New forum guy with questions

[brody66]

Ok so i have owned a 20v since august of last year, it is a 2006 i bought carry over and love it, lot better than my gas guzzling baja 232 i had before, but anyway the tige pretty much has everything except ballast tanks, i am having problems with my tower speakers shorting out when they are over a volume of 28, and my tower lights short if i have the front and rears on for about five minutes, i was having this problem last year as well, brought it back to have it fixed and it still does it, anyone have an answer for me, any help is appreciated

[ragboy]

Doesn't sound like a short, sounds like they are drawing too much power, and tripping the circuit.

[brody66]

ya thats what i meant i guess, there was a loose lug on the alternator before and thats what they told me was the problem, that helped the speaker situation a little, before i couldnt turn it past 23 before the tower speakers would quit, but the lights are still the same, could the alternator be to small? All the options are from the factory and the tower speakers are the only ones to quit, also the lights do trip the circut and then i have to reset it.

[Moki]

What size alternator do you have and do you know how much your amps draw at full power? I switched out my alternator for a high output and am glad that I did. Spharis hooked several of us up with a company on ebay.

[Jeff T]

I'm betting his alt is a 65 amp. Do you have a Merc or Marine Power?

[brody66]

I dont know what size alternator i have, but i would think that it would be large enough being it is all factory installed, if that is the problem is it something i could get covered by warranty

[brody66]

Mercury towsports mag

[chpthril]

Ok so i have owned a 20v since august of last year, it is a 2006 i bought carry over and love it, lot better than my gas guzzling baja 232 i had before, but anyway the tige pretty much has everything except ballast tanks, i am having problems with my tower speakers shorting out when they are over a volume of 28, and my tower lights short if i have the front and rears on for about five minutes, i was having this problem last year as well, brought it back to have it fixed and it still does it, anyone have an answer for me, any help is appreciated

What amps and tower speakers do you have? Is it factory or dealer installed, and how many tower speakers do you have. Factory tower?

Easy solution, amps needs tuned correctly, worst case, you have a short in a tower speaker wire.

What are the tower lights doing specifically?

[brody66]

It is the factory tower and i have 8 kicker components and a sub with two amps, as far as i know they are factory installed, they tuned the amps and told me not to touch them because they do a lot of high end stereos in boats so the knew what they were doing, supposedly,

[brody66]

oh and also the tower lights are just fine if you leave them on just the forward two, but if you turn on the back three as well then that is when the breaker kicks, i cannot just turn on the back ones with out the front ones on.

[chpthril]

It is the factory tower and i have 8 kicker components and a sub with two amps, they tuned the amps and told me not to touch them because they do a lot of high end stereos in boats so the knew what they were doing, supposedly,

How many tower speakers?

[brody66]

two, sorry

[chpthril]

Sounds like your tower speaker amp is going in to protect mode. May be due to a low impedance problem (short in tower speaker wires for example) or gains set too high.

[akdoc]

Sounds like your tower speaker amp is going in to protect mode. May be due to a low impedance problem (short in tower speaker wires for example) or gains set too high.

I agree, you may also need to vent the compartment where the amps are. I know someone on here has taken out a cupholder that goes into the compartment and put a fan in there. Those compartments on the 20V are pretty small, so it might be getting too hot in there and causing the amp to go into protect mode. I don't think its your alternator, I have 3 amps running over 2000 watts continous power and I didn't change the alt.

With regards to the lights, it sounds like you might have a ground issue since it keeps tripping the circuit. I would trace your ground for the lights and see what you find.

[philwsailz]

It sounds like there is just not enough breaker for the lights current draw when they are all on. If they are all in parallel, you can add up the total wattage of the bulbs, and then divide by 12 to find a rough estimate of the total current draw for the lights when they are all on. I bet you are simply overloaded on the circuit.

If this turns out to be correct, you need to seriously consider some changes. If the breaker is tripping, your lighting wiring might be getting pretty warm, and if it melts the insulation off, you can start a fire.

There are options:
1. Series wire a few of the lights to raise the resistance and lower the curernt draw. The downside is lower light levels, but really, what do you use the lights for anyway?

2. Replace the light system's primary wiring with a suitabl wire gage, then upgrade to a properly sized breaker. The downside is the cost associated. Do not be tempted to simply replace the breaker without replacing the wire. That will increase your chance of a fire.

On the stereo side of things, we have a few things to check. If factory installed, the amp driving the tower speakers is the ZX350.4 probably. You need to check to see that bass boost is turned completely down, (knob on top face of amp) for both halves of the amp. Make sure that the crossover switches, (on the endpanel) are set to hi-pass. The crossover controls, (again, a knob on the front face) should be set to something like 100 - 150, roughly 9:00 - 10:00 o'clock as you would look at a clock.

If my assumptions are wrong, can you share which model speakers and which model amp you are using in the boat?