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Looking for help in troubleshooting an electrical issue. We purchased our 262 last year and only used the docking lights once. After having them on for 2-3 minutes they completely shorted out the dash gauges. I planned on converting them to LED to reduce the draw but haven’t started that project yet. Everything worked fine on future trips out with no electrical issues. On our last trip out, I had the interior and navigation lights on and everything shorted out again. Once docked I shut down the engine and started it back up and all instruments worked fine. Any suggestions?

Loose ground? It seems almost every electrical issue I've ever had (12v) has been because of a bad or faulty ground. It can do crazy things. I'd start with that.

NautiWeasel wrote: Thu Aug 25, 2022 12:38 pm Loose ground? It seems almost every electrical issue I've ever had (12v) has been because of a bad or faulty ground. It can do crazy things. I'd start with that.

They are pretty easy to chase down around the bow but first do you have power and grd.

What do you mean by “completely shorted out”? Short circuits usually mean blown fuses or tripped breakers if those safety devices work. If they don’t work properly, then high heat, smoke, flames, and other bad things happen. Open circuits, on the other hand, don’t cause those bad things but will leave components de-energized.

Are you losing both your gauge lights and the interior/navigation/docking lights?

We lost all of the gauges on the dash and Nav and interior lights. The circuit breakers under the dash were fine but found the reset on the relay? Mounted above the port battery with the help of someone at the marina. I’ll be looking for a ground issue this weekend to hopefully fix the problem.

Did resetting the relay at the port battery do anything? Can you post a picture of the relay?