suggest a different sender all together so you have redundancy.

The gauges you posted a pic of are larger than stock size, so you'll have to re-do the panel. All of the gauges come with lights that I know of from the major brands anyway.

KerrLake

01-21-2009, 01:03 PM

They have the same guage in the 2 1/16 and 3 3/8. The stock speedo and tach are 3 3/8 aren't they? Not a bad idea about two separate sending units. The warning light and the guage should use the same type sending unit?

VetteLT193

01-21-2009, 01:10 PM

They have the same guage in the 2 1/16 and 3 3/8. The stock speedo and tach are 3 3/8 aren't they?

Yes, I didn't realize they were making them in the smaller size now. Pretty cool.

Not a bad idea about two separate sending units. The warning light and the guage should use the same type sending unit?

I think the stock warning lights on my boat were daisy chained into the gauges. I can look when I get home tonight, the stock dash is in my garage still.

VetteLT193

01-21-2009, 01:13 PM

And on another note before you really dive into this project...

The stock VDO's used push on blade style connections. The new gauges are more than likely going to be screw on style, so you'll need to put a small eye connection in place of the old blade connection.

In a nutshell, it's probably just as easy to re-wire the whole dash as it is to fiddle with each wire back there.