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I have a 2000 Sundancer 340, while...

mjresq4
Guest Contributor

I have a 2000 Sundancer 340, while replacing my cockpit lights with LED'S I think I might have blown a fuse or a breaker. The port side works fine and the starboard side worked when I first spliced the wires together, I think the wires might have touched before I taped the ends. I checked the LED with the battery from my drill and it still works, I also checked the wires with a test light, no power found. Does anyone know of an inline fuse or breaker that only effects the starboard cockpit light.

7 REPLIES 7

filimili
Guest Contributor
Check the fuses in the battery charger

mjresq4
Guest Contributor
Do I have to open the charger? I looked in the engine bilge, I can see the main DC panel and what I believe is the charger right next to it but I didn't notice any easily accessible fuses.

filimili
Guest Contributor
Yes . Bottom portion of my charger face plate unscrews and there were two 30 amp fuses inside. Mine blew when installing my underwater lights . I presume due to reverse polarity . Worth checking out .

mjresq4
Guest Contributor
Ok, I looked at the charger as best I could, as it's not readily accessable and don't see a removable cover. I supplied a pic.

wingless
Rising Contributor
The charger image shows that it is providing about 10A total to the three battery banks.

Using the main DC panel in the salon and the manual BATTERY VOLTAGE TEST rocker switch selector, are both the PORT and STBD banks above 12.5 VDC? If so, there is plenty of voltage to power the lamps. If not, what are the indicated voltages on each bank?

The wiring for my 2000 380DA should be very similar to that on your 2000 340DA.

On my 2000 380DA the starboard bank powers the salon and the port powers the cockpit.

On mine, the DC lighting is protected by circuit breakers w/ these functions: FWD CABIN LIGHTING and AFT CABIN LIGHTING.

If yours is the same and part of that circuit is powered, then there is either a wiring problem or a fixture problem.

The method Sea Ray used for wiring my boat was to daisy chain the distribution, from one fixture to the next. They jammed two wires into a yellow Faston crimp connector, to continue the circuit from one lamp to the next.

It may be that fiddling w/ the wiring has disturbed the connection. If so, then replacing that Faston crimp connector might restore the connection and resolve the problem.

wingless
Rising Contributor
On my boat for the cockpit, there is a door below the wheel at the helm w/ twelve pushbutton circuit breakers. There is one circuit breaker for: LIGHTS.

They daisy chained the wiring in the cockpit the same as in the salon.

Check the connections and check the fixtures first.

wingless
Rising Contributor
The other potential issue is that Sea Ray built my boat w/o tinned wiring.

In the cockpit that copper wiring is starting to show age, w/ the copper starting to get dark. This is contrasted to the salon where it is still bright and shiny copper color.

My seat of the pants guess is that I'll get at least ten more years out of the cockpit wiring before I have to replace it w/ marine wiring.

It is possible that an abnormal exposure to the elements on your boat might have accelerated the wiring deterioration and there might be a wiring problem on your boat.