I am in the middle of installing my new deck and XM radio. The XM reciever calls for a constant 12v power source not being shared with the radio. I was thinking about the cig lighter but I think that is switched, I havent checked that yet. Does anybody know of a good source to tap into that is near the radio for a constant 12v?

 

id run a dedicated wire from the PDC or battery. when you start tapping in already engineered circuits you create unwanted problems.. ie: not sharing the radio power source etc etc etc.. easy enough to buy a roll of 10ga or 12 ga wire and run it from the battery throught the firewall (through a grommit) and feed it power from that and then ground at the location.

if you really wanted to stab power from a local spot.. you could meter out some of the 10 and 8 guage wires that are under the steering colum. those are the main branches (or legs) of the key switched and constant powers. if you really want to go this route. your looking for a pink/black and/or a red wire under the colum.. these will give you 12V constant and should be upwards to 30 amp circuits ..

i noticed you already have an alarm with a remote start so more then likley these circuits will be already tapped into so i restate my first statement.. run a dedicated power source.

 

Thats what I was afraid of. The alarm already has a dedicated line running to the fuse block under the hood so I might just do the same with the XM unit. I dont know what has been tapped under the dash for the alarm since I didnt do the install so I am not even going to try to find a source there.

 

On my 97 the cig lighter is constant. Thats where mine goes off of. Spliced it in ehind the dash.

Oh yeah, Sirius is better j/k

 

yea. my 01 has two , one is constant and one is switched.. you gotta remember when you try and share a circuit like that your gonna drop the capability of that original circuit, untill you blow a fuze and then put a larger one in it, then the small 14-16 ga wiring is going to be the week point and thats where problems really start

 

Well the draw is only 2 amps for the XM reviever, so if I tap thepower outlet which is 20 amps(which Ihardly use) it should be ok. The question is, how do I get behind it to tap the wire? Do Ineed to remove the ashtrayor the cup holder to gain access to the wires?

 

just reach up and look behind.. feel around to see if you can disconnect the conection int he back.. meter out the hot and tap into .. remember that its tapped so if you try and plug in one of those 12V compressors that draw alot .. you dont run into any problems.. .. i got one of those little B&D all in one boxes.. its a jump box , compresser flashlight etc etc etc.. and when the comressor runs on the cig. outlight plug it draws a buttload..


you should be fine tho.. its not like you cant change it later..

 

i don't remember if the 99 has the flip down cup holder that isn't above the radio or not, but in my 01 all i had to do was pull out four screws and pull the cup holder out. that allowed me access to the cig lighter and power outlet. you might have to dig around a bit back there but it does allow the room to do it easily. it's still a hack job though.

i would really suggest running the wire from the battery with a 5-10 amp fuse in a seperate holder. or even an inline fuse would work too if you can get the right amperage. i would say you shouldn't need anything more than a3 amp fuse.then if it does spike it will blow the fuse not the xm.

 

The power lead that came with the XM has a 2 amp in line fuse attached to it, but if I were to run from the battery, I was going to add an additional in line fuse holder by the battery. I do have the flip down cup holder, I will try to see if I can gain access to the power outlet there. But the most I plug into the power outlet is my phone charger so I want to leave the battery as a last resort.

 

since the xm already has the inline fuse you don't need to add another one. as for just tapping into the power source just gotta see what amps the charger draws.