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Ford Explorer Community - Maintenance - Modifications - Performance Upgrades - Problem Solving - Off-Road - Street
Explorer Forum Covers the Explorer ST, Explorer Sport, Explorer Sport Trac, Lincoln Aviator, Mercury Mountaineer, Mazda Navajo, Ford Ranger, Mazda Pickups, and the Ford Aerostar
You can probably use a 20A or 30A fuse there. Find the item that you will be using in the outlet that draws the most current, and go up a couple of amps over that. With the wire gauge you used, you can carry a lot of current.
I fuesed the lead from the battery to the distribution block under the seat with a 30 amp fues as close to battery as possible. The lead from the dist block to the outlet is fused with a 25 amp fuse located as close to dist block as possible.
aldive, thats what i did, i hard wired my power inverter under the front passenger seat. for the power wire to the inverter i used 8 gauge straigh to the battery with a 40 amp inline fuse, then from the invertor i modified some extension cords and rigged to outlets up in my home made console an the rear. i got 2 in the front and 2 in the rear, ill put some pics up tommorrow night(i love this digital camera!!!! makes postin pics so much fun)
heres a pic of my front outlets the 2 yellow ones in the center are the ac outlets, and the 2 on either side of those are another set of 12volt outlets:
Dead Link Removed
and one of the invertor, i would have taken a better pic but im feelin sick and hangin at that angle doesnt agree wiht my stomach, but here ya go:
Dead Link Removed
maybe ill do a write up on it if i get to feelin better.
aldive, i havent had any problems with noise at all, i use it to power my vcr and the vcr has no problems with it at all
its rated at 350watts continuos and 600 watts surge, i think it is a vector or somethin like that, i know it came from sam's and cost about 35 bux, it does a good job, i even use to power a box fan and a 4.5 amp drill when im workin on my ex and it has no problems at all. my dad went bakc to sam's to buy himself one but now for 40 bux they got a 400 watt continous/800 surge. i even used it to power a camcorder and got no noise what soever, so im pleased with it
This thread is kinda old but maybe you can still help. I have a 400/800 watt inverter that I want to hard wire. Did you guys just cut off the DC pulg and splice into the cig. lighter wires? It is possible to do it that way right? I read that someone used 8 gauge wire directly to the battery. Why is that necessary if these things are designed to run off the cig. lighter? Please tell me any info you have. Thanks.
its *possible* to just slpice it like that, but running directly to the battery is "better" for heavy uses. i like to over engineer this hind of stuff, makes it very relaible and doesn't affect the "normal" operation of the vehicle's other systems (as much) if something goes wrong.
i have a friend with a 2,000W inverter, wired directly to a 2nd, isolated battery.
i curently have a 300W, floating around here somewhere... but i'm considering a larger unit, permantly installed.
alright well if i used 8 or 10 gauge wire and ran it directly to the battery, I am still connecting it to the smaller gauge wire that is on the inverter itself. Isnt it only as strong as the weakest point? Would it make more sense to use the same guage wire that is on the inverter and run it directly to the battery?
ok, so where do I come off the fuse block? what size fuse? its a 400/800 watt inverter. when I cut the cig. lighter plug off, how do I know which is positive and which is neg?
The 12v in ( 8 g ) is direct from the battery to the fuse block. One side of fuse block powers the inverter ( located under drivers side rear seat ) and the other side powers a 12 v outlet, located next to the 115v outlet in the rear compartment ( drivers side ).
The fuse block is a device that accepts input power ( in this case via 8 g wire directly from the battery. It jas 1 locations for fuses. After each fuse wire is run to whatever device you want.
oooo i thought you were talking about the fuse block under the hood. I dont think I need a fuse block. I have 8 or 10 gauge wire with a 30 Amp fuse in it from an old car stereo amp I used to have. Can I just use that with the 30A fuse?
