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Joe Joe is offline
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First recorded activity by BoatBanter: Jul 2006
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Default Stray current (voltage leak) problem on steel boat.

On May 20, 1:39 pm, Chuck wrote:
Joe wrote:

Again, here in this marina the average voltage in the water is .5
volts DC.
If your marina is of any age the discarded metal in the water can
create stray voltage.


Joe


Hi Joe,

Nick is measuring a voltage between his
hull and his negative wiring, with the
battery and AC power disconnected! It is
hard to attribute that to the water.
That's like measuring a voltage between
the water and the air.

Chuck

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That is weird, has to have a short to ground somewhere then.

Where do you think it is coming from?

His engine is grounded to the hull, he can claim it is not all he
wants to. Even if he has a flex joint in his shaft he has a steel
exhaust, which carries water through the flex joints and retains
enough moisture to cause a flow of electrons.

And IMO his engine should be grounded to the hull.

My guess is it's in the water, and at .6 V DC it not an issue, it's
normal.

Nick should measure a few slips in is marina. I had a big crewboat
here that had a rat's nest of wires so the owner of the crewboat & I
mapped the voltage in the whole marina. I wanted to make sure he was
not going to cause problems as he restored the boat.

On average it was .5 volts DC. We mapped the area and watched it over
time to see if anything changed, we cut the power to this side of the
marina completely and still had the voltage.

Joe