Ahoy

[Hugh]

Hi boys and girls.  Just bought my first Pro-Line, so thought I'd stop over and say hi.

She's a 21' 1987 with a 200 2 stroke Yammi and a Yammi 9.9 kicker, cable steer.  My brother used to build boats in Florida (Morgans or something similar) so even tho I'm former Navy and Merchant Marine, I let him sea trial her and tell me if it met muster. 

I'm happy to say it will do nicely up here in the finger lakes of NY.  This is the first boat I've owned over 14 feet, so it is a step up.  Single owner boat, and past owner who is now 75, stepped down to a Lund/Honda combo.  He always trailered the rig and used it on Erie.

The 200 is a beast, and looks brand new.  Still uses the oil injection.  Top end is 42 mph.  The 9.9 is 4 stroke.  Comes with a King auto pilot somehow tied into an old Lowrance rig. 

The wiring is a rat's nest and will need a complete overhaul.  Fortunately, Blue Sea Systems and I have a long and loving relationship   And rewiring boats is something I actually enjoy, being a gadget guy.

Here it is...to me it's a thing of beauty

[231CALIFORNIA]

welcome aboard , Question,whats "rats nest" about the wiring, Proline does good work I think, in my boat the only  minor rats nest are the ones I put in to deal with lack of pos buss space.
Welcome and share , this site is new and us members need activity to create a proline owners network.

[Hugh]

Hi Cali,

The boat is an 87, and the old boy who owned it must have gotten fired from the spaghetti factory.  Non-marine splices and connectors, wires spliced several times in less than 18 inches, toggle switches going to nowhere, unsecured trim tab pump and sump, downriggers powered up with plug in the transom well, blah, blah, blah.

It may have once been a Proline wiring job, but now it's a rat's nest.  Maybe I shouldn't be so harsh...it's a chimpmunk's nest, complete with cracked walnut shells and chewed up foam nesting material.  This may explain the non functional bilge pumps LMAO!

Anyway, she sat for 2 years before I bought it, and now I have a project on my hands.  Runs great tho, and the hull is solid as a battle ship. 

If anyone has any experience with the 87 vintage 21' walkaround, let me know.  Love to hear from you.

I need a heated barn to work on this thing all winter...any takers?

BTW, I'm a marine engineer by education, which means when I screw stuff up I do it very professionally and thoroughly

[26walk]

Welcome, boats you gotta love em & hate em depends on how much $$$$$$$ you gots to spend on your project

[Hugh]

I'd rather be upside down and covered in bilge than doing anything else.  Well, almost anything else 

Getting a rig back into shape and updating the gages, controls and electronics is pure bliss when I drop it in the water and let 'er rip. 

I'm not a paid promoter for Blue Sea, but they make some of the nicest marine electrical gear I've ever seen.  I used their 6 switch waterproof panel, waterproof circuit breaker, bus bars, etc. on my last project.  Makes it fun to plan when the end product works so well.

I'll run the Proline for a summer and get used to it while I read up on different options.  Then I'll draw up a wiring diagram next fall, run it by my EE buddy and then start buying parts.

Tinkering with the idea of a 1kw generator and shore power inlet.  Relocating the batteries and switching to AGMs.  New battery switch and charging relay.  Thru-hull transducer.  Spotlight and/or bow lights.  Washdown pump and portable livewell.  Relocate and/or secure the trim tab pump.  Water tight downrigger power outlets. 

I need a summer behind the helm and jigging lakers before I play around too much

 

[231CALIFORNIA]

you may be able to get a premade harness from engine to helm/controls /instruments etc. even if its from another mfr ,and just do connecting  and  then  redo accessories yourself(pumps,blower,tabs,wiper,lights,12 outlets,batteries and charging  etc etc)
or are you leaving engine harness alone?

not rocket science , maybe get a diagram already done on a similar boat and save some thinking  and jsut copy it.
being an engineer you will have no trouble but get the chipmunks another home or maybe  harness them to run the  downrigger in a little hamster wheel with gears
just drop a nut into the up or down slot and you wont need any wiring for those
 there are so many nice products avail today you will be able to do a better job than was reasonably ossible in 1987.
keep us up to date on you adventure Hugh

[Hugh]

Engine wiring appears to be working-both at the engine and in the cockpit.  As expected it's all weather worn, and it hurts the eyes to look behind the dash.  

Each switch, wire, relay and alarm will be chased down and inspected.  If it turns out the harness or substantial portions of it are of questionable longevity, I'll try to hunt down a new harness.  

Electrically, engine tilt, injector oil level, RPM, and the starting circuit are all that appear to be active on this outboard.  I will chew through the manual and look more carefully at the dash as the days go by.

