Skeeter Tilt & Trim Issue

Good Morning, the trim down circuit became intermittent and now doesn't work at the shifter & bow switch, it works properly at the outboard. Took gear shifter switch apart to clean it, it was clean. Ordered replacement switch thinking I had a broken wire, found continuity on the hot wire and the blue down wire. Took shifter apart followed the wire till it gets into a bundle and disappears. Trying to find where the wires go so I can run a bypass wire for the down circuit does anyone have experience with this? I was told a while back that Skeeter wiring did not change over the years they just kept adding things. Thanks for any help.

My Yamaha had the same issue. It was a faulty relay.

Not to hijack the thread but is the relay on the engine? My blinker trim has never worked on my boat since I bought it. I haven't spent any time trying to figure out why it's not working.

The relays are on the motor and it would be easy enough to switch the two and see if your problem reverses itself. Easy enough to throw new relay or relays on. Otherwise, your left with where the switches and/or connections make contact.

More times than not a switch is just wet, can be either position. But if switch or switches are wet, it's time for new. If you had her out in big rain or even a heavy dew, then this problem just showed up, your switch or switches wet, most of the time it's just one switch though.

I will check the relay thank you, question does the switch on the motor use the same relay? Because it does work. I did check both front and shifter switchs and they not wet.

If the switch on the motor works, the relays are good. You have a wiring issue. Find where the wiring comes from the back and find the connection is made to the switch on the control. Should be some kind of plugin in the wiring harness. Disconnect and short between the red and the green/blue. Green is down, blue is up. If this works the wiring is good to the motor. If not you have a wiring issue in that area. A lot of the times the plugin gets corroded and causes the problem you described as it affects both of the other switches.

Agree; if the tilt/trim works at the outboard and the trim up (blue wire) works at the throttle/binnacle and bow; but the trim down doesn't work at the throttle/binnacle and bow, you likely have a short to ground in the green wire.

The most likely location is in the throttle handle/binnacle (years of moving the throttle back and forth rubbed the green wire insulation and wire)

Sounds like you are not blowing a fuse when you try the trim down from the throttle and bow or you would then not be able to trim down from the outboard switch.

Wire continuity detectors can be helpful localizing the short.

Try to follow the wires from the bow switch back to the console and see if you can find where they spliced the bow wires into the wiring harness for the throttle lever trim switch. I am not familiar with the way Skeeter does their wiring at all, but I would figure those two switches will terminate there at the console area. It's just digging and pulling around in the wiring harness to find that connection, mainly digging and pulling real easy so as not to jack anything else up lol...

I was able to find where the gear shifter switch ties into the harness and it did not have continuity from the plugs to the shift switch but in the main wiring was still shorted. Does anyone know where the plug is? I have stuck my head back there and cannot really see much, I am not a flexible as I once was. Getting old sucks. If I can just find this main plug then I could just run bypass wires and go around the short. Thank you for your input on this I appreciate it.

Getting old doesn't help at all when trying to get in under the console lol. I have my body so beat up and jacked bad enough anymore that can get me in trouble in places, I am speaking from experience on that also...

Most of the harnesses have the plugs right at or around the area where it comes through the gunnel up and into the console area. They usually have enough slack in the harness to separate it all out so you can sort through all of it.
The one thing may be a tie-strap or 3 that they pulled up tight to hold the wires, little hoses and xducer cables snug and tiddy. So you may need to snip those real easy.

Got educated that before you use continuity to find a wiring problem you have to de-energize the circuit or you will be chasing your tail and putting your meter at risk. Once I did that I started at the switch and checked continuity from the gearshift switch and started working back towards the outboard. Found the problem was where the main 10 pin wire harness goes into the outboard. I ran a new light green wire back to the shifter around the break and wala I have a working down trim circuit.

Thanks for sharing what you found. Glad you got it fixed as well.

Glad you found the short.
The wires going to the outboard harness and the harness itself are also common trouble areas--years of steering right/left and tilting the motor up and down can rub the wires as they cross the transom, as they enter the cowling, or at the cowling harness.