wrote in message
...
On Mon, 25 May 2009 19:31:59 -0600, "SteveB"
wrote:
I am about to rewire my Lund. A simple thing, with only a few circuits.
Some wires need to be deleted, others replaced, and some I'm not sure. I
was wondering if it is advisable to just put a knife switch on the hot.
Right now, I have the screw on battery terminals, and it's just another
step
before launch. The wiring is generally half birdsnest and half done
right.
Is a knife switch a good thing? Should I put a mondo fuse in line, too?
Just in case.
Steve
If you can really keep it dry, use a breaker panel but if it is going
to be damp and maintenance is a sometimes thing a good brass fuse
block may be a better choice. It is something you can fix on the
water. Use a good silicone grease on everything (Dow/Corning 111 works
for me).
I have all the wiring on my boat in RNC (the gray plastic conduit)
terminating in a 3R electrical box under the console or up into the
control part of the console.
The 3R box has a good cover so I went with breakers
The places where conduit was impractical to fish I used ENT (Smurf
tube).
19 years of salt water later my wiring is still doing fine.
I avoided any splices that were not right at the termination points.
All wires home run to the box under the console or where they go in
the console.
Try to color coordinate which wires go to what so it is easy to fix
later.
My green light is in green wire, red for red, white for white etc. I
maintain the Merc color code for gauges. (tan is water temp, gray is
tach etc) Black is always ground.
http://gfretwell.com/electrical/merc%20color%20code.pdf
The place I differ is orange is +12v and the only red other than the
red light is the battery cable and that is easy to differentiate.
Doing a system like this makes sorting the mess out behind the console
panel pretty easy, I could tywrap the stuff up into a neat cable but
that can sometimes actually make it harder to work on.
I
I feel like I live on another planet. Our climate here is such that
corrosion and a lot of factors are not applicable. Yes, I know it is good
to have everything fused. My question was the ease at which the whole
system can be turned off versus the now thing of clamping three terminals on
a battery lug with a wing nut.
Steve