Instrument wiring

[aquaholic]

Planning to re wire the instruments at the binnacle as it looks like spaghetti junction at the moment !
I have depth, wind, speed, auto helm and chart plotter displays, I have bought a blue sea dual pole busbar with cover that I am planning to fit and take the feed from one main supply from the fuse board which is labelled 'central navigation'. The plan was for each one to have its own in line fuse but I am wondering whether I should use more than one feed and have 1 or more instruments with their own dedicated feeds from the fuse board?

 

[martinball]

Don't forget a fuse is there to protect the wiring, not the devices on the end.
I would also use at least two feeds, if on device developed a fault that took the fuse out you would loose all the instruments. Think about what you would do then to get the other instruments working. I have priority instruments, depth in my case, that are fed separately.

Martin

 

[rob2]

A lot depends on the instruments being fitted. For example, if they are Raymarine only one power supply is need, which is chained around the instruments along with their Seatalk connections.

Rob.

 

[Sandyman]

Ideally each instrument should have its own dedicated fuse. Then if you get a fault with one instrument you don't lose the lot. If on a single fuse & it keeps blowing how would you know what instrument was at fault if you cant apply a voltage to check it ?

That's the way I would do it anyway.

 

[aquaholic]

I planned on fitting an inline fuse to each instrument between the busbar and the instruments themselves, and maybe a dedicated feed for the chart plotter

 

[nigelmercier]

I planned on fitting an inline fuse to each instrument between the busbar and the instruments themselves, and maybe a dedicated feed for the chart plotter

Just a heads-up that Standard Horizon chart-plotters need a fuse in the negative leg.

 

[V1701]

Just a heads-up that Standard Horizon chart-plotters need a fuse in the negative leg.

Why's that Nigel? Does that mean just in the negative or should there be a fuse in both?

 

[nigelmercier]

Why's that Nigel? Does that mean just in the negative or should there be a fuse in both?

It's what it says in the manual, see attached...