re-wiring my boat..had a fire.

[tallcanadian]

i had a bit of an electrical fire on my boat this morning. a lot of wires ended being burnt. luckily, no damage to the boat. this is totally my fault. i've read the forums here on wiring boats by using a fuse panel. i can get my hands on a switch panel that has fuses built in. i believe this should suffice. yes? no? i only have my two nav lights, bilge pump, a battery gauge that i have a monetary switch hooked up to. i have no charging system yet on my 45hp johnny. i could wire my two fish finders to this panel as well, if i had to, just to have it on a fuse. is this okay or not? any advice would be much appreciated. thanks.

 

[toolsinbox]

Re: re-wiring my boat..had a fire.

Do you know what or where the fire started?

 

[tallcanadian]

Re: re-wiring my boat..had a fire.

Do you know what or where the fire started?

lol. i was really hoping no one would ask me that. i had all my devices wired directly to my battery. i know, i know. but what started the fire was, i was drilling a hole in my dash and pushed the drill bit, spade bit actually, too far and it grabbed some wires. i took a quick look and everything seem to be okay, but a few seconds later i saw smoke about half way down the inside of my boat. so i quickly went to the back to disconnect the wires from the battery and when i took off the back curtain the wires at the battery were on fire. luckily i was able to disconnect quickly and blow out the flames. the problem was two wire, on positive and one negative ended up together. so now i want to do it right. i've always been wanting to do it the proper way but kept putting it off. now is a good reason to do it. and a good reason to put a fire extinguisher on board as well.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: re-wiring my boat..had a fire.

Here is a wiring diagram that should help. Delete what you don't need.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: re-wiring my boat..had a fire.

Here is a wiring diagram that should help. Delete what you don't need. Yes, you can use a switch panel that has breakers built in. But you end up with a bunch of switches that aren't needed so why not use a fuse panel and add switches for only the stuff that needs one. Radios, fish finders, GPS, etc., all have their own power switch. You don't need another one for them.