please help on wiring

I have a 1996 sunbird Neptune 202 .. boat runs great. this past winter(not here in florida) I decided to do its normal maintenance, ie water pump , lower gear service, plugs, carbs, the usual stuff .. now here is my problem the tach and mph stopped working so I decided it was time to upgrade the gauges, when I removed the dash I fell out on the ground.. the prior owner cut here spliced there .. its a mess and I don't have $85 hr to pay some one to do it so I took the project on my self beings I was a auto tech shouldn't be to hard right ...wrong lol.. I have everything fixed and working but these few things .. any help would be grateful...
1.. trim gauge .. I connect the tan/white wire and it stays up in full position . but worked fine before I corrected the mess. I checked for grounds in wire have none.. changed gauges .. still no luck .. my question is this . the harness that the trim switch and motor use has the standard green/white & blue/white 1 can I use them together on the gauge or can I run a new set of wires to by-pass the factory harness.

2. temp gauge.. my boat was not equipped with one. it has the standard horn in the control throttle ( remote). after much reading I found out why its not working for my .. my sender is a on/off sender not a variable resistor sender like the fuel injected motors ... here are my questions on this .
can or am I able to change the senders to the new kind with tstat change also so I can use a gauge. and how would I make the wire changed ..ie the black/white wire for warning horn .. or can I by-pass it ..


I know I asked a lot and i hope to get the help I been told I would get here from so many people I have asked on other questions..
thanks

I can't help you on most of that except the heat gauge. Send me an e-mail at [email protected] and I will return a write-up on alternatives for installing a heat gauge on the engine or manifold.

Email sent ^^^

Sent the reply with the attachment.

Thank you my friend ..one of the best information on temp senders and gauges I have every got ..many many thanks ..look forward to adding my help one day

Anyone else that can help me with my other issues ??? Please ..lol

Well, maybe I can help a little bit. What motor do you have?

Normally, the tilt/trim switch is a rocker with three posts, The UP post is typically the blue wire, and the DOWN post is usually the green. On some setups these are reversed. The center wire is power. So the switch sends 12 volts to either the up terminal or down terminal when it's activated. You can easily test by running a jumper from battery positive to each wire in turn to see how it should be wired up. The T/T motor is normally grounded to the engine frame. Usually there is a ground cable running from the T/T motor's frame to the engine frame, but not always.

In responds to the trim gauge all the wiring is hooked up right I can tilt from the switch on motor or helm ..just the gauge don't read right. it's a new gauge and should only be a 1 wire hook up from sender right (white/tan) wire ..when I hook this to the gauge all it does us stay in the up position no matter which way I tilt motor

trim sensor,sender, sounds bad,can be tested.

Hmm maybe.. worked fine on old gauge ..but not now so possible . I'll double check tomorrow

Update..........
Thank you chuwk_man for your help...new temp sensors on way for variable resistance for temp gauge .
Through other posts I believe I have the warning horn and safety cut off switch figured out .but will welcome any more input on this.
Will check sender/sensor on tilt motor

Any more feed back is welcome. Thank you

The T/T sender is a simple reostat. Put an ohm meter on the signal wire coming to the gauge from the T/T lever on the back of the engine. With the engine tilted all the way up (and safety lock in place) have someone slowly exercise the lever. If you read resistance varying as they move the lever, then you likely have a bad gauge, or a gauge that is not translating the resistance properly. If no variation on the ohm meter, then you have a bad sender, or bad wiring.

thanks chawk--man, didnt feel like typing all that,johnngjr.