Bought a used 20002 Jeanneau sailboat last year that has a ST6001 autopilot that would not stay in auto. Did some troubleshooting and found the power supply wires into the course computer were not securely connected. I cleaned up the wire ends and re-connected as best I could and the auto pilot worked perfectly....for a weekend. Then back to the same issue, would fail from auto to standby almost immediately. I believe that the wire connection is the problem but need advice on a good method to secure the connection. The wire is #10 wire, which per the manual is the proper wire size to use, but the jaws of the connection at the course computer will not open any where close to wide enough to accept #10 wire. Have considered splicing on a short piece of smaller gauge wire or crimping on some type of pin connector that will fit into the jaws of the terminal. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Brian
Welcome to the Raymarine Forum Brian,
The most common cause for the reported problem is, as you have suggested, insufficient power resulting from intermittent/poor electrical connections or depleted batteries. It is recommended that the power and ground cabling supplying the autopilot's power be disconnected, inspected, and re-connected (from the autopilot course computer through any distribution blocks / panel to the batteries) to ensure that adequate gauge wire/cable has been used through and that all connections are free of corrosion and tight. With regard to connecting the 10 gauge able to the course computer's power terminals, either of your two suggestions are satisfactory to address supplying power to the autopilot course computer.
The second cause for such issues may be an intermittent SeaTalk communications path between the autopilot control head. It is recommended that the SeaTalk communications paths (power (red), data (yellow), and ground (shield) leads) be disconnected, inspected, and re-connected (from the autopilot course computer through any terminal strips or junction blocks / boxes) to ensure that that all connections are free of corrosion and tight.