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Does your boat have a 12" touchscreen, G3.2 tower, and tower lights?


mikeo

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Does your boat have a 12" touchscreen, G3.2 tower, and tower lights? If so, I need your help please! The g4 tower wiring will be very similar for what I'm looking for, but I'm looking for an exact match.

I'm trying to add tower lights to my '15 23 LSV with G3.2 tower and I can't figure out where the relay "trigger" wires are to integrate with the 12" touchscreen. I've turned on the "outputs" in the 7" display (MTC) and traced most of the wires under the dash, but I can't figure out where the wire(s) are to turn on the lights.

Malibu sells a "secondary" wiring harness that goes from the fuse panel, to the tower, and up the tower to the lights; This wiring harness contains two relays and the high-amp leads come from the fuse panel in to the relay and then to the tower, there is a ground lead, and there is a "trigger" lead. I can't figure out what/where the trigger lead is. In '14 and earlier boats the tower light triggers were white with black stripe wires in the looming behind the blue box as detailed in the install guide here:

http://bakesonline.com/images/MediaLibrary/AlphaInstall.pdf

see image #3 on page #6

If you're in NorCal and will let me look under the dash of your boat I'll buy you a 12 pack of whatever you're drinking...

If you're further away, a picture is worth a thousand words, and I'll try to figure out how to send you a frosty beverage or two...

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Well, I managed to peek under the dash of another boat and know what wire(s) are supposed to be the relay triggers. Now the problem is that I checked those wires and didn't get a voltage reading last night, but I may have had an issue with my meter. I'll check again as soon as it cools down so I can work under the dash. If I can identify the trigger leads then it's an easy process to add any after market lights to the tower. I'll provide another update if I'm able to isolate the trigger and the correct voltage.

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The tower light wires are under the dash the are white and white/black the should have empty bullet connectors on the end of them they control ground the are designed to be used with relays to control the lights you connect them to the ground side of the relay to tigger it

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I agree with you on the wire color and they're obvious on the '14 and older boats with the blue box. On the '15 with the black box the wires appear to come from the 12" display (I haven't traced where they really come from yet). I found out that the the 6 conductor plug marked "RELAY" contains the correct wires on connections #3 & #4, but as stated previously when I put a meter on the wires and turned the pushbutton on/off I didn't get a change in the reading. After a small investment with my local dealer I have the official Malibu wiring harness and it's as simple as I thought it was; when I connect it the relays click so I know it's working. I'm still baffled by the low/no voltage showing up on my meter, but the relays work so I can't complain. In looking at the harness the most difficult part to source is the proper wire connector to go in the RELAY plug. I already happened to have the correct plug in hand since I've managed to override the computer and turn on the circuit for the front ballast pumps.

With how simple the circuit is and how inexpensive the parts are it's odd that Malibu didn't just include the relay "harness" as a default part of the boat build.

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Like kdavis said, the control outputs are open collector, which means that the signal is either an open circuit or ground. To test them, put the red lead of your meter on a known good 12v source, and the black lead on the desired output. With the switch off, you should read very low but possibly floating voltage, but when you turn it on, you should see the 12 volts.

In other words, the switch output is a connection to ground, not 12v. You connect your stuff (e.g. a relay) to 12v, the switch completes the circuit to ground for you.

Why the relay? Because the transistor (the electric switch) doing the grounding cannot pass much current at all. It can pull the relay in, and the relay does the heavy hitting.

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