Before our 2010 PacCup I went thru and replaced all NANCY's inside-the-hull wiring. A Wyliecat with an outboard is a fairly simple wiring job. I found several wires that were "spliced" together and dangled in what passes for a bilge under the forward bed platform. I replaced all with continuous wires. The old switch panel didn't have enough circuits so several had been clobbered together as accessories were added so I wired in a 2nd panel. Needed amps for the SSB radio, chart plotter, masthead lights, and several other items which were not present when the boat was originally wired. Halfway to Hawaii is not the time to be checking circuits! Working on cabin wiring is an inside job; good for when it's raining outside.
Yes on checking battery connections, cleaning and tightening -- really tight! Yes on getting wires out of the bilge. Yes on checking connections everywhere. Yes on checking the backside of the electric panel for corrosion or loose connections. Yes for clearly labeling wiring. Yes on LED lights; much lower draw and smaller wires. Yes on a clearly labeled wiring diagram just in case. Spares? A roll of duplex can create a circuit directly from battery to whatever in an emergency (like auto helm circuit). Toss in an inline fuse holder.
During a sunny break a good idea to check everything having to do with solar panels, too. They're out in the salt environment 24/7.
All of that is on my "to-do" list! It's just that now it's front and center on my "to do" list! I'm going to add a depth sounder at the April haulout, and that of course will be another circuit. Right now I don't have a steaming light, as it's corroded and ruined. I velcro a little LED garden light into the spinnaker pole ring when I'm motoring. I suppose I could use that circuit for the depth sounder. But you know, a new panel with circuit breakers is not that much $$. EDIT: I just bought one, circuit breakers, 8-gang "waterproof". riiight.
Carrying a couple of in-line fuses and 20 feet of wire is a good idea.
The autopilot soon to be autopilotS, as Joan and I had a talk last night and I'm going to buy another Pelagic, is on it's own circuit, with it's own switch with an inline fuse, straight to the batteries and the wiring is not in the bilge. The wiring is pretty new, all the connections are crimped. I feel pretty good about that, though I could make a fancier switch box. So that should be fine. Hopefully this windvane will work out so even if the entire electrical system fails, I can still point the boat in the right direction. Even if the windvane doesn't work out, I might close my eyes...wince... and buy a Windpilot Pacific Light, or a Mister Vee windvane.
The nav lights are now, all LED. The one interior light that I sometimes turn on, is incandescent, and there are three of them, but I hardly ever use them, so....
I have a couple of overhead LED lights in the cabin powered by AA batteries, so I can light up the cabin even if the electrical system goes down. I have two AAA-battery powered headlights. I have a strobe light on a pole, with wiring and alligator clips and I can run that for days on a 12v lantern battery. I also have some red and green LED strips, which also can run off of a lantern battery, glued to bits of plywood. They can get duct-taped to the hard-dodger, and run off of a lantern battery so I can even have nav lights.
I have one Magellan GPS that is terribly old school and runs on AA batteries. So I'll know where I am, and I might just buy an old Garmin etrex off of ebay for a AA-battery powered backup to the backup. I have two old cell phones now, and an android tablet all of which have GPS's in them, but they need a USB connection to charge. So being able to juice them up would be very nice. Anyway, For getting a position twice a day, 6:00 AM and 6:00PM, I think I'm good.
The Garmin tracker needs a working USB connection to charge, so that's a concern, but the reality is that's a rules issue, and a "peace of mind for the folks at home" issue, not a "will I get there?" issue. The solar charge controller seems to be working fine, but if I HAD to I could just wire one panel to each of the batteries and it would work...badly, but it would work. Also a spare low-tech charge controller is cheap, probably worth it to have a backup on the boat.
Anyway, my idea is to set things up so that even if the batteries die, I can get to Hawaii. I can see what I'm doing, the boat can steer itself, people can see me, and I know where I am....all with no functioning electrical system.
All that said, it would sure be easier to have a functioning electrical system, seeing as I bought the battery and the solar panels and the charge controller.
