Wiring Scarab OEM tower on 165 HO Impulse

[stevenk2]

Has anyone ever wired their Scarab OEM wakeboard tower on the 165 HO Impulse? The black folding upper portion of the tower seems like it would be easy enough to drill a hole (or holes) in to run wires through, but they connect to solid brushed aluminum uprights on the sides, and there's really nowhere for wires to go down from there. I suppose you could fix up something with small wire ties or something like that, but that wouldn't look very good, plus I'd question the durability of that kind of setup over time.

I'm considering wiring my tower for some LED lights as well as possibly some tower speakers, but need a way to get wires up there without it being a mess.

 

[stevenk2]

After some thought, I'm wondering if I were to get some marine-rated split wire conduit and some screw-in cable ties, I could probably do a reasonably neat job of extending the wires down one side of the tower upright, likely on the port side so I'm closest to the battery. The next issue will be getting the wire down into the hull so I can attach it to power. I could drill a small hole in the deck near where the tower base attaches; I suppose I could also unbolt the base of the tower to see if it's possible to somehow route the wires down through an existing hole (and/or drill the hole into the base of the tower in lieu of drilling additional holes into the deck).

Some other thoughts on all of this: probably going to have to be careful and use marine-grade fasteners throughout, specifically ones that won't react badly with aluminum in wet conditions (for when I screw the cable fasteners into the upright); I will need to make sure that I use grommets anywhere the wire conduit passes through material to avoid chafing/wearing the conduit and possibly through to the wire; wiring will need to have sufficient slack in it and/or the ability to move a bit in order to continue to allow the top of the tower to be folded; will probably need to seriously consider upgrading to a dual-battery system, especially if I do some kind of combo clamp-on bar with tower speakers and such.

If I do end up doing this project, I'll post up pics to show progress and results. In the meantime, if any of you foresee any potential issues with my plan, now would be a really good time to speak up before I dig in.

 

[stevenk2]

Okay, I looked at it last night after I got home, and it looks as though there won't be a way to get the wires down through the deck/hull without drilling - the base of the tower is bolted to the hull using two big bolts, and the holes in the hull where the bolts go through are reinforced with a solid metal backing plate (which I don't think I want to mess around with given the stress the tower deals with). There should be enough space just to the side of the tower mount on the deck to drill a small hole to allow the wires/conduit to pass through without compromising anything. Also, it's interesting to note that the plug for the navigational light tower is just aft of the starboard side of the tower upright, which I may be able to utilize as a power tap somehow. Ideally, it would be nice to just get rid of those goofy ports for the nav lights at the bow and stern anyways and get some kind of omnidirectional nav light mounted atop the tower instead (though I need to check out regs on those to make sure I'm still in compliance with CG rules).

Also, there is a crease that runs down the length of the solid aluminum piece of the tower upright that may be an ideal place to run the wire conduit. It wouldn't hide the conduit completely, but it would give it somewhat of a channel to rest in that would help to guide it down the upright to the hull/deck.