Navico PH-8000 Autopilot

[John Proctor]

First don't tell me to talk to Simrad as the local distributor doesn't
own up to knowing anything about this autopilot.

I have a Navico PH-8000 power pilot on my 37' Jeanneau Sun Odyssey. The
drive is hydraulic and steering is cable driven. My problem is that the
pilot has become increasingly intermittant over the last several months.
I have a PC-8000 controller in the cockpit and I thought that this might
be flakey so I replaced all the components and now it doesn't seem to
work at all. Does anyone have any schematics for this autopilot that
they might be willing to share. Given the price of a new pilot I would
like to get this one working again but there is a limit to how much agro
I can take;-)

Any help would be welcome.

Regards,
John Proctor
S/V Chagall

 

[John Proctor]

First don't tell me to talk to Simrad as the local distributor doesn't
own up to knowing anything about this autopilot.

I have a Navico PH-8000 power pilot on my 37' Jeanneau Sun Odyssey. The
drive is hydraulic and steering is cable driven. My problem is that the
pilot has become increasingly intermittant over the last several months.
I have a PC-8000 controller in the cockpit and I thought that this might
be flakey so I replaced all the components and now it doesn't seem to
work at all. Does anyone have any schematics for this autopilot that
they might be willing to share. Given the price of a new pilot I would
like to get this one working again but there is a limit to how much agro
I can take;-)

Any help would be welcome.

Regards,
John Proctor
S/V Chagall

Well the gods are smiling!

I pulled the PC-8000 controller and had another hard look at it. Outside
the box the resistance measurements on the 2-wire control bus were ok.
However when I put it back in the case thet were screwy. To shorten the
story the pc board was settling into the case deepere than it was meant
to and as a result several of the push buttons were always activated.
Shortening the shafts a little solved the problem and guess what it
works!

Ah life is sweet when you don't have to spend $3K (AUS) to replace your
autopilot!

Regards,
John Proctor VK3JP
S/V Chagall

 

[Gordon Wedman]

Good sleuthing on your part. A good example of how a mechanical problem can
cause electrical problems.

I bought a used Icom M600 recently from a dock neighbour. He had some ham
friends check it out and they said it worked fine except for the internal
speaker. They were in the process of ordering a new speaker from Icom when
I said "Wait, I'll check it out myself". Speaker did not work when first
tried but signal showed on signal strength display.
Read owners manual (which hams provided).
Manual says speaker will not work if microphone is not connected.
Connect microphone and speaker is A-OK.
A very cheap fix.