Thumper charging system install
Hi guys,
I have recently bought myself a new thumper battery and am trying to instal the charging system for it.
The charging system is basically a battery isolator that ensures the battery is only charged whilst the engine is running to prevent the car battery from draining.
The system has 5 wires, two that connect to the cars battery, two that are lead to the thumper and one that connects to an 'ignition activated wire'.
I'm having trouble finding a sutible wire for this, I'm assuming its just any wire that is live when the engine is running. The instructions reccommend looking inside the loom of the windscreen wiper loom but I am unsure about this.
I found one thread on this topic which reccommended using a wire inside the fuse box? I agree that this would be best, but where in the fuse box should I connect it?
Thanks in advance, Ben
And there's the answer ...
On most vehicles, the wiper harness is easy to reach from under the bonnet, and usually has an "igntion activated" wire in it (it's required for the self parking function of the wipers) - one word of caution - on the iO, that is an "accessory activated" wire, as it is live when the key is in the accessory position. I'm not certain how much of a difference that makes to you, but if you leave the key in the accessory position so the radio plays, you could end up draining the starting battery unintentionally.
"accessory activated" wire
Yes Fordem, this is the problem I am having. Both wipers and horn are accessory activated.
Is there not anywhere in the fuse box that I can tap into to get just an ignition activated signal? Or, how hard would it be to get a connection to the ignition switch wired into/from the engine bay?
Finding a safe & easy to reach connection is not that easy ...
If you want an underhood connection point - you can tap into the SuperSelect 4WD solenoids - look on the inner right fender you'll see two solenoids, the black/white wire should have +12V only when the ignition is on - it's fed from a IGN1 via a 10A fuse.
There are probably others, but I don't one risk sending you into an engine or ABS harness.
Syndicate
Why the wiper harness?!?
I know you don't have the answer, but suggesting the wiper harness makes no sense at all - there are easier places to find an "ignition activated" wire - like the ignition switch itself.
There are ignition activated wires in the fuse panel, but given the multitude of wires it can get confusing - it's going to be a lot easier to look under the dash and find the harness going to the ignition switch itself.
As a matter of fact, let's make life easy - look under the driver's side dash, in the very corner near the transmission tunnel, you're going to find the diagnostic connector - it's a 16 pin connector with no more than maybe 6 wires or so in it - connect a meter positive to #16, negative to the mounting bracket - if I'm not mistaken you're going to see +12V on that wire when you switch the ignition on, and 0V when you switch the ignition off.
Have you decided where you're going to mount the charger/isolater? There's quite a bit of room under the dash there, and you can probably run the cables down the right side of the vehicle under the plastic panels.