How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

[gkosel]

I am trying to install a radio and am having trouble determining how to get power to the unit.​

I have tried hooking up the positive and negative directly to the fuse box terminals just to make sure I could get the unit to work.​

Eventually, I want to hook the radio and sonar up to the empty accessary panel buttons. I have tried attaching the wires to the panel switches and directly to the fuse panel. I can get a faint led light and you can see the clock is lit up, but it is like it is not getting enough power to run the radio.​

I have hooked up a lighter plug and ran the unit successfully in my truck, so I know the radio works.​

I have tested the fuse panel with a light tester and every one tested successfully.​

My battery is fully charged. The tilt, blower, etc all work at full speed.​

I am not sure what I am doing wrong.​

I have attached pics of the panels and switches.​

Any help would be appreciated.​

Thanks​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Hard to tell about the acessory switch on top but it looks like the acessory switch in the middle is already feeding something.

 

[Rob454]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

You dont have any open spaces on your fuse panel but wha tyou need to do is look on the acc button and see if that wire goes to anything or does it jsut go to the panel ( some boats have the buttons prewired) if thats the case then the Pos of the radio will go to the open side of the switch and the ground wire will go on the ground block of the panel. Personally I prefer to feed constant power to my accessories and break and connect on the ground. this way if a wire ground out n a sharp piece of metal all that happens is the unit or accessories wont turn off but if its a pos wire then it could short out the electrical. Evebn if there are fuses depending on where you get the ground fault it could mess up the electrical

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

From what I can tell they are not. There are already wires going from the Fuse panel to the switch and that is what you see.

It also appears that the ground wires are all piggy-backed across the panels.

You can see that there is a wire that goes from the middle accessory button up to the top accessory button. There is another wire that is cable-tied to the ground wire that then goes over to the lights switch and then also connects to the bilge and unused court lights switch.

It appears that they are all piggy backed together. I was hoping that someone could explain the reasoning behind this because it doesn't make sense to me.

If you look at the fuse panel, there are only two ground wires attached. One of them comes from the horn, and the other one (I believe) goes to the switch panel and is piggy-backed across all six switches.

It also appears that the positive wires are already prewired to the switches as well.​

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

I tried connecting the positive to the open side of the switch and the negative directly to the ground block on the fuse panel.

I also tried connecting the positive directly to the positive on the fuse panel and removing the wire to the switch.​

In both tests, the lights/clock on the radio faintly come on, but it appears that there isn't enough power to run the radio as I cannot get any sound.​

I have already tested the radio by hooking it up to my truck and it worked great.​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

One fuse can supply multiple items, which looks like the case in your boat. iIam going to assume there is an indicator light in your switches which expalins why there is a ground.

If a switch currently only has two wires going to it, one from the fuse panel and other ground, that switch is available for use.

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

You are right. There are indicator lights. So that explains why all the grounds and positives are already hooked up.

That doesn't explain why I can't get the radio to work when I connect directly to the fuse panel.

Now that I think of it, I am not sure if I have tried to connect the positive to the open side of the switch yet. But it should work no matter what if I connect directly to the fuse panel though shouldn't it?

I am going to have to do some more testing tomorrow night, but I think the only time that the indicator lights on the switches showed up, was when I removed the positive wire from the accessory fuse on the panel and replaced with the positive wire from the radio.

Should the indicator lights always be on? Doesn't that waste battery?

When I turn the ignition key on all the fuse panels temporarily go dead. I am assuming this is by design, so they are not drawing power while you are cranking the engine?

If you have any other ideas on what to do to get the radio working I would appreciate your suggestions.

Thanks for the help so far.​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Depends on what kind of indicater lights. If you have the kind that come on with the ignition so that you can see them at night, there has to be an extra wire attatched to them. If they only come on when you switch them on, it will be getting power from the fuse panel only. You may have the former.

If the indicater light dim when you crank, that would be due to voltage drop.

I have a feeling you haven't hooked the radio up correctly. next time you hook up the radio to your switch, measure the voltage at where you connected the radio. If you get a voltage drop, there is a resistance somewhere. If you get the full 12V, there is something wrong in how you connected the radio.

Remember that a radio(assuming weare talking stereo and not vhf) typically has 2 wires that need to be tied to 12V. In an automotive application, one wire is always tied to 12V and the other is switched on by the ignition. In a boat, you want the radio on when the ignition is off so you tie both to 12V, or in your case, a switch. Having it go to a switch is a good idea since most stereos draw enough current when they are off to draw down a battery over time.

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

It is kind of strange how the indicator lights on the switch panel work. I didn't know they turned on until I tried to hook up the radio (yes it is a stereo not VHF) directly to the positive and negative ports on the fuse panel. I did not notice that these incidcator lights came on before I attached the radio wires directly to the fuse box.​

The indicator lights change from red to green when I press the switches.​

I believe that they are red in the off position. If I then turn the ignition key into the start position, but do not actually crank the engine, the indicator lights turn off, and the blower indicator light turns on. The blower is a separate switch located next to the ingnition.​

I have been using the ignition positivie wire from the radio in my tests. There is also another positive wire that is meant to be the always on positive for maintaining memory and clock. I was hoping to use this so I wouldn't have to reset the clock/radio stations, but see what you mean about it drawing down the battery over time. Is this more of a problem if there are extended periods between uses? Or should I not tempt fate and just hook the memory positive wire up to the switch with the ignition positive wire?​

Could my problem be that I am not attaching both of these wires? I thought not, because when I tested this with a cigarette adapter plug in my truck, I only had the ignition positive wire hooked up and it worked fine.​

Just to take a step back, the following diagram details the switches that I have in my panel. Currently, there is a positive wire coming from the fuse panel going to the positive (top-middle) of the diagram that supplies power to the switch. The negative (top-left) is open. The bottom connections for the indicator lights have wires that are piggy-backed to the other switches with indicator lights in the panel.