As I buy new boat candy and discover more hilarity or decrepitude I'll post it up

BTW, this is a sampling of the stuff I used on my other project:

http://bluesea.com/category/9/35/productline/184

http://bluesea.com/category/3/10/productline/overview/174

http://bluesea.com/category/5/21/productline/126

http://bluesea.com/category/5/20/productline/121

http://www.jamestowndistributors.com/userportal/show_product.do?pid=8213&familyName=Ritchie+Explorer+Compasses#

http://www.sherco-auto.com/krimpaseal.htm#krimpa

I used a Brundy crimper to make up my battery cable connections.  

Perko nav and anchor lights.

I've found that regular heat shrink tubing isn't water tight unless you dab some silicone caulk at either end of the tubing before shrinking it down.  I'd like to find some heat shrink tubing that has the goo in it like the heat shrink marine grade connnectors I use.  BTW, I don't use a torch on the heat shrink...I use a heat gun.  Much easier to use and less likely to fry the shrink

Occasionally I still seal up wiring with tape, especially on chipmunk-chewed trailer wire or on spliced, multiconductor cables.  However, I go wild on it.  A Brundy copper crimp or marine butt connector followed by the 2 layers of 3M putty tape, 2 layers of 3M C130 and two layers of 3M 88.  It looks like a dog turd when I'm done with it, but has yet to fail.

[a7ewizard]

"Liquid Tape" smeared over standard splice connectors or into twist on connectors works pretty well when the marine style are not handy.

[231CALIFORNIA]

IF I ever upgrade my git er done wiring, I will remember that, i have used the liquid seal also, but i have a mixture of soldered,crimped,twistntape, plugs,sealed rubber plugs, tube fuse,ato,circuit breaker etc.
I have a few items doubled on buss bar right now and want to ad another one.

[seabob4]

231,
Add a second Buss, with a 10GA jumper from the original to energize it.

[ppaulg]

Hi Hugh, just purchased a 91 210 W/A and starting to sort out the wiring mess behind the dash. Any help would be appreciated. Gauges and nav lights are not working. Also finding clipped wires that may be from removed electronics and transducers.
Thanks, Paul G

[Hugh]

Hi Paul:

First of all...congrats!  The Proline has great lines.  Damned nice vessel, and a heck of a platform.  I call the w/a cuddy the "SUV" of boats.  It isn't a go-fast boat at 40mph, it isn't a ski boat, and it isn't a center console or a cabin cruiser.  It is the perfect morphing of all those forms into a vessel that doesn't compromise any of those tasks so much as to disqualify it in any of them-except for the go fast part .  Certainly its greatest strength is in fishing and seakeeping.

Some general rules I follow on wiring, in no particular order:

1. Every circuit is individually fused.  Each circuit is labeled (either on the wire or if I'm lazy, on the one-line I draw up and keep).  Try to figure out what the current draw will be for the device, and wire it and fuse it accordingly.  My wiring is always oversized for the load, but my fuse is sized as close as reasonable to the expected current draw.  Again, try to get the current draws-from the literature, google or the manufacturer.  

2. Main disconnect, to me, means main disconnect.  When I shut the power off to the boat, I want it dead.  No surprises from still energized hotel loads (interior lights, etc.).  The only exceptions I make for this (i.e., always hot) are the bilge pumps.  My bilge pumps won't have 3 position switches "On, Off, Auto", only On and Auto or no switch at all, just a float which I can get to and test.  If I want the bilges off, I pull a fuse.

I was in the cuddy last night (my son insisted on sleeping in the boat, despite being parked in the driveway and it dropping to near freezing  ) and noticed the cuddy light came on with the main switched off.  I'm sure some folks think this is OK...but it's not the way I wire things.

3. Certain things don't get switches-just fuses; bilge pumps and cigarette lighter outlets being two of them.  Everything else gets a switch, including little stuff like the compass light.  This allows me to run completely blacked out up river at night when I'm practicing my stealthy ninja beach landings

4. Protect your battery(s).  I count up the max current draw with all loads switched on, add 20% for future load growth, then plop a circuit breaker in on the positive battery lead before the main disconnect.  This excercise also helps me size my main battery conductors.

5. Consider drawing a wiring diagram before you begin.  I find this important, so I don't get mixed up as I go.  It also forces me to think about the correct size of everything, before I go out and drop a bunch of cash.  

6. I like to use a seperate positive and negative bus.  I don't like the combined panels I've seen, as they are too difficult to wire, and place the (+) and (-) too close together.

7. I really like the pricey marine grade goo connectors for everything.  The ones you hit with a heat gun and they shrink and flow goo out the ends to seal the capillary gap that usually exists between heat shrink and wiring insulation.

