Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

JSmitty

Seaman Apprentice
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
35
I'm a novice when it comes to electrical, so bear with me.

I have juice to all the fuse clips connected to the 'hot' side of my fuse panel (my circuit tester (test light)) lights up, but when I touch the fuse itself with the circuit tester, the tester does not light up. And neither do the fuse clips at the other end of the fuse. It's not just one fuse clip ... I have three brand new fuses and two old ones, and they all have the same result.

The input to the fuse panel comes directly from the battery.

I have a multi-meter, but I'm not sure that would make a difference, or what values I should look at, except I've tested the hot into the panel as 12 volts.

The reason I got into this was because none of the switches I had hooked into the top of the fuse clips worked. This is a boat I'm restoring, so it's not like they worked before and now suddenly stopped working. I have no idea if they ever worked, but it just doesn't make sense to me that touching the fuse wouldn't show 'hot'. The panel is old and the clips, while not corroded, do have a 'patina' on them.

Thanks for any help.

BTW, I'm talking about the fuse type with the glass tube in the middle.
 

Fireman431

Rear Admiral
Joined
Sep 17, 2007
Messages
4,292
Re: Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

You may have a bad connection on the panel itself. Disconnect the battery feed from the panel and remove the panel from the boat. Either open it up to fix it or thouroughly clean all connections. I would recommend replacing it with a newer style (ATO) fused panel. Those are the flat plastic coated fuses you see in autos. They are more stable when they get hot, especially in a bouncing boat. Fuse panels are not very expensive.
 

Georooney

Seaman
Joined
Sep 29, 2009
Messages
51
Re: Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

Are you running in salt water? I've had that problem too. The fix for me was to remove the fuses and clean the fuse clips with emory cloth or fine sandpaper. (Cleaning the ends of the fuses can't hurt, either.) It seems the atmosphere corrodes the brass clips and prevents the fuses from making contact.
 

JSmitty

Seaman Apprentice
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
35
Re: Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

Are you running in salt water? I've had that problem too. The fix for me was to remove the fuses and clean the fuse clips with emory cloth or fine sandpaper. (Cleaning the ends of the fuses can't hurt, either.) It seems the atmosphere corrodes the brass clips and prevents the fuses from making contact.

Yes, the boat was run and moored in a salt water environment. I'll give the emory cloth a shot, and if that doesn't work I'll probably just buy a new fuse block.

Thanks to both repliers
 

JSmitty

Seaman Apprentice
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
35
Re: Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

The emery cloth fixed one fuse clip, but several minutes of sanding didn't fix the others. At least I know what the problem was. The other ones would probably work if I took the fuse block out so I could sand it properly, but if I'm going to do that I may as well get a new one. I found a new block complete with blade fuses for $25 plus shipping.
 

Fireman431

Rear Admiral
Joined
Sep 17, 2007
Messages
4,292
Re: Juice to fuse panel, but no juice on fuse

Good deal. Just D/C all the batteries first!
 
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