Stereo fades when LED lights are turned on

[dshannon11]

Hi, new to the forum and new to owning a boat. (I have been around boats my whole life)

Recently bought a used 2005 Lowe 202 Trinidad with a Mercury 50 HP 2 stroke motor.

The previous owner used the boat as a ground for his electrical work so I took the opportunity to rewire the accessories and add a second battery with the "Add a battery kit" from BlueSea.

So the only items hooked up to the batteries are: the motor, the accessories line I ran, and a 16awg wire for the helm console gages/lights (I assume factory).

With that said, Last night I hooked up the battery kit and ran a 4 AWG pos/neg wire from switch to the helm for an Accessories fuse box.
I ran 18awg wire from the fuse box to new LED docking lights (Nilight 2 X 18W 1260 lm Cree LED Spot Driving Fog Light LED - $17.99)

Upon turning the LED lights on, the FM stereo immediately got quieter and fuzzy. Turned Lights off, and radio worked again.

What are my options? is this a grounding issue or are the LEDs putting off RF?
Tonight I will run the lights off a separate battery to see if its through the lines or airwaves.
Can I fix either situation or did I just by crappy cheap LEDs?


A separate unrelated issue, The stereo was bad so I replaced it with a Sony marine headunit. It appears to vibrate a little. Is there a way to prevent this?


Thanks
Dylan

 

[alldodge]

Howdy

previous owner used the boat as a ground

This is your main issue. The boat should never be used as ground or anything else electrical. You need 10 AWG wire feeds for pos and neg to/from the fuse panel to the battery

 

[NicoPags]

What are my options? is this a grounding issue or are the LEDs putting off RF?
Tonight I will run the lights off a separate battery to see if its through the lines or airwaves.
Can I fix either situation or did I just by crappy cheap LEDs?

Welcome to iBoats

Symptoms of voltage drop.

First off, Alldodge is correct. I think you said you were rewiring the boat, but didn't mention if you were going to ground through the batt.

Testing the lights on a separate battery is a good test, but your lights already work fine. Try a good solid ground connection (to the battery).

 

[dshannon11]

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I removed all "Frame grounds" and installed a fuse box under the helm via a 4awg positive AND negative wire to the battery. The LED lights are currently the only thing connected to the fuse box.

The stereo is currently wired with the helm gages that run via a pair of wire to the battery. I am in the process of moving those wires to the fuse box under the helm as well but the radio issue threw me for a loop.

 

[alldodge]

Oh OK, then the next thing is what gauge wire goes to the radio?
Even though the LED are low current draw, 18AWG is kind of small (36 watts, about 3 amps) but maybe that's a real short distance.

 

[KD4UPL]

LED lights used in buildings are notorious for emitting bad RFI. They often include very cheap power supplies that are poorly designed. I've heard of household LEd lights totally blanking out radio reception.
For your application I wouldn't think that there is a power supply in the lights since they are designed to work on DC anyway. However, there may still be a switching type DC to DC converter in there changing the voltage. If this is the case I suspect they still emit RFI. You could try moving the radio antenna further from the lights or possibly wrap the lights in aluminum foil as a temporary test. If it's radiating from the power wires than putting some chokes on the wires may help.