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I can’t say what exactly caused the over current on the excite wire, maybe diodes? RC will be the answer guy for that.

But, JFYI the excite wire and the fuel pump feed are redundant (if it’s a non B engine) ie, you can use one wire to supply both.
There’s both there because the excite is part of the OEM engine harness from universal and CTY ran the fuel pump feed wire.

I was running my engine at the dock today and started smelling and seeing smoke.  I cut the engine off and went down to take a look and noticed that the plastic around the alternator excite wire was melted.  It was also melted up to the key switch.  I am hoping that one of you guys might have a clue as to what is going on.

Let me tell you what happened.  I was testing my engine today because it overheated yesterday at the dock before I was about to take it out for a sail.  I did just recently install a new heat exchanger.  However, I ran the engine for hours a week before with no problems.  Right now I am not worried about the engine overheating, but I thought I should just mention that.

So I add coolant to the reservoir because the coolant all came out after overheating, and then I started the engine.  Everything seems OK.  Engine temperature is normal.  Runs for about 15 minutes.  But, I noticed the alternator was not working.  And the tachometer was not working.  The voltmeter on the instrument panel read 12 V.  I checked at the batteries and was reading about 12.6 volts.  The tach was at zero.

I gave it the thought that maybe I inadvertently turned the battery switch to off when the engine was running, but that did not seem likely to me.  I noticed the vbelt was too loose, so I stopped the engine, tightened the belt, and restarted the engine.  Alternator and tach still not working.  But then about five minutes later the alternator and tach kick in.  I keep running it for about five minutes and decide to increase the throttle a bit.  Just a little bit from idle, which I had been running it at until then.  I had my eye on the instrument panel while doing this.  The tach jumped very high, over 2500 rpm, which it obviously was not doing, then dropped back down to about 1400 rpm, which is probably correct.  The voltmeter went to zero.

It was very shortly after that that I saw the smoke coming from behind instrument panel.  I will add that after the alternator kicked in, the voltmeter looked like it was running too high, but it has always done this.  It was somewhere above 15 V, almost 16V.  Maybe the voltage regulator is to blame?

Anyway, it looks like I am going to have to pull that purple alt excite wire and replace it.  One other thing that I must mention is that there isn't a fuse between battery and key switch.  I know, it's something I've been putting off but will do so very soon.

Thanks

Hello nice looking boat, can you tells about the cockpit floor?  Is that a vinyl flooring, I take it you like how long has it been there , etc?  The interior table matching the floor is pretty sweet also.  How well do you do with your PHRF rating seems low compared to the E.coast
Good luck selling you boat. 
Dwight
Hull #693 GET 'N BY

If you have a Charleston Spar roller furling main, it may be the remains of a vertical cotter pin from the gooseneck. If so, the boom will be loose on the gooseneck. This pin is not obvious when it is missing and boom could separate from gooseneck. This happened on my boat, several years ago. If you can, check out a sister ship, missing pin on yours should be obvious.

Wind was slightly forward of beam.  My 135 genoa was reefed. Probably should have reefed the main but didn't have it rigged.  I dropped the traveler down half way to depower it.  Heel wad probably 15 degrees but hard to tell with the waves.

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 Question for you retired guys, How nice is it just to be able to sail when the weather is nice? >>>>>>>>
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Glenn,

It actually takes a lot of effort.  I find it amusing to wander through a week without caring what day it is, and I just had a vacant look when a shopkeeper said, "Have a great weekend!" to me an hour ago! 

One does, however, HAVE to know what day it is so that the tide & current tables make sense.  Here it is critical, especially during springs.

For example, I've been on the boat since Sunday, got underway on Monday, and I think tomorrow is Saturday because I have to vacate this guest slip at Friday Harbor.

I've traveled through some of these waters by ferry, but it sure is superior when you do it on your own boat.

Getting "into" open ended cruising does take work:  provisioning properly is critical.

Then all ya got left is "Where do we go tomorrow?"

That's the FUN part.

Good luck.  If you need any more specific assistance, I'll probably be in an anchorage with "No Service" on my technologically marvelous toys. 

Glenn : Wouldn't cheer quite yet until those sons graduate!!                                                                            Had one of my daughters enter college with 60 credits on day one!! Only to find that she decided to graduate 4 years later with 3 majors!!  Tried to convince her that on ANY application they do not ask how many majors you have - degrees Yes but majors No.  Now a PhD and it took awhile but I finally got over it!!  With six I started paying college tuition in Aug 1972 and finished in Dec 1989.  Never even missed a semester!

Great to sail when the WX is OK and take trips and not have to be back on any certain date - WX be damned - must get back!!

We always avoided Annapolis on the weekend - you could step from boat to boat to get from the western Chesapeake shore to the eastern shore!!  The radio traffic was - to turn off the radio and hide in some cove!!

Found that the first limiting factor causing us to dock was - get rid of garbage (dingy full)!! 

A few thoughts

Sounds like a blast. What  points of sail did you manage. Were you reefed?

We sailed from Michigan City, Indiana to Chicago (Belmont Harbor) which is 33 miles in 4.5 hours yesterday. This was an average speed of 7.3 knots, faster than hull speed!  Winds were northeast in the high teens and we saw some 6' waves.

Boat handled very well.  The only problem was a little water coming in from the v-berth hatch.  Only one of us got sea sick.  The other two were having a blast.

Donnybrook is still sailing fine after 29 years!

Both sons just left for their junior and senior years. I am 60 and sailing has to be so much nicer when you are not limited to weekends.  I cannot wait till I am retired and can go whenever the weather is nice/perfect. I think I can retire next year, although the financial planners say that either my wife or I will live to be 93, I have to believe it wont be me. Question for you retired guys, How nice is it just to be able to sail when the weather is nice? I take a week every year on the Chesapeake as a vacation and it is so peaceful when the weekend warriors are not out! Cant wait till I can do the whole month.