battery question

[Fonchy]

Re: battery question

That heavy gauge wire is to your engine/starter electrical. The small 10 AWG wires go to your ships electrical accessories (fish finder, radio, lights etc) Starters are NEVER wired with such light gauge wires because of the tremendous load they pull. If you pull the cover off of your outboard and look directly at the starter you will see a large heavy gauge wire connected directly to it. This will be 4 AWG or larger, MUCH larger than the two small wires that are connected to the switch.

Man thanks alot, you hit the head of the nail, I just went an look and there are 2 heavy gauge wires. the one in the center is connected to the pos. starter the other heavy gauge wire is going from bat1 neg. to engine ground. The one that I thought it was accessories is the bilge pump. so now my question is the neg wire on bat2 is not long enough to reach the neg1 ground, so can I connect neg2 to neg1 neg terminal or buy a bigger cable. another thing I just put the ear muffs on the engine , turn the water on and crancked the engine and the engine cranked right up. so is ther any other way to find out if the charging circuit blew or it could be ok.

Thanks for all the responses

 

[PondTunes]

Re: battery question

you can purchase some long cables or get connectors and make up your own... I don't reccomend using the universal replacement ones you find at advance if you make up your own as they don't make great connections.

I think bass pro sells some pre-terminated ones (ones that have a battery post connection on one side and a ring terminal on the other) they come in lengths up to 4 feet. I'm sure you can order some longer ones.


As for checking your charging system you will need a meter that can read DC Voltage. Either hold the leads on the positive and negative terminals of the battery or use clips to hold them in place if your meter is so equipped.
Note the battery voltage. Crank the engine and check the voltage at idle it should be about the same possibly higher. Throttle up the engine to about 1500 rpm, you should see the voltage climb with engine rpm topping out somewhere around 14 volts.

If you aren't getting any voltage you probably have blown your charging system, it is worth noting that switching the perko switch to OFF with the engine running can also destroy your charging system.

 

[Fonchy]

Re: battery question

What gauge wire should I use??

 

[PondTunes]

Re: battery question

4 AWG or 2 AWG depending on how far they are apart, from your picture it "looks" like you have a 2 AWG ground on battery #1. 4AWG will be about 1/2" in diameter. 2 awg roughly 3/4" depending on insulation and such. Also it's highly likely it is written right on the insulation of the wire!

 

[Fonchy]

Re: battery question

Can I just hook the neg2 anywhere on the engine???

 

[QuadManiac]

Re: battery question

Hook the negative from battery 2 to the negative of battery 1. That's ALL you need to do!

 

[Barnacle_Bill]

Re: battery question

Look at diagram #1. http://gator49.hostgator.com/~zeromyst/catalog/images/8501.pdf

 

[TBarCYa]

Re: battery question

Yes, you can hook the negative from battery 2 to the engine block however you run the risk of not getting a good connection due to dirt/oil/paint or whatever else may be on the block. The best way to do it (with the shortest wire) is to follow the negative cable from battery 1 to where it is attached to the engine block and attach battery 2 negative cable there.

 

[QuadManiac]

Re: battery question

The simplest (and by far cheapest) way, assuming the batteries are co-located, is to connect the batt 2 negative to the batt 1 negative. There are no negative effects (pardon the pun) in doing it this way. Why would one want to run ANOTHER cable out the transom to the outboard, with the required service loop, etc.? That's a waste of copper and of money.

 

[PondTunes]

Re: battery question

Agreed, connect battery #2 negative to battery #1 negative and forget about grounding to the engine. If you had an inboard engine you could ground to the engine easy, but you don't and trying to ground to your outboard will be way more of a pain and not benefit you in any way.