Another Voltage Question 2003 SANTE

[meangreen79]

I have a new to me 2003 SANTE, Excalibur 330 with dual batteries and perko switch. The boat has the replacement Faria gauge kit already installed with stargazer PP. In going through the boat over the last three weeks I’ve noticed a discrepancy in the battery voltage at the batteries and the battery gauge in the dash. It also seems really slow to start with a lot of laboring. Each battery has 12.6 volts, there is 12.6 volts at the starter, 12.6 volts at the small relay/solenoid atop the engine. The battery gauge; however, is only reading 10-11. Testing with multi-meter shows that I’m only getting 11.11 volts at the battery gauge. Unfortunately I have not had a chance to test it while running to see if the alternator is charging, I did check out the alternator today and it looks new like it was just replaced(I don’t recall seeing a significant change in voltage reading while in use). We boated all day one day so I would imagine the batteries would have died if they were not charging, especially after running the stock ballast pumps a lot. I also noticed the that the keypad switches were acting up and not functioning correctly after a lengthy ballast pump out attempt at idle, it actually would start filling the bags again before completely emptying them and not let me turn them or the boat off with the keypad, I had to turn off the main power switch to kill the boat and stop the pumps from filling the bags again. That’s when it really didn’t want to start back up, was clicking like the battery was dead. I let it sit for just a few seconds and it fired back up and pumped out the bags like it should. It seems like the drop in voltage at the dash is causing the switches to act up. Any ideas as to where I should look next to find this voltage loss? I have a power probe also. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I’m really not familiar with these boats yet and where everything is. I hope this makes some kind of sense. Thank you.

[Stevemo14]

Someone just wrote a thread about this. I think you need to run new power, or power / ground wires to the dash. I can't find it, but I'm sure someone knows where it is.

[meangreen79]

On the advice of another member and in another thread. I power probed the circuit breaker box and found it to have sufficient power and ground. Looks like PO may have already upgraded wire size from battery to three way switch and then onto the breaker box. Just for added security I went ahead and ran new power and ground to the box and nothing changed, well I blew the perfect pass fuse and now its acting crazy when I replace it but I will look into that another day. For now perfect pass disabled. I am still only catching a constantly fluctuating 11 volts at the battery meter from the purple ignition wire where it comes out of the new 25' harness supplied with the replacement faria gauges. This 25' harness runs all the way to the stern where it is then connected to the former Gateway connections. By the time I dialed it back to that wire, I had to get in to work so I will have to check it out tomorrow. I am not familiar with the ignition module but could this be tied into that? There are some ground wires on the port side of engine that are covered in rust although they did probe out to be sufficient grounds. I will clean those up as well. One thing I noticed is that the purple wire in the old 12 pin connector has sufficient and steady power matching that of the battery and in the diagram for the new gauge installation it says that is the ignition wire to supply the gauges. I just didn't see any connection behind the dash of the OG purple wire and the new one inside the 25' harness. Oh well, back at it tomorrow I hope. My wife is ready to kill me. I have 20+ hours into this boat and it was supposed to be turn key. I have enough projects lol.

[meangreen79]

I had just detailed the boat too. Thank goodness for Miller Lites

[Speedy]

I’m sorry you’re having all that trouble with your electrical system, with that said I am more experience with automotive systems and if I think of it as a car, I would start at the battery. You mentioned you only had 10 to 11 V at the battery and to tell you the truth 10 to 11 V is just not enough. You should have at least 12.6 V at the battery, you should charge the battery or replace the battery then re-check that the alternator is properly charging the system at least between 13.5 v and 14.5 v. You’ll be surprised how many problems a bad batteries will cause.
The other thing I would do is check the Perko switch to make sure the 10 or 11 V you are reading is from the cranking bank. The The cranking bank should always have at least 12.6 V which is what you need in order to start the engine. The 10 or 11 volts that you’re reading could be from the house bank and it could just be that you were running music or different accessories on the house bank and you drain the battery down to 10 or 11 V and when you tried to start the boat, you were trying to start the boat with the house bank instead of the cranking bank.
Sorry for the lengthy response, I just wanted to give you a little bit of help


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[meangreen79]

It was 12.6 at both batteries and I never figured it out. I ran all new wires of the gauge recommended to the fuse box and still had lower volts at dash. Next week I am bypassing the dual battery switch and seeing what that does, after belts, plugs and impeller of course lol.

[meangreen79]

And thank you very much for your reply.

[MLA]

No need to bypass the switch for testing, use that meter. Its the absolute best too for the job and will eliminate ALL speculation and guessing. Voltage drops are easy to detect, just a mater of metering all the points of termination on both the B+ and B-.

Id test the helm BUS supply breaker on both sides.

[meangreen79]

Dual battery switch tested fine. Helm breaker box has 12.6 (ran 8ga +/- from battery for assurance). Will probe each circuit in the harness after the breaker box as well. I didn't see a place to test at the breaker, it was a circuit board. Battery voltage 14.5 while running and dash shows 12.5. Perfect Pass still unplugged until I resolve issue. I have all new relays to install as well as the low pressure fuel pump does not always prime(I actually found a bad connection there so may not need relays but certainly going to put them in anyways). Weird things are happening also assumingly from the low voltage, sometimes the starter, blower or other accessories will not stop with the keypad. I have to disconnect the battery. I will find it eventually.

[gdhall]

Did you ever find the source of the voltage drops????