36 volt boat wiring

June 28th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Kevin,

I changed out my 24 volt trolling motor for a 36. I’ve redone the boat wiring so that the batteries are in series, however I have three wires coming from my trolling motor plug (red, black, and orange)

Question: Do I omit the orange wire and just go with the black and red?

Like your site!!

Scott

Hi Scott,

Yes. Omit the orange wire if you do not need a 12 volt feed to your boat’s trolling motor panel.

Make sure that you have the appropriate circuit protection on your red wire at the battery.

Kevin

Thanks Kevin,

I do have a follow-up question.

If my batteries are run in sequence and pulling 36 volts into my trolling motor, then why can’t I just take my three-bank charger and wire it similarly instead of using each bank (3) for each battery?

Using the same theory for wiring in a series; couldn’t I just use one charger and omit a three-bank charger?

Thanks!

Hi Scotty,

Each bank on your charger is designed to recharge a single 12 volt battery. Since all batteries discharge and recharge differently, this method seems to be the most effective.

If you wanted to use single charger, it would need to be a 36 volt charger and have a method to monitor each battery to ensure the proper charge went to each battery.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Posted in Battery Charger, Boat Wiring, Marine Electrical, Trolling Motors | Comments Off

Adding a second wiper

June 23rd, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Dear Kevin,

The original wiper motor and arm on my boat need replacing. Whilst doing this, I want to add a second wiper motor to the boat on the driver’s side.

On the ceiling of the boat there is just some trunking with black wire running to the positive and negative on the wiper motor. This is activated by a switch on my dash board.

How do I arrange my boat wiring for the second wiper motor? Is there a simple way to just loop them and using the existing switch set up?

Kind Regards,Marinco is the marine industry's leading source for wiper motors, arms and blades

Jason

Hi Jason,

The best practice is to have circuit protection for each wiper motor. If you keep the current fuse/breaker and add a second wiper motor to the system, you will get nuisance tripping when both motors are on. If you simply increase the size of your circuit protection, you will get an even greater nuisance – a fire – when you cause one of the wiper motors to bind up.

The simplest solution is to double the size of the circuit protection at the wiper switch. Add an in-line fuse at your current wiper motor. Connect the grounds of your two wipers. Connect a second in-line fuse to your wiper power wire at the same location to form a “Y” in the harness and connect this your second wiper motor. If you bind either wiper motor, you will trip the corresponding fuse and your boat will be safe.

Let me know if you have any questions,

Kevin

Posted in Boat Wiring, Circuit Protection, Marine Electrical, Wipers | Comments Off

New Switch Panel

June 14th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Kevin,

The original panel on my marine electrical system had a toggle switch as a terminal point from the battery lead and a short length of wire to the positive, fused bus for distribution on the same panel.

For the revised boat wiring, I’ve included a fuse at the battery terminal feeding the positive lead to the panel.

Do current standards require I use a switch and fuse at the point this positive feed is attached to the panel? Can I leave the fuse out, as on the original? Should I use a circuit breaker?

Thanks.

Ken

Hi Ken,

Current standards only require circuit protection at the source of power.

The fuse on a power lead for a distribution panel is meant to protect the lead. Installing this protection as close as possible to the source power is the key to protecting the lead.

Check out the attached Wire Size Calculator. It will help you determine the size of your power feed for your distribution panel along with all of your other boat wiring.

Kevin

Posted in Battery Switch, Boat Wiring, Circuit Protection, Marine Electrical | Comments Off

Low voltage causing VSR chatter

June 7th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Hello,

Last year I installed a VSR cluster on my 23’ center console. I have a dedicated starting battery and a house battery. All the electronics are hooked up to the house, and everything is wired according to the diagram that came with the cluster. The cluster includes a BEP VSR smart battery switch, a manual on/off battery switch for the house system, a manual on/off for the starting battery, and a manual on/off switch for emergency parallel.EzAcDc takes the guesswork out of your project with snap-together boat wiring

After a winter lay-up, and with fully charged batteries, I went to start my boat this weekend but it seemed as though the batteries were dead. Both starting and house switches were “on” and the parallel was “off”. I then shut the house off and the engine would turn over at that point. I did this process twice and confirmed that the engine would only start when the house was in the “off” position.

With the engine off, the red light of the VSR switch was on indicating that the starting battery was charged and both batteries were now in parallel. I ran some lights on the boat to draw down some of the charge and the switch kicked off isolating the batteries. But then it started clicking on for a few seconds, then off. It did this continuously for 5 minutes until I shut everything down. I think I read that this was “chattering”. Any idea what’s going on?

Thanks!

