Voltmeter Got The Shakes......

[rpell1@msn.com]

...Strange development today. While running my Universal 25xp today, as I normally do, I charge my deep cell for about 1/2 hour and then the starter combo battery for 1/2 hour as well, using my battery switch.

Suddenly, while charging the starter battery, my voltmeter on the dash starting to violently shaking back and forth between 9 & 15 volts...continuously.

At first, I thought it might be my alternator starting to fail, So I switched back to the deep cell. The voltmeter steadied up solid on 13 1/2 volts and stayed there.

When I checked the voltage on my starter battery using the voltmeter on my switchboard, it read almost 14 volts and stayed there for the 15 minutes that I waited.

Any ideas?

Happy Sailing all......

 

[kentobin]

Sounds like the dash voltmeter wiring. Fastest check is to bypass the existing wiring with some jumper wires between the voltmeter and the starter battery and see if the reading steadies. I should say easy if you can get to the meter, you have the wire, and the battery is accessible. All if's on a boat.

Could be a lose wiring nut, a bad crimp, corrosion, I've had instrument wire fatigue from vibration and break internally causing an intermittant, etc., etc., etc.