Horn button on starboard side control pad activates bilge lights!

Gunn

Well-Known Member
TECHNICAL Contributor
Oct 4, 2006
2,335
Potomac River - MD
Boat Info
2003 280DA and 1995 Sea Ray 175
Engines
Twin 4.3l and 3.0l, all w/ AlphaI GenII drives
I'm having an odd issue with my multi-button helm control pads lately on the boat. I'm not sure if there is a short in it or not. (what is the official term for these pads?)

On the starboard pad, now when I press the horn button, all that happens is my bilge lights go on! The little green light on the bilge lights button on the control pad will also light up. Pressing it again will extinguish the bilge lights and green light. Pressing the bilge lights button will do the same. So it's like both of these buttons are linked together, doing the same thing. No horn. What could this mean? Is it a short in the control pad?

Also, my windlass down button on this same control pad no longer works. The windlass on/off and up buttons work fine. The windlass works fine both up and down using the foot switches at the bow. I have a brand new windlass motor...replaced in 2013. Gotta be the switch.

On the port side, my bilge blower green light no longer activates (though the switch works fine) and I may have trim tab button issues (port side bow down may not work). But that needs further troubleshooting and is a topic for another post in the future...


Any thoughts?
 
Last edited:
Sounds like your Starboard EIM may be shot. Could also be the Keypad. It can be hard to troubleshoot these without a spare keypad to use for testing to eliminate that as the problem. The EIM wiring diagram in the owners manual will tell you what accessories go back to which EIM. If all the accessories you are having trouble with map back to the same EIM (regardless of what keypad), the EIM is probably bad. Unfortunately these are pricy but the good news is I believe they are orderable again as they were discontinued at one point in time. Bad news is you can only order through Sea Ray since the manufacturer, Digital Switching Systems will not sell it direct (at least every time someone here has contacted them and posted about it).
 
Last edited:
Take care ! Starboard and port EIM talk together..... So a faulty starboard EIM can cause problems on the port EIM.......don't ask why I know that ;-)

for me, the solution was 2 new EIM.... The pads were OK.
 

Forum statistics

Threads
112,950
Messages
1,422,861
Members
60,932
Latest member
juliediane
Back
Top