3 prong lights

[going coastal]

Greetings Happy Boaters,

I have a question... I have a 99 Nitro fish and ski and it has the 3 prong lights that stab into the connector which is mounted in the hull, they do not function. What are the three wires for the three prongs. I am sure one must be power and one must be neutral but what of the other one? Could it be to the main power switch? Thank you for helping me out.

[marshmat]

Are you referring to the navigation lamp mast? This would be a white all-round light on top of a pole, used at night and in poor visibility. Or are you referring to a different light, halogen spreader lamps perhaps.

[Hank Rosendal]

How many lights are on the pole/stick/fixture? If there are two (ie steaming light and general/deck light), then one could be earth (return), wile the other two are switched individually.
If there is only one light fixture, only two wires are needed and the third one is superfluous. To check things out, one can use a multimeter with a globe installed: the two wires which show a reading of approx. 10 Ohm (if lamp is approx 10 Watt) are the ones to be connected to the battery (via a switch).
May I assume that you have checked that the globe is OK?

[going coastal]

I just bought the new lights for the boat both front and rear. The front is the green and red light with a handy deck light to the rear, and the rear light is an all around white light. The switch on the boat is a rocker type switch marked "navigational" if the switch is to the top and "Acc. lights" if the switch is moved to the bottom. The switch, however, does not stay in either position, only springs back to center and the indicator light on the switch does not light up (nor do the navigational mast lights). Maybe the switch is bad? I checked the fuses and they all are fine (of course they are not marked so I checked them all). I checked the prongs in the receiver port for the navigational mast lights and I am not getting any power regardless of the switch position, even having the wife hold the switch in the up position while testing it. What would the wiring diagram look like to just rewire the thing myself?

[Tim B]

Are they twin-filament lamps like car sidelight/brakelight combos? these use the ring as negative and the contacts on the bottom as positive for each filament. It is possible that there is a high and low power winding.

Tim B.

[going coastal]

I do not know about the bulbs, they are simply the "buy em at Wal-mart" navigation masted lights all in one piece "plug n play". The lights are brand new and they should be okay, I just need the info to rewire. Thank you for the response.

[alan white]

The spring loaded switch is puzzling. The third prong you're talking about may be for an option you don't have, who knows what. The nav fixture you bought would have two bulbs each having hot and ground contacts, and both would operate on a single set of two wires supplied to that location.
This isn't as complicated as you're making it sound. Every wire can be traced with a continuity light from the source, starting at the battery, usually made simple by wires of different colors.
The swich seems unusual, in that it seems it is meant to stay on after depressing, and the go off when depressed again. Did you install that switch? And if not, have you ever seen it work with the old lights? Did you just buy the boat? Do you own a simple continuity light or a meter, or did you test the fuses by looking at them?

Alan