Electrical question

[coralee]

My Lowrance sometimes won't start up when I turn it on after moving it to my new (old) boat. It fires up every time when I hook it to my other boat. Also I installed led lights and tried them yesterday on the water and they were flickering while trolling. When I hit the channel on the way in I tried them again and they worked. The wiring to the graph is solid and I already replaced the ground all the way to the fuse block and I measure 12v power at the plug. Any ideas? also does the extra yellow wire (for powering up other things when the graph is turned on) need to be hooked to power? It seems to not make a difference as sometimes it works and sometimes not either way.

Thanks for any help.

[rbradley]

do you have the yellow wire powered on the other boat? i would first try to match up the wiring to what you know works on the other boat. if the LED lights are powered from the same fuse block you may have a ground issue going into the fuse block. most LED lights have very little draw and if they aren't getting enough there is no way your sonar is.

could wire direct to battery for testing purposes. someone with a lowrance setup will know more about the dual power question.

[jimcr]

I would look on the power side for a loose connection or corrosion at either a terminal or fuse joint. Are your LEDs wired along with your Lowrance?

[coralee]

All connections seem fine and I've checked and reconnected several times. The LED is completely separate wiring and not even in the same fuse block. I wondered if the alternator would cause either issue when charging the battery that is being used. Guess I can try switching the battery selector next time out to see what happens with the LED's but the Lowrance issue happens when its running or not.

Its weird that it would not start up for quite a while yesterday out fishing and then I just tried it after a few hours and it worked and stayed on.???? Even when it won't start up I measure 12V at the connection. I suppose it could be a Lowrance issue with the start up but it always worked every time on other boats and its only 1 year old.

[jimcr]

Really sounds like corrosion to me , I would pull your battery connections and clean them really good with a wire brush, I have in the past had a similar problem and turned out to be corrosion I could not see. I could not trim my motor but some of the other things worked fine , cleaned all the connections an deverything was fine even though when looking at them before cleaning they looked good.

If your like most of us we have multiple connections at our batterys ,if you have switches make sure the connections to and from them are clean too.

[coralee]

Well I was at my favorite store saving big money and they had a small 12v battery on sale for $16 after rebate so I got it hooked it up and it works like a dream. I think the advice of a bad connection seems right so now I'll be cleaning connections. Thanks for the advice guys.

[prop nut]

LED lights may be offering you a clue

LED lights as well as computer driven products like fish finders and gps units are verry sensitive to polarity issues

A alternator on a boat puts out alternating current

And a recifyer regulator converts this alternating current into straight dc current

I have found in the past with problems similar to your there was a bad diode in the recifyer regulator letting some alternating current slip by into the dc circuit

This will cause a led lite to flicker and a gps unit to shut down or not start up

Replacing the regulator recifyer solved the problem in my case

After spending lots of time looking for loose wires and bad and corroded connections

[coralee]

Frank-Thanks for that info that I would never have even dreamed of. I'll check it out. I was wondering-when I was running it was at its worst but when I went slow through the channel the lights seemed to work fine (at least for the moment. Is this a clue as to if its the regulator? or would they flicker all the time then?

[prop nut]

A led light will flicker when ever the circuit is hooked to has ac current present

The rectifier regulator is usally not a serviceable item usally just replace it

A led light it polarity critical if hooked up backwards the lights will not work at all