Boat wiring colours

[Palmtree]

Hi,

A job for the winter is to renew the wiring on Sailor V. At the moment the boat has a combination of US and UK wiring colours that are confusing. What I intend to do is replace as much as I can with tinned cable, where I hit a problem is is there a standard for UK/European wiring colours?

I know there is a US standard, but the colours of cable over here do not match very well.

A second question is where is a good place for getting cable?

Thanks

Ian

[pks1702]

I know a man who will know...... I am sure he will be along shortly

[ranworthbreeze]

Hello Ian,

Here is a site that may help you regarding the colours needed, all the 12 volt wiring will be the type used in car/lorry installations and this may be your best option with regards to suppliers.

http://www.boatwiring.org/boat-wiring-color-chart/

After saying that Brian Ward's do a lot of panel work and they also stock a wide range of 12 volt cables.

Regards

Alan

[Guest]

I think the wiring colour codes on the American Boatwiring.org website would be somewhat awkward to adopt, as the very complex list seems to depend on striped colours on the individual conductors.

I've worked on the wiring of a great many boats over the years, and unlike mass produced car looms, the colour coding has been much simpler, usually just signifying the voltage carried, ie red = live black - negative, and green = earth. (for DC voltages).

Indeed, the Americans use black = live, white - negative, and green as earth, so they are radically different to us anyway.

Even production boats are wired in-situ, rather than car type looms, and use just a few solid colurs. Further identification is sometimes aided with "tagging", which is a good idea anyway, whenever the cable run is concealed and individual wires can't be traced visually.

Good quality tinned coper wire is expensive enough anyway, and keeping the various gauges required to a minimum number of colours enables some economy in full drum sizes.

Specialist items like autopilots and trim tabs usually have their own bespoke multi-core screened cables anyway, usually pre-wired to polarised plugs to simplify things.

[Jim]

THe American colours used to mystify me. I can recall asking an American electrician for an explanation and the reply I got was black=hot, white=neutral and green = ground

[C.Ricko]

I think you are all spelling color wrong if you are talking american

[Jim]

I did think about spelling it the American way Clive...honest! But then I'm British, stiff upper lip and all that

[MBA Marine]

Red and black in general and green or yellow and green for all bonding. stick to this and it will save so much confusion.

You might want to add another colour for things that want a permanent or maintained live as well as a switched live such as the bilge pump, car stereo and wiper if its wired to auto park.

If you want to help people in the future and do i real nice job then label all wires at the the distribution end either with words or number rings and a chart/key for reference.

[Palmtree]

Hi,

Thanks for the thoughts on the way to go. I tried to post a photo of the rats nest I have at the moment but it did not load, so will try later.

Ian

[ranworthbreeze]

Hello Ian,

I guess that you are going to need shaorter lengths of cable rather than full drums, this being the case there is a chap advertising on Ebay who hasa marine supply company. Do a search on Ebay for Marine wiring, there is a supplier in Sheffield (Item number: 261018983343) another under marine cables in Manchester (Item number: 110884515712).

I look forwards to your pictures.

Regards

Alan

[pks1702]

I would hang on until the weekend Ian unless Mr Antares _9 pops in before.