Alpha 3000 Autopilot Help Needed

[42tapaki]

Do you have any parts left from your alpah auto pilot ?

Thanks
Jack

[42tapaki]

Hi Zoomer, I am happy to hear you are up and running with your compass. I am still dead in the water with my defective compass and unfortunately cannot work with the poor service at Alpha Marine Systems anymore. They actually deliberately misdiagnosed my problem to bleed me of more money after i already gave them $1400.

[Sandero]

I find that mis diagnosis to bleed your wallet a bizarre claim. My experience with Alpha is that they have been very helpful, though my 3000 has been pretty much problem free for 2 decades aside from some minor tightening of bolts.

There are only 3 components - compass, control head, and drive unit and you could A-B swaps on each one and see where the trouble is. Begin with the compass... The install must be free of magnetic influences and should be mounted as close to the center of motion of the boat.

I wonder if voltage spikes could damage some of these units?

[Charlie]

Def def I know we have found this conversation before but I sent my Alpha 3000 to be repaired three times. Each time it came back and worked for a very short time. I spent over $1400. I ran the tests and couldn't find the problem. I decided that Alpha was not living up to their end of the bargain so went with a WH Pilot. I was very impressed with their customer service at WH.

[Charlie]

Originally Posted by 42tapaki

Hi Zoomer, I am happy to hear you are up and running with your compass. I am still dead in the water with my defective compass and unfortunately cannot work with the poor service at Alpha Marine Systems anymore. They actually deliberately misdiagnosed my problem to bleed me of more money after i already gave them $1400.

I have lots of parts but don't know which ones work. Send me a PM to discuss

[42tapaki]

Originally Posted by defjef

I find that mis diagnosis to bleed your wallet a bizarre claim. My experience with Alpha is that they have been very helpful, though my 3000 has been pretty much problem free for 2 decades aside from some minor tightening of bolts.

There are only 3 components - compass, control head, and drive unit and you could A-B swaps on each one and see where the trouble is. Begin with the compass... The install must be free of magnetic influences and should be mounted as close to the center of motion of the boat.

I wonder if voltage spikes could damage some of these units?

Hello Defjef,

I am happy to hear you have been problem free with your Alpha for 2 decades. Unfortunately i have not been so lucky along with meny other owners you can find on the internet that complained also about Alphas service or lack of it.
There are actually 4 components to the older 3000 series systems, compass, a propriatary black box, control head, and drive unit. The last time i sent in the control head , compass, and the black box as Chris requested to Alpha for repair. This is after we have determined the drive unit was working with testing with several methods. We also took Ohm readings on the compass before sending all the components and found it was fine.
After Alpha sent all the units back saying the system is fixed,we than proceeded to install it and found that it wasnt. I called Chris and he than told me that it was the compass cable which he sent me at the cost of $70. At that point i realize what he was doing and i hired a qualified Marine Electronic Tech. to finish the diagnosis. They found that pins 1-2 on the compass was open with no readings, compared to all the Ohm values that where fine before sending it to Alpha.
Point is that the compass was fine before sending it to Alpha Marine and of course they will not take any responsibility from hear on.