John L

Hi John,

You are definitely experiencing chatter from the VSR. BEP has made a revision to the timing circuit on all of their VSRs to prevent this. The latest version needs to have 5 seconds of constant high voltage to make the relay latch and 5 seconds of low voltage to make to relay open up.

On your application, as soon as your voltage settles, the relay should stop chattering. You can force this by turning off the battery switch, starting your engine, or turning on a larger DC load to force the relay open or closed.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Thanks Kevin,

I guess I’m unsure about why this chattering is taking place – the whole marine electrical system was fine last summer. I’ve done what you noted to force the voltage to settle and here are the results:

  1. Shut house battery switch off – the VSR red light goes off and chattering stops
  2. Put the emergency parallel switch on – VSR red light goes off and chattering stops
  3. Attached an external battery charger w/ a 2 am float charge to the house – VSR red light stays on and chattering stops

Also, I ran the engine and the chattering continues during engine operation.

Since I can’t operate the boat in any of the above configurations (emergency parallel would defeat the purpose of this whole setup) I’m wondering if my only option is to replace the VSR with the corrected version you noted? Just can’t figure out why it worked all last summer and it’s not working now.

Thanks again!

Hi John,

Sorry for the delay.

I have been thinking about your problem.

If the system ran fine last year, even though you may have one of the older VSRs, that may not be the entire problem.

The VSR is chattering because the voltage is not staying high. A loose connection anywhere in the system would cause a high resistance and induce enough of a voltage drop to make the unit chatter. As soon as the high current stops, the voltage shoots back up again, the relay latches closed, and the cycle starts over again.

  • Check all battery cluster connections
  • Check all battery connections – replace wing nuts with locking nuts if possible.
  • Perform a load test on each battery to ensure that you do not have a bad battery cell.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Posted in Battery Charger, Battery Switch, Boat Wiring, Marine Electrical, VSR | Comments Off

Boat Wiring Types

June 1st, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Hello,Marinco's Ancor wire is the industry's most reliable boat wiring

A quick question about wire type.

I have a autotiller that the previous owner wired with SJ cord (heavy duty extension cord).

Do you see any issues using this type of boat wiring?

Thanks,

Carmen

Hi Carmen,

I am not a huge fan of using SJ cording on boats, but it does work.

I would much rather use a quality, marine grade, tinned copper boat wiring like the product from Ancor.

Kevin

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Configuring 12/24 Marine Electrical

May 25th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Kevin,

I bought a Sea Nymph 195 Sportfisher with a four-cylinder Mercury I/O last fall and am getting ready to prep for the season.

The current marine electrical setup has a dual battery with an isolator switch controlling them. One is setup for starting and accessories and the other is only being used for the Lowrance navigation and sonor system. Both are charged by the alternator.

I have just bought a 24 volt trolling motor and a 12 volt anchor winch system. I still have to purchase my third battery and might just buy two new for the 24 volt side and pick the best of the two I have for the 12 volt side.

I am trying to identify the most effective way to reconfigure my boat wiring. I don’t have easy access to shore power, so I will not be looking at a marine shore power system right away, but might add one at a later date.

Is there a way to still use my isolator switch with 12 volt on A and 24 volt on B? If so, how would I wire it? Or, should I just trash the isolator and go with a 24 volt VSR since it would allow me to hook up shore power at a later date?

If I go the second route, which battery should I hook up the following accessories to Trolling 1, trolling 2 or starting battery?

  • Anchor winch
  • Downriggers
  • Nav system
  • Navigation lights
  • Boat horn
  • Aerator and bilge pumps
  • Marine radio
  • Music radio

Thanks

Sam

Sam,

The best solution for this marine electrical system is to have one battery for your engine and normal boat circuits and use the other two batteries for your trolling motor and anchor winch.

Connecting your boat accessories to the trolling motor batteries may seem like a good idea, but as I have mentioned in an Easy Ac/Dc post you can run into some extreme problems.

A normal 12 volt isolator can not be wired to charge a 12 and 24 system. It can be used on a 24 volt system, but your alternator will only put 14.4 volts and your engine is only designd for this lower voltage.

The BEP trolling motor VSR would work great for your application. Since shore power charging is not currently an option, I would use the engine alternator to charge your trolling motor batteries.

If you are concerned about drawing your engine battery down too low with your boat accessories, you may want to consider using a Low Voltage Sensitive Relay. I would normally recommend having a second battery for your house loads, but four batteries in the bilge of a 195 SeaNymph may keep the boat from going onto plane. The LVSR cuts power to the accessories connected to it when the battery voltage gets too low. The battery voltage will still be high enough for your engine to start.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Kevin,

Thank you for the reply.

