Autopilot ST4000...

[wazza]

Right I've been on this job a while, my autopilot has no power out from the unit to the actual wheel. There is power coming into the unit but I traced the problem to unit and there seems to be no power from where it says 'drive'.. are you with me??
Has anyone had a similar problem?

 

[Talulah]

My opinion "Dead unit". But I don't have much experience with these.

 

[wazza]

Yes, I was guessing the same..
I don't particularly fancy buying a new one (12000 SEK) and there seems to be nowhere to get them fixed.

 

[BabaYaga]

This company does service on Raymarine equipment:
http://www.ramantenn.se/Serv.htm

 

[wazza]

Tack... I'll try them and the bonus is they are in Gothenburg...

Incidentally I did, as I say, follow the fault all the way to the unit itself and then opened the unit...nothing to play with, no wires or nothing, just a circuit board, how boring was that..????

 

[whiteoaks7]

Point 1: I had a misbehaving one of these some years ago. I took the back off it and found it had leaked water which had corroded the printed circuit tracks. It was easy to see where the tracks led so I ran a wire to replace the tracks and all was well again. Begs the question: why should it leak?

Point 2 - my first boat also had an autohelm problem which I decided to involve raymarine with. They wanted both the motor and head unit returned to them and charged me separately for testing each (not insignificant money but I can't remember how much). They then passed the head as ok and proceeded to repair the motor - a case of taking the gearbox off and lubricating it I think (long time ago). Point is they wanted me (and will presumably want you) to shell out for every step of the way.

You have a quandry - take it apart and risk them refusing to fix it (will they ?) or pay money hand over fist.

Let us know,

David Berry

 

[wazza]

Thanks David for your valid points..
I have taken the back off the head unit (where the buttons are) and there seems to be no type of leakage there as all the nice silvery circuit board is still that..shiney..
And also I ran a (basic) multi-meter and found no power going out of the unit to the drive.. like I said earlier there were no wires to play with, just a soldered circuit board. So I was thinking, a bit out of my league!