I’m out of room on my sea hunts dash. I’ve added switches for every electronic and sometimes I’ve doubled up on the switch with in line fuses. I don’t care for this setup because the fuse holders are all over the place.
I was considering adding a small 4/6 fuse sub panel and actually switching the power to the panel at the dash with all 4 electronics having their own fuse in the little panel. My concerns are the total load on the switch and the power into the switch. Its a 20A switch I think, will confirm, and I’ll keep the total fused load at less than the switch’s rating. I also will probably land it on the existing fuse panel point with a 20a fuse in the block to source the hot.
Is this a typical practice on a boat and what are your tnoughts on safety and design? I’ve up’d the gauge to 8 just to be well oversized for 20A.
Its typical practice to add a fused distribution panel… i see no issues there. And putting a single switch on the feeder to the panel is no problem. Fuse the 20A feeder near the battery to protect the bulk of the cable run and the switch, then limit the distribution panel to 20A with (4) 5amp fuses or any combo that adds up to 20.
Just make sure your cable, connectors and switch are rated for 20A and you are good to go.
if you have a perko switch, the dash switch to turn the panel on and off is just another place for corrosion.
we regularly add a subpanel, but we just power it from the common side of the perko and add resettable circuit breaker at the perko.
each device has its own fuse and on off switch at teh unit, but you can turn everything off when you flip the perko.