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Trophy King
New Trolling Motor Wiring
Ordered a new 55# Riptide w/Ipilot to install on my new (to me) boat.
Is there anything special I need to do as far as wiring?
I have an Atwood 3 wire receptacle (Walmart receptacle, blue wire not connected) which is 10 gauge. I'm not sure what gauge boat wire I have but it's larger than the receptacle wire, so #8 I assume? The original OMC trolling motor is on it now and works fine.
What should do? Leave as is and connect new Riptide? Upgrade to 6# or 8# with a breaker or fuse?
I had a 55# Powerdrive on my last boat and I just connected to what the boat had and added a 60 amp breaker.
Crappie.com Legend
Using the existing wire will be fine unless the boat is really old, use butt connectors that account for the step down in wire size to get a good bite and some black tape or shrink wrap over the connections. Install a new breaker of the correct size close to the battery, and go fishing.
The current gauge size should be printed on the insulation cover on the wiring.
GO BIG ORANGE !
I meant to behave, but there were just way too many other options available at the time.
Trophy King
Would a 50 amp breaker/fuse work or does it need to be a 60 amp? I wouldn't think that diameter wire would handle 60 amps, but I'm no electrician.
Crappie.com Legend
Use whatever the owners manual says to use.
GO BIG ORANGE !
I meant to behave, but there were just way too many other options available at the time.
Crappie.com 1K Star General
The length of the wire run from battery to trolling motor will be the deciding factor as to what gauge wire to use in my opinion. On my 16' boat it had #8 wire factory installed and works fine. On my 24' pontoon boat I installed the wire. Because of the length of the wire run I used #2 wire. Being on a pontoon boat with to many opportunities for the insulation on the wire to be worn off and cause a short I placed the wire in conduit. If your trolling motor has a variable speed control and you have a transducer mounted to it you might want to consider running an #18 wire from the transducer clamp to the ground or negative post of a battery not used to power the trolling motor to prevent RF interference with the sonar unit. Again giving care to prevent the ground wire from coming into contact with a metal hull. The reason for no contact with a metal hull beyond safety !is because a positive voltage even a small one will encourage corrosion to the hull.
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