GW 33 Express with Yamaha 425's & electrical problem warning

popespoint

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I recently purchased a 2020 33 Express with Yamaha 425's. Great boat and fantastic engines! More than enough power and low gallon per hour fuel burn!
Caution! Anyone with the new 425's make sure you regularly check your battery connections and keep them clean and tight!
We took ours on its first shakedown cruise 10 miles out into the Gulf of Mexico and just as we were about to enter the bay entrance the Starboard engine shut down. Would not restart. Sounded like a dead battery. (Note, all new AG batteries and showing a charge of 12.6v )
After about 20 minutes it fired up and we continued into the bay headed toward the marina. Just as we got into the main shipping channel, with tugs and barges all around us both engines shut down and a warning of ' LOW VOLTAGE' rang out. Again all batteries were showing a full charge of 12.6 while running.
After a few tense moments I turned the batter selector switches on 'BOTH' and got the motors back running and made it back to port.
After close inspection by the Service Tech's they found every battery connection on positive and negative terminals were loose! The vibrations from those big engines had worked them loose.
So a word of caution, check your battery terminal connections before heading out into the deep water!
 

wspitler

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I’d say there is a high probability that the connections were not properly tightened either upon new battery installation or originally. On my 330, for those connections to be vibrated loose would do much more damage to other things in the boat. If your vibrations are really that significant, you will have other issues to deal with in the future.
 
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seasick

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You didn't happen to have wing nuts on the battery connections did you?