[Public-List] Ignition Switch Replacement

[Jonathan Bresler via Public-List]

Folks,

Which ignition switch do you use ?
If you had to replace it, what would you choose ?
The story below revolves around what appears to be a Cole Hersee M-550 with
screw terminals (www.*colehersee*
.com/assets/files/.../1303151353-CLH046-Marine-A.pdf)

Had a little "experience" last week.   During the evening of Monday August
10th, Mike Nikolich called to me to alert me that a buzzer/alarm was
sounding on #262.   Mike spent the time to explain to me fully what was
going on, what he was seeing, check the bilge and bilge pump, try a couple
moves for me, stabilize the issue. As is written in
_The_First_50_Years_An_Alberg_30_History_, its the people!  Thank you Mike!
  Its good to be docked near other Albergers.

The previous week, and that weekend were fairly wet.   Seems that on
Monday, when I was at the boat, I left the main battery switch energized.
The wet got into the ignition switch and shorted the "Off" position to the
"IGN" position.   Thank God not the "IGN/START" position!

After some troubleshooting, I was able to verify that the switch is/was
shorting by disconnecting everything from the switch but the power input
from the batteries, placing a VOM from the IGN terminal to GND, turning the
key to IGN and to OFF, and seeing that the voltage in the OFF position did
not fall to zero.  Rather in the OFF position, I was seeing a number of
different voltages.  Sometimes 1+V, sometimes 4+V, as high as 10V, all over
the map, different each time I cycled the switch from OFF to IGN to OFF.

Further verification, consisted of reattaching the rest of the leads, and
watching the voltage on the IGN terminals slowly rise to about 1.5V, at
which point the alarm would begin sounding.  Cycling the switch to IGN and
back to OFF would knock the voltage on the IGN terminal back down to zero.
Over the next 30 to 75 seconds, the voltage would rise to 1.5V and the
alarm would start sounding again.

The above is the short version.  Took notes while trying to figure out what
was going on.  Would be happy to share should any want to read the full
version with various errors, detours and distractions.

Thank you,
Jonathan

-- 
Jonathan M Bresler
Alberg 30 #262
Annapolis/Eastport MD