Boat grounding question

[Snake River King]

Hey guys I have a quick question for you and tell me if this is right to do or not.

I have a 17' alumimum bass boat and I run 2 batterys. 1 starting and 1 trolling battery. The starting battery only powers the engine the other powers lights, bildge, bow mount, radio and locator.

I grounded the negitive on the trolling battery to the boat with a big black wire so I only have to run power wires to my lights, bildge ect. Is this smart to do or should I run black negitive wires back?

My next question is I just purchased a cabelas Prosport battery charge a month ago and I screwed the unit right to the grounded boat and connected the cables and I worked fine until now the unit wont turn on? Being that my boat was grounded do you think it shorted it out?

[boatfixer]

Never use the hull as a ground. Always run wires. You can run a larger gauge to a common terminal but again, don't use the hull. You will run into corrosion and electrosis issues.

[Eelpout08]

+1

[CAMAN]

+2!!

And if your positive wire insulation gets damaged somehow, you have a very BAD situation if there is no fuse inline.