Help me understand how to wire a shoreline float switch....

[lrdchaos]

We are planning a number of trips to the lake this year where the boat will be kept in a slip overnight and I would like to make sure that it doesn’t sink for some reason so I’m going to install a shoreline float switch. I currently have a dual battery setup with the 1/2/both switch, but I believe I’m supposed to run 1 wire from the float switch directly to a battery, is that correct? How do I wire in the additional 2 wires?
Am I thinking about that accurately? That after I install the float, it will always have power regardless of the position of the manual switch on the dash. But I can still power the bilge manually from the dash switch if needed.

thanks in advance.

 

[dingbat]

We are planning a number of trips to the lake this year where the boat will be kept in a slip overnight and I would like to make sure that it doesn’t sink for some reason so I’m going to install a shoreline float switch. I currently have a dual battery setup with the 1/2/both switch, but I believe I’m supposed to run 1 wire from the float switch directly to a battery, is that correct? How do I wire in the additional 2 wires?
Am I thinking about that accurately? That after I install the float, it will always have power regardless of the position of the manual switch on the dash. But I can still power the bilge manually from the dash switch if needed.

thanks in advance.

Float ground goes to the battery.
Power is supplied via a 3 way bilge switch.

 

[alldodge]

Your saying a shoreline float switch, but then mention 3 wires. What I think your talking about is a bilge pump with built in float switch?

If that is the case, use the pic Ding posted and note the 3 wires coming from the pump and switch. One is ground, the other 2 are used to turn it ON

 

[matt167]

You tie one leg of the float switch wiring to the brown wire on your pump. Then the brown wire and the float switch wire you tied togther, goes to your manual bilge pump switch.. The other float switch wire, goes to the battery.

If you use a 3 position bilge pump switch, then the wiring in that diagram is correct. The 3 position switch just allows the bilge pump system to have an off position

 

[Grub54891]

You can wire the float to the battery switch itself, on the hot side of of wich ever battery is the house battery. Doing it that way you eliminate the cluster of wires going to the battery. Makes for a much cleaner setup,

 

[dingbat]

I would strongly recommend wiring the pump through a 3 way switch given past experiences.

Float switches, bilge pumps and the associated wiring are known problem areas. Floats stick, pumps burn up and wiring fails over time. It’s not if, it’s when there is a failure

The last float that stuck on me melted the bilge pump (run dry), shorting the windings to ground which bled roughly 6v through ground to the helm. This caused all kinds of weird stuff to happen when I turned the ignition.

It was by chance, I flipped the bilge pump switch off while troubleshooting that Isolated the problematic circuit to the bilge

Pretty religious about turning the bilge pump circuit off when the boat isn’t in the water

 

[lrdchaos]

This is what I was thinking in my head. This setup would allow me to keep the factory on/off switch and basically wire a float that would activate if the water level rose without me there. But I can still activate the pump manually, correct?

although having a 3 way switch would be nice, I need to see if I can find a factory switch that matches the others.

 

[matt167]

This is what I was thinking in my head. This setup would allow me to keep the factory on/off switch and basically wire a float that would activate if the water level rose without me there. But I can still activate the pump manually, correct?

although having a 3 way switch would be nice, I need to see if I can find a factory switch that matches the others.

Yup, that is pretty much as I described, but keep in mind if the float sticks you will burn the pump up.

what brand is your boat? If it's somewhat recent it is likely you will find a spdt switch

I recently upgraded my little runabout with a Seaflo switch panel, and a rule float switch and rule pump. Previous owners had a cheap Seachoice pump wired through the radio

 

[lrdchaos]

It’s a 2015 Monterey, I’ll begin my search this afternoon.

 

[matt167]

Great Lakes Skipper is probably going to be your best bet