Where should I be hooking up the positive and negative wires from the stereo to correctly provide power to the stereo?

It looks like I need to pick up a voltage tester. I do not have one right now. I do have a test light that I used to test power to the fuse panel, but this obviously does not give a voltage number.​

I am guessing that I am experiencing a voltage problem as you suggest. If in fact this is the case, how do I narrow down where the problem is occurring and fix the problem?​

Sorry for all the extra lengthy posts. I have learned a lot in this thread already and really appreciate your help.​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

If that is really your switch, the radio will attatch to the terminal labeled load in your diagram(it is not negative as stated). It is just showing a load(your radio) in between the switch and ground. The other two terminals will be ground and ignition. Not sure which pins go to what on those two but they look like they are already hooked up.

You will hook the ground of your radio to that ground bus with all the black wires on it on your fuse panel.

Where did you get that diagram?

Just to be sure. Get a voltmeter and measure everything first.

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Thanks for the reply.

I will get a voltage meter and check the voltage before trying to set this up again.

I will hook up the positive ignition wire from the radio to the load pin (top-left) on the switch, and the negative wire to the ground bus on the fuse panel.

Thanks for all the help, I will check back in again tomorrow night after working on this again.

BTW I got the diagram from the following BoatFix link:

http://www.boatfix.com/how/Ele5.html​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

The switch you have may or may not be the same configuration as that diagram. That is why you need to measure things first.

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

OK, I purchase a voltage meter and did some testing.

The voltage at the fuse panel main wires is at about 9 (obviously not good).

I checked the battery and that is putting out 12.4 as it should.

I tried turning over the engine and it only gave me a 1 second Rrrrrh.

So I cleaned the terminals on my battery and also on the circuit breaker that the cables from the battery are connected to.

Still nothing.

So, it appears that I was hooking up my stereo correctly and I found a new and bigger problem. I am glad I figured this out while the boat is sitting in the garage, instead of out on the lake.

Any ideas on how to troubleshoot this electrical problem from here?​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Aren't you glad you bought a voltmeter so you can actually trouble shoot now?

Get your battery charged, start your engine and see if your alternator is working.

How old is your battery?

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Yes, I am glad I got the Voltmeter. It is something I should be able to continue to use.

I just bought the boat at the end of last year and have only had it out on the water one time, but I think the sticker on the battery showed that it was purchased in 2005. It is a dual purpose deep cycle battery. How long should these batteries last?

It would be so easy to simply get a new battery and not have to troubleshoot a birds nest of wires.

But the battery is putting out 12.4 volts. Doesn't mean that the battery is not where the problem is? Or should it be reading more?

I am still learning about a lot of this stuff and do not have a lot of mechanical engine background. How do you test the alternator?​

 

[POINTER94]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

You need to take the battery out and have it load tested. You can have slow "leaks" or the battery may have been run down to the point of no return. It may be retaining a superficial charge giving you a misleading reading. Batteries are sometimes stange things, I take very good care of mine, but had one that only lasted about one year. Others I have had last 5-6 years. I have mine on a replacement rotation of three years.

Is it a maintainance free job, or can you pull the caps and check the electrolite.

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

OK, I took the battery out and had it load tested. They tested it with two different testers and both said that there weren't any problems with the battery.

The problem appears to be affecting the ignition swith too. I tried to crank the engine last night (not intending to start the engine) and I only got a small grrrr and that was it.

Any suggestions on where to go from here?

I have already wire brushed and cleaned the connectors from the battery to the circuit breakers that are attached to the starboard side riser. From there the wire appear to go off into the abyss of the motor.

​

 

[bruceb58]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

Check the connections form the battery to the starter. When you crank the engine, is the solenoid engaging and the starter turning?

 

[gkosel]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

When I turn the key, I hear a sound that is very brief that sounds like the starter is trying to turn. But there doesn't seem to be enough power to turn the starter longer than a second.

It doesn't click like a car starter does when the battery is dead. It just seems like it isn't getting enough juice. If the starter is turning, it is not very much.​

 

[Tredeb]

Re: How to hook up accessories such as radios/sonar?

The first thing I would do is try a different battery or charge the one you have. Did they charge your battery after the test? It really sounds like you are not getting enough juice. If you can rule out the battery, you should follow all the cables and verify the connections and terminations. If you can see corrosion between your cable and your connector, clean it up or replace the connector.

Do you have full battery voltage anywhere in your system? You mentioned 9V at the block and 12V at the battery. Hook a wire to your negative terminal and follow your positive wire with you voltmeter, testin where you can. When the voltage drops, you have found your poor connection.