Problem with Penn electric downrigger

[yukiginger]

Installed used 820 and 825 downriggers on my brother's new boat. We put an inline 30 amp fuse in on 12 gauge wire. One rigger blows the fuse when powering the rigger "up" only. Down it works fine. Other rigger does fine on the same line, etc. Any ideas on what is causing this? We replaced the male plug on the cord from the rigger, tried wiring with 8 gauge wire on the positive from the female plug all the way to the fuse and on to the battery - same effect - blows the inline fuse. Again, one rigger works fine and it only blows the fuse when trying to power up.

All advice welcome. HELP!

MarkG

[rail bird]

I would guess either the moter it'self is having trouble or something is binding. It is easy for the motor to turn when going down because there is little load on it in that direction. What size weights are you trying to pull up? Maybe you have to go down a size with that rigger. Will it work if the boat is not moving? Pulling a weight up through the water while the boat is going 3 mph can take a lot of force. Is there a clutch on the unit that is turned down too tight? Just some things to think about.

[yukiginger]

Greg, thanks for your reply (and your troubleshooting). This was just as we were mounting it to the boat, so not pulling a weight, just some resistance that I provided with my arm, but nowhere near what a 12 lb. weight would provide. My brother spoke with Penn about it and they suggest something in the circuitry, so it's going to them.

Thanks again.

MarkG