Idiot moment!!

If you make a battery pack for your depth finder, and put the batteries in before you pack, make sure that the leads don't touch or you'll drain the pack.

Just checked prior to leaving in the morning and my batteries were dead as week old carp.

Glad I checked before I left!!!!!

moosedoggie: "Idiot moment!!

If you make a battery pack for your depth finder, and put the batteries in before you pack, make sure that the leads don't touch or you'll drain the pack.

Just checked prior to leaving in the morning and my batteries were dead as week old carp.

Glad I checked before I left!!!!!"

I learned the same lesson before I left home a while back. It's too easy to have things connect in packs! Great thing to share...

I put wire nuts on the battery pack leads to insulate them and then use the same wire nuts to connect my locator when needed.

Good teaching moment for everyone here. Be glad you only lost your battery power. Shorting out a battery pack will cause heat and possibly a fire.

What leads? I can't picture what happened since mine has no exposed wires. My Garmin has a power lead that looks like this (red tip):
http://www.boatersland.com/images/cache/Garmin-010-11678-10-Power-Cord-for-Echo-Series-1801462541643.jpg

newguy: "What leads? I can't picture what happened since mine has no exposed wires. My Garmin has a power lead that looks like this (red tip):
http://www.boatersland.com/images/cache/Garmin-010-11678-10-Power-Cord-for-Echo-Series-1801462541643.jpg"

I think he made a battery pack with leads off the pack wires, then he attaches the clips to the connector ends.
The way I did it when I made mine was to connect the battery leads right to the power source with insulated male/female leads. That way there was no chance of shorting out the battery pack.