TE 31 DC Power

[kowal_53]

I have had a strange failure of DC power recently. The first time all of my main ship DC went off. Then about a few minutes later it came back. This weekend I was pumping the water tank for winterization, and it went out again. I came back a bit later it was on again. So I was able to pump the tank dry. The TE 31 has a ship/generator/engine battery selector. The engine part did stay on when the main ship was out.

So it seems that could be the main DC breaker, or the power selector, unless there is some other breaker in the system. I plan to take my meter down so when it happens a gain I can try to narrow it down a bit. (The breaker did not indicate that it had tripped)

[catalina_mike]

I have ordered a new battery selector switch as I was having intermittent issues. Upon inspection the main terminal shows signs of a weak connection. (discoloration)

[Steam Flyer]

Are the batteries connected using the stud-to-post connectors? Our 2000 model 31TE has about 4 cables connected to each battery post using these, and in the process of replacing batteries the threaded stud came apart. They had probably overheated due to poor connection.

Doug K 'Sugar Magnolia'

[kowal_53]

I finally tracked this down. Apparently in the 31 all of the grounds from the batteries come to a single ground bar. Then a single cable goes from there to a secondary ground bar above it. The screw on the cable between the two was loose. I am going to change that so I have a better connection, because the screw was way to small, subject to motion so it backed out a bit.