Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

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krampuppy

Seaman Apprentice
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Jul 28, 2003
Messages
31
Okay so I had my boat out trolling yesterday. Used it for about an hour and half. All of a sudden the trolling motor completely quit. It is a bow mount with a foot pedal control, I could not get it to work at all.

So, I got it home and have hooked my batteries up to the charger... nothing. I used an AC detector pen (don't have a multimeter) and it lights up everywhere on the motor. When I push the test meter on the guide it won't light up. I checked all the connections and they seem to be fine.

I don't know how to check if its the foot pedal. Is there anyway to make it turn on without the foot pedal?

My nephew is coming up on Monday and he loves to bass fish. Promised I would take him out on the boat, so I would like to get this figured out.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks a million.
 
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bassman284

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Jun 24, 2006
Messages
2,840
Re: Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

Which Minn Kota and how old?

edit: Sorry, should have asked original Powerdrive or V2? Just for starters, I had a similar problem a couple of years ago and it turned out to be a bad crimp in one of the butt connectors (marina installed it, not me). It was periodically slipping out and breaking the circuit. Actualy, all of the crimps were pretty bad but only one actually breaking circuit altogether. Amazing the thing ever worked at all.
 
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K

krampuppy

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Messages
31
Re: Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

It is a powerdrive. Don't know the exact year but I know this is the first version not the v2.
 
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bassman284

Commander
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2,840
Re: Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

OK, so you have the flat plug going from the foot control to the motor. Pull that apart and you will see severall pins. These can get corroded over time and screw up the connection. What you need to do is GENTLY clean up those pins. I'm not sure of the best way to do this but I'm thinking maybe some very fine sand paper. Female end maybe use toothpick or something.

My best friend has a boat with a 24 volt version of this motor. A couple of years ago we were out on a lake and the tm started screwing up. It intermittently didn't want to turn and sometimes didn't want to go at all. Then it got where it wouldn't go at all. He used my pocket knife to scrape some corrosion off the pins and we got it working again. He had a CoPilot on his and the clue was that it also wouldn't run using the CoPilot remote. Up til then we thought it was a pedal problem

The first version foot pedal can go bad but it is much more robust than the V2 which is basically made out of toilet paper. The cheap kind.
 
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krampuppy

Seaman Apprentice
Joined
Jul 28, 2003
Messages
31
Re: Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

Thanks. I think I have figured it out. The positive terminal had an inline circuit breaker on it. I didn't know what this was initially. The circuit breaker was all corroded so I took it off and hooked it up direct to see if it would work and it ran.

So now that brings up two more questions:

1. What is the danger of running it without a circuit breaker?

2. Should I replace it with a circuit breaker or an inline fuse? If so, where can I buy them?
 
Silvertip

Silvertip

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Sep 22, 2003
Messages
28,771
Re: Minnkota 40lb Powerdrive help!

Would you eliminate the fuse or circuit breaker in your house wiring??? Think about it!
 
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