Crazy Cigerette Lighter

[Boss Hawg]

I put a new Lighter in my boat & wired it direct to my cranking battery - When i push it in with everything shut off (key off) my gas gage goes to full
With engine running it makes the gage move a little also, soon as it pops out gas gage retuns to proper position -------
Ideas? Would it just be better to run it off my trolling battery?

 

[j_martin]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

I put a new Lighter in my boat & wired it direct to my cranking battery - When i push it in with everything shut off (key off) my gas gage goes to full
With engine running it makes the gage move a little also, soon as it pops out gas gage retuns to proper position -------
Ideas? Would it just be better to run it off my trolling battery?

It shouldn't affect your gauges at all. You have a serious wiring fault somewhere, probably a ground.

Find it before it strands you.

hope it helps
John

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

What did you ground the shell of the ligher to? And you did connect the center terminal to the POS battery post -- correct?.

 

[Boss Hawg]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

What did you ground the shell of the ligher to? And you did connect the center terminal to the POS battery post -- correct?.

Grounded to a grounding spot on the fuse panel & ran hot to battery -
Its a 1987 Starcraft fiberglass bassboat-

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

I don't think you have the ground on the lighter connected to ground on the fuse panel. I feel you have it on a non-ground position so when you punch the lighter you are actually feeding the gauge. Better check the ground connection.

 

[ridefst]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

Yeah, there's not often a "grounding spot" on the fuse panel. It's generally all positive voltage.
Try running a ground straight back to the neg battery terminal, since a cig lighter can often draw quite a bit of current (depending what you plug into it), direct wiring (with some sort of fuse in the pos wire) is probably the best bet.

 

[Boss Hawg]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

Thanks, i'll keep it simple & safe & just run both wires to trolling motor battery

 

[flargin]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

if you do have a fuse panel with a ground section... run the ground back to the battery and connect it to the ground section. You existing ground line is falty, and this would be just the start of your problems. This would likely prevent other problems.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

Most modern fuse panels do indeed have a ground bus on them but some folks simply don't understand that or understand a little but still make incorrect connections.

 

[Boss Hawg]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

if you do have a fuse panel with a ground section... run the ground back to the battery and connect it to the ground section. You existing ground line is falty, and this would be just the start of your problems. This would likely prevent other problems.

That was it
All working great now
Thanks to all!!

 

[flargin]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

Great to hear.

You may want to spend a few minutes to figure out what happened to the ground that is not working.

 

[Boss Hawg]

Re: Crazy Cigerette Lighter

Great to hear.

You may want to spend a few minutes to figure out what happened to the ground that is not working.

Most defintely up on my list
The wireing was (still is) the only real PIA in this new to me boat