Kevin,

I am in the process of restoring a pontoon boat and doing some research on the fuel system.

If using a plastic fuel tank with rubber hoses that go from the tank to the metal deck fill on the side of the railings, should you ground the metal inlet to eliminate any static charge?

The U.S Coast Guard’s Boating Safety website says that any portion of the fuel system that is metallic has to be grounded. This confuses me because if you ground the inlet, it will essentially ground the entire marine electrical system, which could potentially cause corrosion issues.

Any advice you can give me would be great.

Thank you,

Bill

Hi Bill,

It is important to ground all of your boat’s metal fuel fill components together to prevent accidental, static discharge.

When fuel flows down a hose, the swirling action creates a static buildup. If the fill is not grounded to the tank, there is a change of a static discharge when the pump is removed from the fill which can cause an explosion. If the fuel fill is made of plastic, this static ground wire is not required.

Galvanic corrosion (the corrosion that occurs when dis-similar metals are electrically connected) will not be a concern. To cause galvanic corrosion, the two pieces of metal need to be electrically connected and submerged in the same body of electrolyte (water). If your boat’s fuel fill and tank are continuously under water, you have more serious concerns than galvanic corrosion.

Please let me know if you have any other questions,

Kevin

Kevin,

Thank you for quick response.

The way the boat was originally wired, there was a tank ground wire from the filler to the negative terminal of the battery.

The tank is plastic so I do not think bonding them together would discharge the static energy. The only metallic portion of the fuel system is the filler.

Is this the correct way to go about this?

Again, thank you for your help.

Bill

Bill,

Beyond connecting all metal components in fuel system that can come it contact with fuel, the system must also be connected to the boat ground.

The full intent of this practice is to give a low resistance path back to ground – metal fill – wire to tank – tank – to ground on boat – ground connected to metal underwater gear – boat in water – that will help prevent static discharge buildup.

• If your boat fuel tank has a fuel gauge sending unit, connect the static ground to the sender and the sender ground to the battery negative/ground bus.
• If your boat does not have a sender, connect the static ground wire directly to the battery negative/ground bus.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Kevin,

This clears it all up.

Thank you very much for your help.

Bill

Kevin,

I could really use some of your wiring wizardry.

I have have a 2009 Centurion Avalanche. I put it up for winter and everything was working fine. I charged and installed the boat batteries after winter. All of the switches work, horn, stereo, pump, etc. I go to bump the key and I get nothing. The boat is still on the trailer and before I drag it to the lake I wanted to ensure that power was getting to the starter.

I made sure that the batteries are fully charged, boat battery switch is in the on position, emergency kill switch is in place, boat is in neutral…and I get nothing when I bump the key. I pulled the fuse behind the ignition switch and it looked fine.

The boat has dual batteries. The boat dealer added an marine battery switch last year as the batteries were draining even though the battery switch was turned to the off position.

The boat on has forty hours on it. After working in a confined space and pulling my hair out, I could use some expert advice.

Thanks,

Tommy

Hi Tommy,

If the instruments have power when you turn on the key, then I would check the neutral safety switch. Based on Standard Boat Wiring Colors, follow the yellow/red wire from the starter post on the key switch to the neutral safety switch in the shifter control.

If the key switch has no power, I would check the breaker on the engine that feeds power to the ignition.

If you use a voltmeter or a test light, you will be able to find the problem. It may be something as simple as wiggle the shifter a little or replacing the starter solenoid.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Kevin,

I’m in the boat now with even less hair.

The ignition in the on position does nothing as well as the start position.

It appears that power isn’t getting to the switch. The fuse leading up to the switch looks good. I have also been playing with the shift lever to find the sweet spot, no luck.

Trying to locate the breaker on the engine.

Thanks for all of your advice, hopefully I can get on the lake today.

Tommy

Kevin,

You the man!!! It was the engine breaker.

Tommy

Hello Kevin,

I have a Wellcraft Portofino that I have owned for several years.

When I bought the boat it had an AM/FM CD player in the cockpit that worked fine. I added a car style radio to the salon about three years ago. I wired the unit properly and attached the “memory” lead to an empty, fused position on the same 12 volt bus as the cockpit radio.

From day one the salon radio would lose it’s memory on engine start while the cockpit radio did not. In between engines starts is not a problem. I double checked my wiring, which seemed good and wrote the problem up to buying a cheap radio on sale.

Midway through last season I replaced the cockpit AM/FM radio with a new Sony Marine unit. I now have the same problem with this radio! The tuner memory holds until I start engines. I just don’t get it!

The marine electrical is set up with two battery banks. The starboard bank is a 4-D and starts that engine and navigation equipment including the cockpit Sony radio. The port bank is a bank of four 6 volt deep cycle batteries wired series/parallel for 12 volts that start the port engine and also supplies the house.

I have checked all of the radio connections. I have switched the memory lead from the original fuse panel to different bus bars. Nothing has helped, as soon as I start an engine with the same battery bank the the AM/FM radio memory leads are attached to, the memories go blank.

I am starting to think that this is a surge problem. I believe I have confirmed this by using my master boat battery switches to start engines on the battery bank that does not have the radio memory. If I do that there is no memory loss. Starting and running my boat in this manner is not practical for me and leaves open the possibility of draining the wrong battery bank.

This situation is really starting to drive me nuts, I’d greatly appreciate any recommendations you may have.

Thank you,

Michael

Hi Mike,

Stereo memory circuits are sensitive to low voltage and you are suffering for a voltage drop “stack up” and will reset after only a few milliseconds of low voltage. This is very common with newer, higher draw, higher tech stereos.

The power feed to your helm has a drop. The more current that you draw through it, the more the voltage drop in the circuit. When higher draw devices such as bilge blowers, cockpit lights, stereos, the voltage drop is even higher. Slightly corroded connections induce voltage drops. When you start the engine, the source voltage (the battery) drops lower which makes the stereo input voltage that much lower.

Solution:

• Increase the size of the power feed wiring and ground to your helm panel.
• Run a dedicated power and ground lead from the battery to the stereo.
• Make sure you use circuit protection at the source of power. An increase of 0.1 volts will mean the difference between the stereo memory resetting and remaining.

Hope this helps,

Kevin