Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

Howdy- I need to cover my depth sounder transducer cable with tubing to keep the muskrats from chewing on the cable.Currently I have a stainless wrap on it,but it IS causing my toon to pit from disimiliar metals. My boat lives in a wet slip year round in fresh water.

Thanks,
Robert

I just shoot the muskrats. It makes me and the turtles happy.

When I had my PC in a slip, I used stainless braided jacket as well...never had a pitting problem, but my boat was painted below the waterline. Tons of muskrats up here, they got my transducer cable the first season. You can try painting the SS jacket with antifouling too.

Well I stopped in my local marine store New Hope Marine in Gastonia,NC and Willy the owner, a real salty old cuss... I say hey Willy what do you guys put on your boats to keep the muskrats from eating transducer cables and he tosses this at me.. http://www.docksideinnovations.com/Product.html a stainless spring that is black powder coated,and Willy said the powder coating will keep the stainless from causing electrolysis,so I bought one.

.....What do you guys think? will powder coating keep stainless from causing electrolysis when in the water? ........

Our boat is fresh water that is warmer because it's close to the cooling water from our local coal powdered steam plant.
I'm also getting deterioration on the drive end of our Yamaha 150 motor when I keep my motor in the water, we have a stainless prop, Willy said to keep my motor out of the water to keep from having electrolysis on our motor . I also checked with a few boat owners at my marina,they all said yep,you got to get an aluminum prop,stainless props will eat up your motor in this water.

Cheers,
Robert

Sounds more like an issue with the marina's electrical system if a bunch of people are having the same issue in freshwater.

Might try brass

Here's the muskrat guard I bought, it's powder coated stainless, I have covered it with a plastic cable wrap to keep it from rubbing against my boat and wearing the powder coating, the manufacture says the powder coating will prevent conductivity.

http://www.docksideinnovations.com/Product.html

I'm going to be picking up one of those ASAP. I also like the idea of shooting those buggers, but ammo has gotten a little rare lately.

Muskrats?

We just have black vultures eating everything rubber and water moccasins that like to sun on boat lifts. No rodents.

I cannot imagine that a tiny stainless steel wire covering would cause visible electrolysis. You might use a multimeter to see if there's a small amount of current in the water.

Electricity around a boat dock can be a serious problem. My father dove into the water once and was just about electrocuted. He had crossed the white and black wires (reverse polarity) going to the dock. Polarity doesn't matter on a light bulb, but it does matter on the lift electric motor. The fish floating on top of the water should have been a sign of problems.

^ Yep. I'll bet it's stray current in this case.

Have you considered the alternate solution if you find stray current in the water around the dock? Turn it up.....solves the pesky muskrat issue.(and fresh fish fry's every Friday?)

Ask any electrician for a length of 'BX' cable sheathing. It's aluminum / flexy and varmint proof. Might have to cut/splice somewhere
to feed it through the BX...make the splice up where the wire is out of the way of toothy raiders.

scottm wrote:Ask any electrician for a length of 'BX' cable sheathing. It's aluminum / flexy and varmint proof. Might have to cut/splice somewhere
to feed it through the BX...make the splice up where the wire is out of the way of toothy raiders.

Great idea,thanks!