Lately my electrical system was acting up but I only noticed it when it was dark out. Running in chop, my lightbar and nav lights would flicker on occasion. Other times they would be rock steady. Yet other times they would not be on at all unless I gave the panel a good whack.

So I smartened up and pulled the switch panel. Everything looked in order except one rogue black wire. This end of the wire looked twisted like it was in a twist-connector. But none of the connectors have black wires except the cigarette-plug outlet. I tried all my lights and nothing. But when I touched this black wire to the metal mounting plate for the switch panel, all my lights came on. It's a hot wire, no doubt, so it's not a grounding wire. But why would touching it to the boat metal, cause all the other switches to suddenly work?

Obviously this wire has been my culprit. Running in chop, it would bounce and probably was bouncing off bare metal causing the flicker. I'll try and post pictures so you can see.

One observation that may be useful is that the bilge switch worked all the time. Regardless of if that wire was touching the metal or not.

It's a hot wire, no doubt. What makes you think so? How many volts does it read on your multimeter?

It sparked.


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Bet you 1 dollar it's a common / negative wire coming from the front of the boat and should be crimped in with the black wire going to your cigarette plug

Your welcome sir. Glad I could help.