I am going to go the VSR route, connecting all accessories to starting battery. I would also like to connect anchor to trolling battery bank like you suggested.

Should I have a fuse on both the positive and negative leads of anchor?

Thanx

Sam

Sam,

If you are connecting the anchor to the 0 to 12 volt battery of your trolling bank, there is no need for circuit protection on the negative lead. If you are connecting the anchor to the 12 volt to 24 volt battery of your trolling bank, then I would definitely put circuit protection on the negative lead to protect against accidental faults to the anchor negative which is actually the 12 volt positive lead of your 0 to 12 volt trolling motor battery.

Kevin

Kevin,

Thanks for the quick reply.

The only question I have left would be which battery in the trolling bank is 0-12 and which is 12-24? Battery A or battery B on the VSR wiring Diagram?

It shows the positive lead from trolling motor on battery A and negative lead on battery B. I am thinking battery A would be 0-12 volt.

Am I correct?

Sam

Sam,

Battery B would be the 0 to 12 volt.

The negative of your trolling motor and the negative of your anchor would connect to the negative of battery B. The positive of your anchor would connect to the positive of battery B.

Let me know if you have any other questions,

Kevin

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Bow Thruster Battery

May 20th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Four Winns is one of the country's top builders of recreational boats.Hello Kevin,

I have a 2008 Four Winns V278. It has two batteries, ship systems and starter. The boat is equipped with a Guest 2614A Charger.

I am adding a bow thruster with a third battery. Can I connect it in parallel to the ship’s battery for charging? Also, would the charger be able to recharge both even if it takes longer?

What other alternatives do I have?

Thank you for your help.

Hi Bob,

You can certainly connect a second battery in parallel with the ship’s battery for charging. Recovery time will increase.

An alternative would be to put the battery in the bow with the thruster and add a second charger, but you would lose the ability to have the engine charge the extra battery.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Posted in Battery Charger, Boat Wiring, Bow Thruster, Marine Electrical | Comments Off

12 Volt Accessories – 24 Volt System

May 17th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Kevin,

On my boat wiring, I have a 12 volt battery for starting my motor and a 24 volt house battery setup for running my trolling motor and accessories.EzAcDc offers Smart Battery Switch Systems to make your boat wiring project easy.

I would like to have my electronics, which are all 12 volt except for the trolling motor, run off my house batteries, and use my starting battery for starting the engine only.

The boat manufacturer had the house batteries rigged up in 24 volt, but has the accessories connected in 12-volts across only one of the house batteries. Although this works, one of my batteries drains well before the other. Also, something tells me that boat wiring like this might not be a good idea.

Is there a better way to do this? Should I try to balance the load across both house batteries, or should I use a DC/DC converter to step down the 24 volts to 12 volts in order to run the accessories properly? Also, can I use a Smart Battery Switch VSR to charge my 24 volt system from my motor once the starting battery is charged up?

Thanks,

Scott

Hi Scott,

Your boat wiring  has been engineered in a safe, conservative way.

You run into potential problems when you start running two, separate, 12 volts systems with their grounds 12 volts apart.

  1. Stray current corrosion.

    The engine is connected to one battery ground, while the hull is connected to second battery ground – engine corrodes away to protect hull

  2. Fires caused by crossing grounds.

    Gauges and navigation lights have same ground to complete circuit. Your engine harness grounds the gauges and your boat harness grounds the navigation lights. If you connect the engine ground to battery 1 ground and the boat accessory harness to battery 2 ground, the 24 volt jumper wire for your trolling motor completes the dead short from Battery 1 positive to Battery 2 negative.

    The short circuit path is the Accessory harness ground which is connected to battery 2 negative (battery 1 positive), to navigation light switch ground, to gauge ground, to engine harness ground, and back battery 1 ground.

    There is no circuit protection in this circuit so the smallest wire burns. This is usually the small ground jumper wire that connects your gauges.

If you are going to separate circuits to both batteries, install circuit protection in both the negative and positive wires and pay close attention. Label all battery connections because swapping a ground at the battery will cause a fire.

Best of luck,

Kevin

Posted in Boat Wiring, Circuit Protection, Corrosion, Cruisers, Navigation Lights, Pontoons, Runabouts | Comments Off

Marine Shore Power – New Complete Kits

April 30th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

Boater’s have always appreciated the convenience of on-board AC power. Unfortunately, especially for those of us with smaller cruisers, this convenience often seems out of reach. The main issues are usually the king’s ransom required to have a local boatyard install a simple shore power system, or the lack of electrical expertise to tackle the the job as a DIY.EzAcDc offers a complete, easy to install, marine shore power system.

