Raymarine Autopilot Issue

[Sidclark]

I have a Raymarine autopilot which consists of a APU 200, heading sensor, a P70 controller and a remote. The autopilot has been shutting down with an error that says, "unexpected hardware reset". The unit then will not power back up until the next day, maybe. I've checked and have power going to the ACU. However, no power is leaving the unit. I called Raymarine and they tell me there's an led that flashes error codes. I cannot locate this led. Does anyone have any idea what may be causing the shutdown and where this led may be located? Thanks in advance!

 

[High Wire]

Check the current draw to the drive motor. It could be sucking down the voltage causing strange errors.

 

[tiltrider1]

My guess is that a transistor is over heating and failing. Once it has cooled down it works again until it over heats.

 

[Capt. Jon]

Pull the cover that is over all of the wiring connectors. This is where you will find the blinking LED. If it does not blink then I agree with tiltrider that some of the output transistors are over heating and causing the issue. Might mean a return to Ray for repair.

 

[STB]

Let us know what the LED flashes when you find it.

How long from start up to fail, typically?

What is the environment, i.e. how is it enclosed? How much airflow? Does the surrounding air feel warm? Hot?

 

[Sidclark]

Let us know what the LED flashes when you find it.

How long from start up to fail, typically?

What is the environment, i.e. how is it enclosed? How much airflow? Does the surrounding air feel warm? Hot?

With the cover off there are two leds. One is over the connector which feeds the backbone. The other is by the incoming power connector. When the unit is working both these leds are solid green. Now they are off and the unit will not power up. It's sat for two days now. It is mounted in the engine room, so it's gonna be warm down there. How warm I'm not sure. The other day when I turned the unit on I left it on all night. The next day it worked for a few hours then nothing. Raymarine is telling me it could be a bad backbone cable, but I'm not buying that...

 

[Capt. Jon]

How long has this been going on? What’s changed? Have you added anything to the backbone? Last but not least where is the unit getting it’s voltage from, the backbone or from another 12 volt source (this means the power switch under the cover is in the on position or off position depending on the power source). If it’s being feed from both the backbone and another 12 volt source at the same time that’s something that can cause an issue.

 

[Sidclark]

How long has this been going on? What’s changed? Have you added anything to the backbone? Last but not least where is the unit getting it’s voltage from, the backbone or from another 12 volt source (this means the power switch under the cover is in the on position or off position depending on the power source). If it’s being feed from both the backbone and another 12 volt source at the same time that’s something that can cause an issue.

It's been acting up for the last couple of months and I have changed nothing. It's a pretty simple setup. From the ACU 200 you have wiring going to the drive unit then you have a connector that feeds power to the backbone. That connector goes to a tee that carries the backbone. From there the backbone goes to a five way connector. Connected to that is the backbone, the remote, the heading sensor and the P70 display. And that's it, pretty simple. There's only one 12 volt source feeding the ACU 200 and that's coming from the breaker panel.

So, this morning I flipped the breaker on and the unit fired up. Checked the leds on the ACU 200 and the one over where it says 12 volt 24 volt is yellow and the led over the Sea Talk connector is red. The led on the heading sensor is green. This tells me power is going out. When the ACU fails all these led's are off. No flashing codes. I thought maybe with the ACU mounted in the engine room it could be overheating, but the system will run fine for a few days then quit. Confusing. It may be time to send the ACU back to Raymarine...

 

[tpbrady]

Jon

The power switch you are referring to is for power to the SeatalkNG network not the ACU itself. The ACU is powered by a 20-40A circuit which can power the SeatalkNG network through a 3A fuse in the ACU. In my setup I power the NMEA 2000 network using a separate power insertion that powers the SeatalkNG drops.

I think Tiltrider is on the right track. Some electronic component is overheating and shuts down. Reading LEDs may not get you very far since when it fails the unit loses all power. If you take it out to send it back to Raymarine, look for a new place to put it where it is cooler. The life of most electronics is dictated in large part by how hot it gets.

Tom

 

[SoWhat]

Impossible to debug Raymarine units to component level as schematics are non-existent. $425 fixed price repair for ACU-200.

 

[STB]

Yeah. I thought I had a schematic for the 200, but don't. My only suggestion would be, if you've done any electronic debugging, to pull the top and start to check. Hard-off problems tend to find than others. But, this does sound like an internal problem vs one outside the box. That doesn't mean a complex problem, necessarily, though.

 

[Capt. Jon]

Jon

The power switch you are referring to is for power to the SeatalkNG network not the ACU itself. The ACU is powered by a 20-40A circuit which can power the SeatalkNG network through a 3A fuse in the ACU. In my setup I power the NMEA 2000 network using a separate power insertion that powers the SeatalkNG drops.

Tom

Tom, totally understand. You just can't power the NG network from two separate power sources. In your case you should have the power switch which that powers the network set to the off position. I do the same thing in our boat. Its power is in the network tee. More than once Ive seen the dual power feeds on the network make the ACU do some really strange things. If the ACU is less than 3 years old it maybe still under warranty. Worth sending it back.

If you don't have a manual here is a link to one. Page 113 explains the LED lights.

Box

 

[Sidclark]

As stated earlier, the unit fired up this morning. We're sitting on a mooring ball in St. Augustine and so I left the unit on all day. I did redo the dockside wizard and that went fine. Left to go walk about and when we got back about six hours later the unit had shut down. At this point I'll wait until we get home in nine days and then open the ACU up and see if there's anything obvious wrong. If not, back to Raymarine it goes. Not sure what else to do at this point...

 

[Frosty]

Jon

The ACU is powered by a 20-40A circuit which can power the SeatalkNG network through a 3A fuse in the ACU. In my setup I power the NMEA 2000 network using a separate power insertion that powers the SeatalkNG drops.

I was thinking about this. Now I have the EV-150, and that you have to power the NMEA/Seatalkng network separately (you cannot do it through the ACU). BUT, I'm fairly sure I remember reading a recommendation (maybe it was on the old Raymarine tech help forum) that just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

In other words, if I'm remembering this correctly, the concept was that you are "safer" (from possible glitches) if you power the NMEA/Seatalkng network from a direct power drop, and not from the ACU.

(Seatalkng has special connectors that go on one Seatalkng port and then power the backbone via a red cable vs. the normal blue or white ones.)

If it were me, I might try that. At least on my boat it would be relatively easy/inexpensive, and even if that is not the problem here, from what I gathered it's "better procedure" anyway.

 

[Sidclark]

So, just to update the thread. I tried to inject power directly into the backbone and although that did power up the display, the drive unit was not recognized. I then disconnected the ACU unit and opened her up. Inside, nothing obvious to my eye looked corroded or broken. I'll go ahead and send it in to Raymarine and I'm pretty sure it's gonna cost a little over $400 bucks, but cheaper then a new unit...