Rewiring Boat - Aux Electronics

lazyMlazyK

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
Sep 26, 2015
Posts
207
Likes
10
Points
135
Location
Central ND
I’ve got an older boat that has had some Fred-in-the-shed wiring done for the non-essential electronics wiring (cd player/radio, bilge pump, cig. lighter, nav. lights, graph, on-board charger, etc.) and I’m hoping to organize and protect the wiring better. Right now there are four wires landed on both the pos. and neg. sides of the cranking battery. In the first picture, the cranking batt. is a white rectangle. The blue lines are pairs of wires. The yellow line is the power connection from a deep cycle battery to the trolling motor, and the white line represents the foot pedal cable where I typically run it when fishing. When I’m running the trolling motor from here, I can’t use the radio or graph (mainly graph) because of an intense amount of interference. The green circled area is kind of a mess of wires with splices here and there...ugly stuff. My next post will be my proposed possible solution. Graph is on the left.

6E88F352-EF60-49E5-A6A0-B4E1201E2912.jpg

- - - Updated - - -

This is my proposed solution. The small box on the bottom right is a fuse block. The small rectangle under the steering wheel is a switch panel. Will rewiring like this help to keep induced noise down? I know it will help to remove a couple of wires from the battery connection.

- - - Updated - - -

This is supposed to be the second picture, also showing the charger hookup:
7D6BD6D8-05B6-489D-A0DA-ED0536678599.jpg

- - - Updated - - -

Riding the struggle bus here trying to modify a post from mobile ;:;banghead
 

Attachments

9822157F-F18B-4C1C-8CAD-380C4B348AA6.jpg
Last edited:


SDMF

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
Apr 24, 2015
Posts
10,908
Likes
620
Points
438
6Ga wire from battery to master power switch, I'd put the switch @ the helm. 6Ga wire from master to fuse/switch panel @ the helm. Radio, depth finders, Radio, ciggy lighter, lights, and pumps run through the fuse panel. So your main/starting battery has wires for the motor and a 2nd set for the accessories, then the onboard charger and that's it.

Trolling motor should have it's own battery with just the trolling motor and charger hooked to it.
 

sweeney

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
Apr 27, 2015
Posts
2,793
Likes
143
Points
313
Location
mandan
If you are truly having interference issues run shielded cables.
 

gone_fishing

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
May 15, 2015
Posts
698
Likes
6
Points
158
Location
North Dakota
I ran all my accessories through a Blue Sea Systems fuse block:

https://www.bluesea.com/products/5026/ST_Blade_Fuse_Block_-_12_Circuits_with_Negative_Bus_and_Cover

I also picked up one of their battery switches so I can completely kill power to everything. Fuse block, motor, and factory boat accessories all go through this switch:

https://www.bluesea.com/products/6006/m-Series_Mini_On-Off_Battery_Switch_with__Knob_-_Red

Where I purchased custom battery cables. 2 AWG between positive battery and switch, 6 AWG between switch and fuse block

http://www.bestboatwire.com/custom-cables/custom-battery-cable-assembly

Wire I used to bring pos/neg from fuse block to bow for graph:

http://www.bestboatwire.com/10-2-awg-marine-grade-wire-tinned-boat-cable-flat-blk-red-25-ft
 


Skeeter

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
May 16, 2015
Posts
3,693
Likes
860
Points
403
Location
Beulah nd
Buy heat shrink solder connectors and a heat gun. Solder and heatshrink your splices and you will never have to worry I had an issue with crimp connectors that caused a massive headache one summer.
 

SDMF

Founding Member
Founding Member
Joined
Apr 24, 2015
Posts
10,908
Likes
620
Points
438
Buy heat shrink solder connectors and a heat gun. Solder and heatshrink your splices and you will never have to worry I had an issue with crimp connectors that caused a massive headache one summer.

Agreed.
 

Recent Posts

Friends of NDA

Top Posters of the Month

  • This month: 159
  • This month: 133
  • This month: 114
  • This month: 108
  • This month: 102
  • This month: 86
  • This month: 82
  • This month: 75
  • This month: 74
  • This month: 74
Top Bottom