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Bertram31.com General Bulletin Board
Electrical Failure nearly sinks Shambala *PIC*
Posted By: JohnV8r
Date: Monday, 2 January 2006, at 6:56 p.m.
So here is what you'll find in this post:
1. The Story
2. Some Questions
3. Two Photos (one on a reply since only one can be posted at a time)
The Story
2005 will not go down in history as one of my favorite years. A slow year for our business, $4.19 per gallon for gas at the Jack London Fuel dock at one point this summer, and then some kind of electrical failure in my DC system that nearly sunk Shambala when the big West Coast storm rolled through on December 30-31 all have added up to a very forgettable 2005 for me.
For those of you who didn't hear about the storm, we normally get 19 inches of rain a year. We got almost 4" of that in less than 48 hours. In the nearly 30 years that I've lived in California, I've never seen it rain as hard as it did on December 30-31. We're now at 300% of normal rainfall for the year and we officially had the second wettest December on record (1955 was the wettest).
I got concerned about the amount of rain hitting my cockpit deck (stock) based on what I was seeing out my window, but I couldn't get down to the marina due to Interstate 80 being closed due to flooding. So I called one of my slip neighbors at the marina and asked him to go and check out Shambala to make sure everything was OK. The picture below shows what he found (the picture was taken AFTER he started pumping her out). What I now know was some kind of short in the wiring that powers both bilge pumps caused the bilge area in the v-berth to fill to the point that the water was just slightly above the main cabin floor and the water was approximately 1/2-3/4" below the bottom of the refrigerator. Because of Shambala's unique and heavy bow pulpit, the low spot in the bilge is actually in the bilge area forward of the bulkhead. At least that is where the last and hardest few inches of bilge water are when I pump out the bilge. My hypothesis is that as the bilge area under the cabin floor begin to fill, the bow actually became heavier. The fact that Shambala's stern looked high in the water when my friend went to check her supports that notion. As the bow got heavier, gravity took over and actually caused the rain water to head forward into the bilge instead of out the cockpit scuppers, thereby compounding the problem. I should note that since December 10th (the last time I was on Shambala until yesterday), we have had more rainy days than dry days. So the water that accumulated in the bilge may well be the culmination of several storms.
The good news is that despite having an unusual amount of water in the bilge, the only critical areas to get wet were my windlass master power switch, my heading sensor for my autopilot, and my freshwater pump. Replacing all three of those items would be less than $1,000 so I doubt I'll be filing any insurance claims that may cause my insurance to be cancelled.
I was finally able to physically get down to Shambala yesterday to check everything out. The culprit was no power to the switches that control my bilge pumps. I'm assuming that Shambala's bilge pump set up is stock, but in the event that I'm wrong about that, I'll describe the way she is wired.
Just above the door that reveals the house style circuit breaker panel are two toggle switches. These toggle switches are three-way toggles that allow for manual pumping, automatic (float switch) pumping, or turning off the bilge pumps. The bilge pumps are actually located in the bilge under the forward cabin floor section and aft near the transom. The switches are both left in the automatic position except for the few moments after each use when I turn the forward bilge pump on to "manual" so I can get as much water out as possible. The way the switches and pumps are wired is as follwws: A reddish orange 8 or perhaps 10 gauge hot wire appears to come out of the main bundle of factory wiring and goes to the back of the forward bilge switch. A jumper wire of the same color and gauge carries the hot current to the other switch. Both switches have wires coming off the automatic or manual side of the toggle that are 1) white with a purple and black stripes and 2) white with a purple stripe.
I made a temporary repair by running a hot wire straight from one of my batteries to the switch on the forward bilge pump. I disabled the bilge pump in the transom area by removing the jumper hot wire because I found a burn mark on it. I will post a picture of the jumper wire with the burn mark on a reply to this post.
The Questions
1. First, is this a stock bilge pump set up and does the wiring color scheme indicate factory wiring?
2. If this is factory wiring where does the reddish orange hot wire originate? Because of time constraints, I could not get into the area behind the electrical panel to see if the hot wire was coming off the panel or coming out of the bundle of wiring that comes into the panel from the starboard side. I'm assuming that because the wire is always hot regardless of the position of the circuit breakers on the panel that it must come directly from a battery or from a terminal block somewhere before the circuit breaker.
3. Is the burn mark on the wire (shown in my reply to this post) an indication that the wire has overheated due to an age related increase in the resistance of the wire or is it an indication of some external source of heat? The burn mark is consistent in its black discoloration all around the wire.
4. Is a factory wiring diagram available anywhere on this site? Also, are there updated wiring diagrams that show the more appropriate way to rewire the Bertram 31? I'm at the point now where if this burn mark is age/corrosion related resistance I may be rewiring Shambala this Spring.
5. Is an increase in age related resistance in DC wiring a cause for fire concern? I know corroded AC wiring can start fires, but I don't know whether DC wiring can do the same.
As always, thanks in advance for any and all responses.
JohnV8r
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