Marine wire connections

[kerrye]

Since I am relatively ignorant on this topic I found the tutorial useful.

https://marinehowto.com/marine-wire-termination/

[WillieC]

Yes. Read everything in Marine-How-To.

[DesertAlbin736]

I use a Sears Craftsman version of the "Ideal Stripmaster". Works great. Good tutorial, thanks for posting. I am somewhat guilty of not using heat shrink terminals on my 12V distribution panel terminal blocks. However, they are in a protected environment on the back wall of the head compartment. Top "before" picture shows the shore power wiring as it was at right, scary stuff, just a simple plug fuse & open connections.

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That shore power mess replaced with this, including a galvanic isolator in the AC green wire safety ground circuit.

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However, I did shrink wrap the terminals on the SI-ACR relay cables as well as all other butt connections. These cables cross connect the house & start batteries for charging when the ACR senses alternator charging voltage when the engine is running and isolates the house bank from the start battery when the engine is off. This picture is with the covers off.

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[Beta Don]

I've always boated on salt water and I've rewired dozens of old boats and many times found crimped connectors with the raw end of the copper wire in the crimp corroded badly enough that it caused high resistance connections - True, many of these boats were 30 or 40 years old and primarily used on salt water. Many older boats were wired with untinned copper and not marine grade wire from the factory

Because of this, I always crimp first and then solder. I don't overheat the connection and never have the solder wicking up the wire beyond the crimp, so there's no "it causes the wire to become solid and easier to break" - I just heat it up enough to flow enough solder to cover the exposed end of the raw wire and solder it to the tinned crimp

I always thought this was why quality crimps were tinned and not left raw copper - If a raw copper crimp isn't good, neither is raw copper wire in the end of your crimp, IMO. I've worked in the electronics field for 50 years and I know how to make a good solder connection - The Air Force sent me to 'soldering school' in my younger days

Personal choice - And hotly debated in some circles as the article mentioned, but for me, nothing beats a properly soldered connection

Don