toasted some wires.

C

capt. meares

New member
Replaced two older looking wires today that were connected to the cigarette lighter socket. When i finished and connected the battery back up, the entire cabin filled with smoke. I quickly disconnected the battery. These same two wires were completely burnt, all the insulation gone. I removed them and cleaned up the mess.

Questions...

1. I can live without this outlet. If i never rewire it again, is there any more damage this could have caused?

2. What did i do wrong?

3. If i replace all the other wires that were slightly melted because they were touching these two, should i be out of the woods ?
 
Sounds to me like a dead short at the outlet unless you were using the outlet at the time of the toast. I would replace the outlet and wires, using at least AWG 12 wires, as well as replacing any other damaged wiring.
 
Probably not much further damage but certainly a likelihood of future damage if the wires burnt without blowing a fuse. You definitely want to check the rating of the fuse in the circuit to make sure it is low enough to protect the wiring.
 
capt. meares":ltw5oj0j said:
Yes, the outlet is very old and wiggly.... everything seems good now. Any chance of further damage?
Click to expand...

I would definitely replace the outlet, its much cheaper that replacing your burned up boat!
 
It sounds like there was no fuse and a short in the cig lighter plug, or elsewhere along the line.

There should be no more than 3 wires coming off the battery: Engine start cable, a cable, which has a 40 amp fuse or breaker , within 7" of the battery, which goes to a small bus bar, and an auto bilge pump wire.

There should be a #10 wire going to the console--not specifically to the cig. lighter plug. There should be a fuse box, and bus bar where this #10 from the breaker/fuse by the battery terminates. This should be a new wire. You should re-assess each circuit under the console. They should all come off a fuse from the fuse block/breakers under the console. The cig lighter accessary is only one of the wires off the fuse block-9-it should have no more than a 10 amp breaker.

The wiring is close to 30 years old, and should be replaced with tinned AWG marine rated wire. I like those in a sheath for two wires.
Unless someone beats me to it, i'll put up the product numbers of the switch, breaker, fuse box etc, a little later today.

Until you have assessed the condition of all wiring, don't do any more electrical work....
 
You probably want to follow all the way along the burnt wires to make sure there are not other wires (or other stuff) next to them that "felt" the heat. And I agree with some of the other comments about likely no fuse in line if it burnt the wires rather than blowing the fuse. Everything should be fused near the source of power.
 
Thank you attaway and friends for covering everything thoroughly. As fate would have it, there was indeed no fuse. Im not very happy about it, but many lessons have been learned. All other wiring looks professional and new. This outlet looked 30yrs old and mickey moused, the reason which led to replaceig it in the first place. I have systematically inspected and replaced anything that looked like it felt the heat.all seems good. Thanks again!
 
This is kind of scary to me. If it was mine, I would torque down all connections to the bus(es), and trace EVERY circuit to ensure that they're properly fused. If you're not absolutely certain of what you're doing, I'd call in help
 
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