jeremyandalison
New Member
- Apr 20, 2009
- 71
- Boat Info
- 300 Sundancer 2006 (2009 to present)
260 Sundancer 2003 (2009 to 2009)
- Engines
- 5.0L Mercruiser/BIII
Hey Everyone,
I haven't been here in while but I am truly mystified. I have an 06 300DA that has been giving me some problems with a spontaneously draining starboard battery bank (two group 27s wired in parallel).
I won't trouble you with the entire history, but finally I spent the day on the boat with a multimeter trying to track down anything that could be drawing these batteries down. Here are a few bullets:
1. Disconnected negative terminals on both port and starboard banks and hooked up ammeter to see what the draw was on both sides with everything I could turn off, off. Port was about 0.07A while starboard was about 0.6A. This seemed to high to me considering I had every breaker off that I could easily turn off.
2. I started flipping breakers off in the main DC panel in the cockpit (the ones with the guards on them to prevent you from turning them off). The draw on the starboard side all but stopped, going down to 0.03A when I shut off the breaker to the forward EIM.
3. Turned the breaker for the forward EIM back on and I went to the forward EIM and started pulling breakers from it. The draw once again dropped down to near nothing when I pulled the breaker for the 12V receptacles.
4. Long story short, I put the breaker back in and started tracking down items on the 12V receptacle circuit. Turns out, when I disconnected the built in KEC DVD player that came from the factory. The draw dropped back to nothing. I should note it would appear the DVD player was drawing about 0.5A when turned off.
5. Out of interest, I have another of the same DVD player in the mid berth which is wired to the port bank so I pulled it out and hooked it up in place of the one that was seemingly drawing 0.5A. It also was drawing 0.5A when turned fully off.
6. Put the mid-berth DVD player back in its home and out of curiosity shut everything off on the port side except the breaker for the mid-berth DVD player. Confirmed it was still drawing about 0.5A when fully off, even in its home location.
The problem as I initially saw it is that 0.5A draw is way too much all the time, especially when the forward DVD player is not on a switch or breaker that I can shut off - unlike the mid-berth DVD which has a breaker in the salon panel. Easy enough fix, I just pulled the inline fuse from the offending DVD player because we don't use it anyway. I also stopped by my local mobile audio concern just to check if a consistent 0.5A draw (when off) is 'normal' for this type of device - the answer was a definite no.
So my problem appears for now to be a solved - forward DVD player is disconnected and my draw on the starboard bank is a manageable (I think) 0.08A. Mid-berth dvd player breaker is off and draw on that bank is about 0.06A.
However, I'm trying to figure out whether it is likely at all that I would have two of the same DVD player that seem to be drawing an inordinate amount of current when turned off and yet still otherwise apparently functioning normally.
Anything I'm missing here? Your feedback would be greatly appreciated. I am baffled.
Thanks in advance!
Jeremy
I haven't been here in while but I am truly mystified. I have an 06 300DA that has been giving me some problems with a spontaneously draining starboard battery bank (two group 27s wired in parallel).
I won't trouble you with the entire history, but finally I spent the day on the boat with a multimeter trying to track down anything that could be drawing these batteries down. Here are a few bullets:
1. Disconnected negative terminals on both port and starboard banks and hooked up ammeter to see what the draw was on both sides with everything I could turn off, off. Port was about 0.07A while starboard was about 0.6A. This seemed to high to me considering I had every breaker off that I could easily turn off.
2. I started flipping breakers off in the main DC panel in the cockpit (the ones with the guards on them to prevent you from turning them off). The draw on the starboard side all but stopped, going down to 0.03A when I shut off the breaker to the forward EIM.
3. Turned the breaker for the forward EIM back on and I went to the forward EIM and started pulling breakers from it. The draw once again dropped down to near nothing when I pulled the breaker for the 12V receptacles.
4. Long story short, I put the breaker back in and started tracking down items on the 12V receptacle circuit. Turns out, when I disconnected the built in KEC DVD player that came from the factory. The draw dropped back to nothing. I should note it would appear the DVD player was drawing about 0.5A when turned off.
5. Out of interest, I have another of the same DVD player in the mid berth which is wired to the port bank so I pulled it out and hooked it up in place of the one that was seemingly drawing 0.5A. It also was drawing 0.5A when turned fully off.
6. Put the mid-berth DVD player back in its home and out of curiosity shut everything off on the port side except the breaker for the mid-berth DVD player. Confirmed it was still drawing about 0.5A when fully off, even in its home location.
The problem as I initially saw it is that 0.5A draw is way too much all the time, especially when the forward DVD player is not on a switch or breaker that I can shut off - unlike the mid-berth DVD which has a breaker in the salon panel. Easy enough fix, I just pulled the inline fuse from the offending DVD player because we don't use it anyway. I also stopped by my local mobile audio concern just to check if a consistent 0.5A draw (when off) is 'normal' for this type of device - the answer was a definite no.
So my problem appears for now to be a solved - forward DVD player is disconnected and my draw on the starboard bank is a manageable (I think) 0.08A. Mid-berth dvd player breaker is off and draw on that bank is about 0.06A.
However, I'm trying to figure out whether it is likely at all that I would have two of the same DVD player that seem to be drawing an inordinate amount of current when turned off and yet still otherwise apparently functioning normally.
Anything I'm missing here? Your feedback would be greatly appreciated. I am baffled.
Thanks in advance!
Jeremy