The new Marine Shore Power Systems from EzAcDc offer a solution to these issues. They are complete shore power kits that are easily installed and  include everything you need to complete the project quickly and safely.
For a more complete overview please visit EzAcDc or check out this post from our sister site:
====================

    Hi Kevin,

    First of all, thank you for all of the time and effort that you put into your website. The boat wiring information that you share is invaluable.

    So tell me Mr. Marine Electrical, do my ambitions exceed my abilities?

    My wife and I have a small sailboat that we’ve enjoyed for many years. It’s a perfect size for the two of us and can’t imagine anything that would make the boat more fun…with one exception. We find that we are very jealous of our marina neighbors who have shore power. Whether they are using a television, a drink mixer, a vacuum, a toaster, or even a simple battery charger, we start down the “if only” path.

    How tough a project is it to add AC power to an older boat? I’m reasonably comfortable with simple household wiring jobs, but have been told that marine AC can be an incredibly complicated and – if not done correctly – incredibly dangerous.

    Any suggestions?

    Thanks.

    Matt

      Hi Matt,

      No project is too big, not project is too small when “Mr. Marine Electrical” is on the scene!

      Seriously, there is a great new product from our partners at EzAcDc that will fit your needs. They have a complete marine shore power system that follows their snap-together philosophy of simplifying boat wiring jobs.

      Installation of the new marine shore power system is easy.

      The panel is pre-wired and comes with a remote outlet with 10′ of boat cable that simply plugs into a “snap together” plug on the back. The kit is also pre-wired with 10′ of Marine grade boat cable that runs from the boat AC panel to the included shore power inlet.

      Best of all, any complex electrical connections are already made inside the powdercoated aluminum box.

      All outlets are GFCI protected. And, for additional safety, the AC panel has a dual pole breaker to protect the boater if the dock outlet is wired backwards.

      The panel also includes a power “on” indicator light and a reverse polarity light. It also comes with the AC to DC grounding wire that is required by the US Coast Guard. This wire runs from the back of the panel to your DC negative buss, engine ground, or battery negative and provides an additional safety path to ground if you have an AC fault on your boat. Even though required, this wire is redundant on this well-designed system since the GFCI also protects everything.

      Additionally, there is a single outlet on the back of the shore power panel to allow a built in AC device to be connected. This is ideal for a battery charger or refrigerator that comes with a standard 15 A household plug. Simply plug it into the back of the panel before installing.

      It comes with the industry standard 30 amp Marinco inlet. You can choose between the standard square plastic inlet or upgrade to the stainless steel version. Both will connect to an 30 amp marine cordset or adaptor.

      Please let me know how your project turns out. I always like pictures.

      Kevin

    Posted in Signaling Devices | Comments Off

    BEP’s New Coutour Zone – State of the Art

    April 14th, 2010 by Kevin Hannula and Nick Kroes

    BEP Marines CZONE™ is a state-of-the-art networked power control and monitoring system it has been designed to integrate and simplify on board electrical and mechanical systems and improve the boating experience.

    The system has significant benefits to the OEM
    Compared to typical circuit breaker installations CZONE™ relocates the circuit control and protection devices closer to the loads thus shortening cable runs, this equates to a reduction in the cost, complexity and weight of the marine electrical/boat wiring.The CZONE™ system through its simple plug and play connection system provides savings in installation time.

    CZONE™ offers an extremely high level of versatility and integration:

    • Control AC and DC loads with built in circuit protection
    • Monitor multiple Tanks
    • Monitor multiple AC and DC power systems
    • Programmable timers, dimmers, alarms, load shedding and more
    • All controllable from one of the intuative display interface

    The CZONE™ system is made up of multiple input and output interfaces that are networked together on a CAN bus. CZONE™ can consist of a single interface or a multi bus control and monitoring system, CZONE™ is the only system on the market that, affordably, caters to the needs of vessels ranging in size from 25 to 100 feet in length

    Configuration
    The system can be modified or updated via the Display module or the extremely user friendly CZONE™ configuration program. If a module is damaged a replacement unit can simply be plugged in place of the old device the system will automatically configure the new module.

    Designed to withstand the harsh physical nature of the marine environment
    The design of CZONE™ was undertaken utilizing the highest quality, proven components and innovative protective circuitry providing a robust reliable on board power control and monitoring system.

    CZONE™ is the only power control and monitoring system which can interface with a third party multifunction marine electronic navigational displays.

    Posted in Boat Wiring, Circuit Protection, Cruisers, Gauge Panels, Harnesses, MarineAcDc Forum, New Products, Signaling Devices | Comments Off
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