Auto pilot controller

[LET IT BE]

When I power up the GHC 10 control head on my 2013 R29 the message searching for controller displays and nothing more.
Auto pilot works when engaged via the chart plotter but no functions etc appear on the control head other than the message.
Any suggestions / solutions? The boat is new to me so probably something I'm not doing right?
Thanks ,
Dave Jolley.
LET IT BE
HULL # FMLT2904E213

 

[Connerkip]

Try turning off the main house breaker. Unplug the two connections at the back of the controller. Wait 30 seconds. Plug back in two connections, power on the main house breaker. Worth a try.

 

[knotflying]

You may want to try disconnecting the power at the controller at the rear of the boat. It should be located near the autopilot pump. Hey, play it safe and disconnect and reconnect all of them. Sometimes it can be a loose connection ot a little corrosion.

 

[Phil Nersessian]

I actually had this problem this weekend. I shut off all my battery power switches(those big red things). It fixed the problem, but now it wants me to do all kinds of set up type stuff, Recalibrate the compass, rudder,etc.... I haven't needed to do this before. I didn't have time to deal with all that. I think I have some manual reading to do.... In addition I think I need to change the batteries in the autopilot ,t.v. , and thruster remotes.

 

[bill46]

usually shutting house power off will fix. Real pain to reach controller on 31. Found power off - on fixes Garmin weird stuff.

 

[Irish Mist]

Mine did the same this spring. I disconnected the feed in the back of the auto pilot for a min or so and then reconnected it and it worked.. Be careful though as the little pins in the back can bend easy.. I have had this happen before when I do not use the auto pilot regularly.. So I make sure I switch it on when ever I go out, That way I can nap and use the bathroom and keep on trucking... Just kidding 🙂
Good luck

 

[LET IT BE]

I found and corrected the problem with the help of the forum suggestions.
It turns out that one of the two round multi pin connectors on the back of the display head was loose because the plastic hex nut was preventing enough threads exposed for the connector to be tightened and the fist few threads were stripped.
By removing the plastic hex nut it was possible to tighten the connecter and the instrument head "booted up" right away.

 

[baz]

I found and corrected the problem with the help of the forum suggestions.
It turns out that one of the two round multi pin connectors on the back of the display head was loose because the plastic hex nut was preventing enough threads exposed for the connector to be tightened and the fist few threads were stripped.
By removing the plastic hex nut it was possible to tighten the connecter and the instrument head "booted up" right away.

In the computer business jargon this is known as the "wiggle test". One time during my Corp life we had a transient issue with our massive compute cluster that had thousands of data interconnects between its compute nodes. We had to take a weekend outage to "wiggle test" every connection and even though no obvious loose connections were uncovered the whole exercise resolve the issue. Any connection that has many pins involved suffer from the possibility, and at times with certainty, that connections will be compromised. 😱

Poor connections where high voltage/amperage is present can also lead to fire and for boaters this can be at the shore power connection at either end (dock-side or at the boat). We had a situation at my marina a few years ago that I witnessed before my very eyeballs when a guest boat had docked and connected to the dock's shore power pedestal and shortly afterwards the pedestal burst into flames with a gigantic fountain of sparks/pops/crackles etc. The fire engine arrived in short order. The marina was obligated to re-wire the complete guest dock and I have no idea what was given as advice to the guest boat that caused this. Just make sure your shore power cord is attached and seated securely at both ends or look into using the SmartPlug shore power cord for some extra safety as it provides greater electrical connection than the traditional twist/lock connectors ... http://smartplug.com/marine/

 

[Kathy H]

It sure is nice getting able to do a quick search of this forum to find fixes to issues. We followed Irish Mist's advice to unplug and reconnect the back of the auto pilot. It worked. Thank you!

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

 

[Scuba Too]

I'll have to give this a shot as well. Over this last weekend twice the autopilot controller turned off and would not turn back on. Having read this thread earlier 😀 I knew to try powering off everything by turning off the batteries. This worked to allow the autopilot controller to power back up. However it tripped off again while I was underway. I was in known waters with good visibility so it wasn't an issue getting back to port but disconcerting. I didn't want to try to power everything off until I was back in the slip as an abundance of caution - there's always that concern that things won't come back online like the engine 😱