Originally Posted by
MOP
I bet you don't have a clean power circuit for your accessories! Common most just take power from where ever they can under the dash, 99 & 44 100% of the time they take power from a #14 wire. Very few small boats have a bus bar at the helm with #10 wire for both power and ground fused at the battery, electricity is very much like water it needs a large enough wire/pipe to flow enough to power the extras.
I'm going to place my bet with MOP. I'm assuming the VHF isn't stock and it was added by some previous owner. Most Average Joe's don't know squat about electricity beyond red for positive, so I'd bet they just found a hot wire and spliced into it.
But after that, I'm also be highly suspect of a grounding problem. People also tend to forget electricity is a round trip, and just as you can't simply keep tyeing more loads to a given hot lead, you have the same issue with ground leads.
Don
'01 22 Classic, 502/B1
And a bunch of other stuff
"If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough" - Mario Andretti