8. I like waterproof stranded copper wiring.  THHN or whatever the electric supply store tells you can sit in a bilge and be OK (I don't worry about gasoline resistance).  If running multiple conductors, I will use corrugated plastic wire armor like you see under car hoods, or I'll buy a multiconductor wire already armored.  Rarely do I run anything smaller than 10ga wire, no matter how small the load.

I don' worry too much about mixing cylinder and spade fuses.  For instance, the BlueSea switch panel I got had 6 switches and 6 cylinder fuses.  The positive bus had spade fuse slots.  In both cases, I had spare fuse slots that I filled with extra fuses for backup.

If you can collar the previous owners, it might be helpful to ask them what some of the funky wiring is or used to be.  

It would be good to get a pdf wiring diagram from Bob for a current vessel  and to hear some of his philosophy on what is wired how, and why.  He probably has a bunch of rules of thumb he uses, and certain hard and fast rules he won't violate.  My rules are based on a mix of experiences, none of which are derived from a long history of working boats.

When I get around to rewiring my boat I'll post up the wiring diagram.  If I get ambitious, I'll scan and post the teeny weeny wiring job I did on my 14 footer that served as part of the learning curve for the Proline rewire that is yet to come

[ppaulg]

Thanks Hugh, Great info!
I am planning to start a wiring schematic and will make available to compare notes.
Thanks again, Paul G

[Hugh]

Paul,

As I was surfing, I came upon some wiring trivia...if anyone, esp Bob, has info that supercedes this stuff, please chime in.

Federal Regs:

http://www.pkys.com/Reference.htm

NOTE: at the bottom of that page is a free wire sizing program.

Boat Wiring Color Codes:

http://www.brokeboats.com/biacolors.html

http://www.ftkltd.com/Boat%20Wiring%20and%20Color%20Codes.htm

http://www.marinco.com/page/marinecolorcodes

http://easyacdc.com/?page_id=54

http://continuouswave.com/whaler/reference/wireColorCode.html

It does make troubleshooting a LOT easier if you have a uniquely colored wires in a bundle.

Marine Grade Wire vs. SAE Wire:

http://www.cncphotoalbum.com/doityourself/wiring/wiring.htm

Sizing Your Wire:

http://www.marine-electronics-reviews.com/boat-wire.html#

Boat Wiring Diagrams, Generic:

Boating Magazine's Powerboater's Guide to Electrical Systems by Ed Sherman
Boatowner's Illustrated Handbook of Wiring, by Charlie Wing
Your Boat's Electrical System, by Conrad Miller and E. S. Maloney
Boatowner's Mechanical and Electrical Manual, by Nigel Calder
The 12 Volt Bible, by Miner K Brotherton and Ed Sherman

American Boat and Yacht Council at www.abycinc.org may have these books if not elsewhere online.

Some Good Practices:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BQK/is_4_4/ai_61555366/

http://www.floridasportsman.com/HowTo/051068/

http://books.google.com/books?id=d1KVXPUczvQC&pg=PT29&lpg=PT29&dq=boat+wiring+color+codes&source=bl&ots=eihbPH02xq&sig=O4KiFBNqEEKHzwlH5ui56GOhZyc&hl=en&ei=o4_fSrSFII7UlAeb3aSoAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CBIQ6AEwATgU#v=onepage&q=boat%20wiring%20color%20codes&f=false

I just ordered the book above.  Amazon has them for less than $20 shipped.  As I dig around some more, I'll post it up here.

Hey Bob...would it be worthwhile to start an Electrical 'sticky' over in the Tech section?






 

[seabob4]

Hugh,
I'll be honest with you.  From what you have compiled and posted here, you have an amazing amount of time on your hands, as it takes a great deal of it to research all the posts/sites/recommendations, sort and sift through them all, and find what is the real deal as opposed to what is some one's opinion.  My hat's off to you.

We follow ABYC wiring guidelines (ABYC Section E-11, AC and DC Electrical Systems) in all aspects.  Wire/cable size, color differentation, amp draws and voltage drops, routing in respect to hard and flexible fuel lines, proximity to sources of power, etc.  I have spent many an hour poring over my ABYC manual to determine what we are doing, or want to do, will meet the specs.  Have also spent 2 enjoyable ( ) in Nashville at the NMMA conference listening to NMMA certifiers explain just what it is we are reading, which is about as exciting as watching the grass grow!

I have a Pro-Line 183 Flats at the house right now that I am doing a complete rewire on.  She will get all properly sized and colored wires/cables.  Can't say if any of his DC appliances will work or not after shes rewired.  I don't think the owner knows that corrosion wicks it's way up BOTH ways!

Keep up the good work.  This seems like your labor of love.  I look forward to hearing more from you...

Bob C

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