FYI: Circuit Breaker - Power Distribution Bar power fault

[evainch]

Ladies/Gentleman,

I figured I would share a hard lesson learned in case anyone else was trying to figure out a power failure issue. The symptoms appear to be a short in the circuit breaker panel. You will get power loss to part or all of your electrical systems including dash switches. At first I was tracing the batteries and switches as nearly my entire electrical system failed. You may even go through a cycle of power loss and gain, with bouncing waves while on the water or just fiddling near circuit breaker panel under throttle control.

What I found is removing the circuit breaker panel reveals a brass strip that links all fuses to main power line. This brass has the potential to corrode and insulate between the breaker and power, causing intermittent power loss. Amazingly the last item on the circuit is the Ignition/Horn breaker, the first is Power Seat by Malibu design. So if the bar was to degrade or break ofcourse you would almost always loose the ignition and your gages. Whereas some of the other items may or may not work intermittently.

In my specific case, the bar broke during disassembly (due to corrosion weakness) in which I was planning on sanding the surface to fix the connection.

I figured this out with a friend on the water. We kept convincing ourselves at first that when you push and hold the breaker reset (Power Seat sometimes or otherwise Heater) the boat would run. So it was being driven with one hand on the breaker and other on wheel. Mind you I have no Power Seat on the boat (and later learned there is also no output line connected to that breaker so it was simply a placebo effect). It was simply the pressure being applied at that spot would push on the brass distribution bar enough to make contact better.

The fix while on the water due to my cracked strip in my specific case was some wire to jump the broken points.

I plan on remaking my strip out of Stainless Steel to address my issue permanently. With also some liberal dielectric grease.

So if anyone is going mad trying to figure out why are you getting total electrical system failure and everything else looks good, check behind the fuze breaker panel.

[Bobby Light]

If your 08 is corroded that bad I suspect you have other issues as well. Why not just let the dealer fix it under warranty?

[evainch]

Appreciate the suggestion, but looking at the design I think I can do better. Already have a Stainless Steel Bar Stock on order from Grainger. Went a little overboard with 1/4 inch thickness, so bending ends will be a little tougher. Also plan on coating everything with dielectric grease.

This will give me confidence for the lifetime of the boat, whereas another brass part will not.

I have found too many areas in the electrical design where continuing with Malibu approach just means revisiting issue again (too many short wires that are hard to reach and splices for my taste, though I am a Mechanical Engineer).