Bilge Wiring Diagram - 1999 Bimini 306 - adding a bilge alarm

[IFish4Tuna]

Just passing this image along for others to reference. It took me a while to trace out the as built. I ended up splicing the alarm in up at the console area using double blade femail connectors instead of the 3way crimps as shown in the image. My new insurance company requires a bilge alarm which I should have done long ago.

Works great.

 

[seasick]

what insurance company do you use?

Your solution has a flaw as I see it. If your float switch gets stuck in the down position, has a broken wire, or your bilge fuse blows, your pump won't work and neither will your alarm. A separate system with its own power feed and water level sensor is a better approach.

If your switch is intender to be the manual pump switch, it normally would be connected to the accessory buss. and therefore not powered when the battery switch is off.

 

[DennisG01]

I think this is a good idea, regardless of the insurance company.

It looks like your manual switch is connected direct to the battery - it should really be connected to switched power so it can't accidentally be left or bumped on. Granted, the way you have it, when you manually turn the switch on it appears the alarm will sound - but if the alarm craps out, you wouldn't know if the switch is left on. Best practice is to have manually controlled items always connected downstream of the load side of the battery switch.

Along with that, having the alarm on it's own, dedicated circuit (as noted above) is really the best way to do it.

It all functions and works just fine the way you have it - just some thoughts to tweak it to make it better/more reliable.

 

[Hookup1]

This is GW standard wiring for my 268 Islander. I'm not sure the bilge pump wires to the battery switch are on the switched side of the switch (on hot side). This way the bilge pump can't be turned off. The bilge pump is fused for safety. The brown wire goes into the wiring harness and goes forward to the panel at the helm. There it is connected to a circuit breaker and manual bilge aft bilge switch. This brown wire at the helm gives you a visual indicator that the pump is running and could easily be tied into an alarm.

On my boat I installed a separate high water alarm circuit with float switch and large bell.