Lake Champlain United - Forums

Is there a reason that on marine systems the ground wire is on a threaded SS post instead of on the lead post right next to it? I am having some issues related to voltage, and was thinking that the clamp style terminals are much easier to tighten down and have a greater surface area for conducting. Would there be an issue with me switching my terminal to a clamp?

Keith, I was having same type issues you were and the dealer said I had too many negative leads coming from the negative terminal of the battery. They rewired the configuration to give a better ground, and now I don't get voltage drain while using all my electronics. I can run, riggers, auto pilot, VHF radio, live well, bildge, and all my electronics at once and still never drop below 12.4vlts..

You may need a negative ground buss installed.

Reelax wrote: You may need a negative ground buss installed.

I installed one of these and it fixed all my intermittent ground issues. Plus you can label everything and know what each lead goes to...I did the same for my positive leads.

you could still change to a clamp style and then split up some of the neg to the stud also so less things stacked in the meantime.

I don’t have much on the post right now just 3 eyelets main ground, and 2 riggers everything else is wired through the main power system. I bought some clamps today going to replace all my terminals tomorrow and my volt regulator and go through my motor grounds etc. I have a blue sea fuse panel in my battery hole that I have my other riggers (don’t use much) wired through that I could attach the other eyelets to may do that as well and keep that on the thread post.

you can switch it to the clamp style no problem

Made the switch tonight. Pretty easy, replaced all of the old terminals (+ and - ) with 24k gold plated terminals. Separated the non essential (accessory) eyelets and attached them to the thread post. Replaced the battery with a new everstart multi use (890cca vs 690 on the old) and replaced the volt regulator (old looked ok but with plans to fish this weekend didn’t have the time to test and order if it was bad so I just bought one and now have a spare) motor rpm seem to be more stable. And I was able to trim up down up down up down a few times before low volt warning vs before when I would trim and motor would cut immediatly. Also set my boat up to run a 2nd battery parallel in future if wanted/ needed

So we thought we had this all figured out. Ran sunday with what seemed like a super minor hiccup where the volt warning popped on and it looked to not be charging early in the morning. I throttled up and it was fine, and then trolled normal speed the rest of the day with stable voltage for the first time in a year.
All of that changed yesterday, we hit the lamoille and trolled upriver for eyes. after about about 2hrs all the sudden the volt warning was on, and it wasn't charging. tried what had worked sunday and no dice. we pulled gear and headed to the dock. while tied at the dock I heard a weird noise like water dripping on a hot pan (sizzle) but there was no smoke, and the motor was off. We loaded the boat on the trailer (fired up no problem) and parked to tie down. As I was attaching a tie-down I heard that same sizzle sound and looked over to see the bonding jumper (the little cable that grounds the lower unit to the rest of the motor) was red hot and smoking. I quickly cut the battery at the switch. I started to play with wires and pulled the cowl off. I tried hitting the switch again and still red hot. played around a little more and no change. Got pissed off and threatened the boats life, and then decided I didnt have an option and needed to raise the motor for the ride home. I flipped the switch on the battery and no smoke, no heat.
So what I have, is some sort of ground issue that causes that wire to get hot (it should not have voltage normally). My issue is that it is not consistent. Last fall I had noticed that the jumper was broken, thoughts at the time were that it had gotten caught on something and snapped, so i repaired it, but now that this happened it seems likely that it had gotten hot melted in half. As all of the shops are backlogged and I don't have the money to have a mechanic work on it, I am now trying to figure out what steps to take. I had just barely gone through all of the major grounds on the motor and replaced terminals, and the volt regulator (which is likely fried again). Has anyone ever seen that sort of thing happen?

I feel your pain and can remember the days of stator plate charging. Could be almost anything. Water and electricity don't mix. I used to run two batteries. One isolated for emergency. Learned my lesson after barely getting the main motor started, but the trim didn't have enough juice to raise the motor. Had to ride around for an hour till I could trim up. Could be the wiring isn't strong enough for the trim pump. Also coat all connections with Liquid Tape. This sounds more and more like a diode or rectifier problem under your flywheel. I am so happy with my 4 stroke and a 65 amp alternator and one battery.

Yeah the motor is a 4stroke but no alternator. We replaced the rectifier/regulator last week so that wouldnt have been the cause (though could be a victim). At this point I regret shutting the battery off when it was smoking... would have taken that 13k insurance money and tossed it toward a new boat.

Well it seems after some hunting that the riddle has been answered and it turns out I am a moron, a lucky moron, but moron none the less. While examining wires I happened to look down inside the battery bay, and noticed that the terminal for battery 2 which is not actually in the boat, was discolored. Seemed weird since I had changed it out last week. Then I noticed scortch marks on the floor of the battery bay. Turns out I must have turned my battery switch to all, with a brand new battery terminal laying on the aluminum floor, that electrified the hill which must have sent that through the trim bracket and over to the motor where it found a path up the bonding jumper, and back to the battery via my main ground. Somewhere in that process voltage likely hit something it should not have and caused the voltage to drop. The tested voltage yesterday and am lower than usual, but at 13.1 idle, I ordered a test harness to test output of VR And stator. Hoping to be back on the water soon!

Sometimes it just is that simple. I have a slight drain in my system where I'm ok for leaving the battery switch on for a week,but not two. Sometimes I forget to switch it off, and it will not start. It will turn over ok, but won't fire. I usually have a spare battery with me when I get home and remember I forgot the switch, next time up. Then I remembered Reelax having trouble getting his same type motor, Merc 4 stroke, to fire. Apparently you need at least 10 or eleven volts to make the coils operate or there will be no spark. I thought I was having gas issues, but really memory issues.

I had the same issue, C-Hawk. The EFI won't fire. New battery, no problems.

Well I took the boat out on Nelson Pond yesterday to see how it acted on a pond small enough to get back to shore if there was an issue. All is good and she will be on champ this weekend! Happy that it was not an actual issue, but my pride hurts a lot, especially since I ruined a day of fishing with it. Glad it is ready to go for this weekend though as has been the weekend that I find the fish the last 2 years in a row.