I really dig my new Garmin, and when I wire up my gauges on Wednesday I also want to permanently wire up my Garmin. I found a plug that fits it, but I'm not sure how to wire it up.

I know which wire is the positive ( I'm PRETTY sure ... LOL ), but this adapter used to be an AC adapter. I just cut the AC part off ... LOL. So, do I fuse what used to be the postive wire and ground the other?

I know all of this sounds stupid, but given that wireing on cars seems to be the opposite of wireing a house now I'm confused ( easily done ) Do I fuse what used to be the positive and ground the other, or fuse the other and ground what used to be the postive?

Here's what it looks like ...

 

Mayfair, fuse the positive as close to the source as possible. Then just ground the other wire

 

I know it sounded stupid, and that's what I was planning on doing anyway, but I stop and think sometimes because for some strange reason they use the black wire as a ground in cars, whereas the black wire is the hot in my home.

Why can't we all be on the same page ?? Is it really that difficult ??

 

Before you hook up check the back of the GPS to make sure its not 3.7V or some odd Voltage. Id hate to see you burn up a perfectly good unit. Once you find the votage use the V= IR ruel to find the correct resistor sodder it in seiries with the positive wire before the GPS unit then plug it in and cross your fingers..... or do what i do find a buddy with the same unit as yours and plug his in first.

 

The cigarette lighter adapter has a sticker on it that says it has a 2AMP 220 volt fuse in it, so I think I'm fine there.

I hope ...

 

if your garman is only a 3 volt or somthing like that you will get 12 volts out of the truck.. thats why most plugs either have a bigger than you need plug or a spot in the wire where it looks like filter. that is usually a resistor to drop the 12 volts down to 3 volts. check the data plate on your Garman to see what the voltage is.

 

We'll do .... THANKS for the tip !!

 

You can also unplug the wire from the gramin unit and measure resistance of each wire. If there is a resistor in there that'll tell you the garmin isn't a 12v system. But by the way things look, just get a positive and a negative and your good to go.

 

I managed to get it all wired up tonight and it works great !! It was 12 volts, not 3 so I was good to go.

Thanks for your help fellas !!