Orana 44: Exterior table lights

[LoudMusic]

I recently had solar panels installed on the roof above the aft cockpit. I fear the installer may have damaged the wiring or light fixture. Last night I switched on the exterior table lights and it illuminated, dimmed, illuminated, and then went out. During this two seconds of erratic behavior I heard a cabin fan spin down and then back up again.

Now the exterior table lights do not switch on, and the interior table lights do not switch on. Everything else on board appears to be working normally.

I tried to get into the exterior light enclosure. After removing the clear lens (glass!?!) I tried prying on the metal housing with screw drivers but it didn't seem to budge much. Does anyone know how these are attached to the ceiling?

I'm really worried the cable is damaged in the ceiling and fixing it is going to be a royal pain in the ass. Where is the breaker for this wire run? The labeling seems to be a tad ... lacking. And French.

[Helia 44]

No one else out of 50 views, had an answer for you. So I will try and help....

My Helia is just an update of the Orana, so there are building similarities.. F.P. use a plug in fuse, with a pop up resetting circuit breaker. It is a medium sized automotive looking two spade plug in fuse, and when it pops a little tang pops up that you can push down. Kind of cool, resetting fuse..

Now where? At least three of these fuse oriented junction boxes, about 8-10 inch square, four screw cover. One mid ships in a locker in each hull, and one behind the settee on the masthead wall of the coach house, is where I would look first. There will be three.

Now FIRST You are going to have to do the fix: On your roof area, sounds like an unlucky drill or screw has partially or fully shorted out that wiring. You are going to have to find it. In the past, I have gotten away with just removing the screws one by one and corrected it, but then you have exposed wires and it may have torn or broken it anyway. Get the Solar Person involved as they did it. If you are really unlucky, you may have to drop the overhead panels in the roof. They are screwed (see the covers) or glued on and can be gently pulled down to re-fix later...

The other course of action is to pull through new wire with pull through snake, light hole to light hole, (through the holes the lights sit in), all the way to a source of where they are fed. That is a common "bypass technique" used by Professionals..

Sorry I am not familiar enough with the Orana to help more...

Good luck with it...

[LoudMusic]

Originally Posted by Helia 44

No one else out of 50 views, had an answer for you. So I will try and help....

My Helia is just an update of the Orana, so there are building similarities.. F.P. use a plug in fuse, with a pop up resetting circuit breaker. It is a medium sized automotive looking two spade plug in fuse, and when it pops a little tang pops up that you can push down. Kind of cool, resetting fuse..

Now where? At least three of these fuse oriented junction boxes, about 8-10 inch square, four screw cover. One mid ships in a locker in each hull, and one behind the settee on the masthead wall of the coach house, is where I would look first. There will be three.

Now FIRST You are going to have to do the fix: On your roof area, sounds like an unlucky drill or screw has partially or fully shorted out that wiring. You are going to have to find it. In the past, I have gotten away with just removing the screws one by one and corrected it, but then you have exposed wires and it may have torn or broken it anyway. Get the Solar Person involved as they did it. If you are really unlucky, you may have to drop the overhead panels in the roof. They are screwed (see the covers) or glued on and can be gently pulled down to re-fix later...

The other course of action is to pull through new wire with pull through snake, light hole to light hole, (through the holes the lights sit in), all the way to a source of where they are fed. That is a common "bypass technique" used by Professionals..

Sorry I am not familiar enough with the Orana to help more...

Good luck with it...

Great info on the fuses, thanks! I checked the two boxes in the hulls earlier today - I'll get to the salon box tomorrow.

And I'll still need to find the damage and repair or bypass ... oh joy ...

Cheers!

[LoudMusic]

Originally Posted by Helia 44

No one else out of 50 views, had an answer for you. So I will try and help....

My Helia is just an update of the Orana, so there are building similarities.. F.P. use a plug in fuse, with a pop up resetting circuit breaker. It is a medium sized automotive looking two spade plug in fuse, and when it pops a little tang pops up that you can push down. Kind of cool, resetting fuse..

Now where? At least three of these fuse oriented junction boxes, about 8-10 inch square, four screw cover. One mid ships in a locker in each hull, and one behind the settee on the masthead wall of the coach house, is where I would look first. There will be three.

Now FIRST You are going to have to do the fix: On your roof area, sounds like an unlucky drill or screw has partially or fully shorted out that wiring. You are going to have to find it. In the past, I have gotten away with just removing the screws one by one and corrected it, but then you have exposed wires and it may have torn or broken it anyway. Get the Solar Person involved as they did it. If you are really unlucky, you may have to drop the overhead panels in the roof. They are screwed (see the covers) or glued on and can be gently pulled down to re-fix later...

The other course of action is to pull through new wire with pull through snake, light hole to light hole, (through the holes the lights sit in), all the way to a source of where they are fed. That is a common "bypass technique" used by Professionals..

Sorry I am not familiar enough with the Orana to help more...

Good luck with it...

Well I still haven't gotten the light out of the ceiling in the cockpit. They're stuck in there real good! But I did find the fusebox and indeed the slot 2 fuse had popped out. The inside of the lid for the box lists slot 2 as the chart table lamp. When I pushed the tab back in the chart table lamp worked again (magic!). Curiously, the salon ceiling lights work again as well, even though they're documented as being on slot 4, which was not popped out. The cockpit lights are documented as being slot 3, and that fuse is not popped either. I'm guessing something changed in the wiring here, as slots 3 and 4 have wires and fuses on them. Slot 2 only has one wire coming off it that I can see, so I'm not sure what's going on there.

I still need to get the assumed damage repaired in the cockpit ceiling, but I haven't even identified what it is yet.

[Helia 44]

Right Oh,
You are making progress...

These are fantastic, and beautiful, and good sailing Cats, with nice eye appeal and comfortable travelling and living on board but: The one weakness is the French electrical organisation... Their method is not to centralize it in general, but to have the three positions in each hull and in the main salon with sub-panels for the protective circuits. Mind you it is well done, and with the pop out circuit breaker style of fuses is very handy and easy to see. There is the highlight of their electrical organisation.

On your drilled in boo-boo, you just have to do the hard yards. I have never had to pull one of those lights down, but if you have the square surrounds on the LEDs, try gently prying down the polished stainless cover around the edges. My guess is it will pop off and you will have a mounting arrangement for the light. I have some spares with this Saba 50, I will try and remember to look at them for the mounting style.

You are just going to have to do the hard yards. Try and find where the screw hit the wiring with mirrors and lights. If you can, you can cut out that section between two of the lights and You can just abandon it. The easy fix is to just replace that run between two of the lights, with threading in a bypass twin core hooked up to both lights to complete the circuit. Failing to ID that location, you might just run a new power feed to the first light, you could get lucky. If not go to the next one with a bypass, and so on...

I mean there is another method, of removing one screw of the solar at a time, it could have just gone through and shorted out the wiring and not damaged it that much. You find it and you might take a skinny screw driver and try pushing the wiring out of the way to the side, even dab the end with Sika to try and seal the wire... Maybe even pump in Sika-Flex to try and seal it.. You could fix it and seal it with the Sika, or you could have exposed wire for a future potential problem. You would have to re-seal each screw thread with Sika-Flex or the like..

Good Luck, and just hope God Blesses your efforts with good fortune like he does mine...

Helia 44, now on a Saba 50 "SERENITY"
Headed for the Islands inside the Great Barrier Reef in north Queensland in a couple of weeks...