Is the ashtray cigarette lighter socket supplied from leisure battery ?

[hubert72]

Hoping someone can help, is the cigarette lighter socket in the ashtray supplied from the leisure battery or the main starter battery ?

Reason I ask is that i recently bought a dash cam and noticed that the cig lighter socket is live all the time even with ignition off, so the camera does not start and stop as it should, it just continuously records.

Not a problem but I wondered which battery is was draining if left on all the time. There is a second socket on top of the dashboard in the tray which is also live all the time.

 

[SimplyDubs]

Fed from main starter battery... standard T5 equipment and not part of the habitation package.

 

[hubert72]

Fed from main starter battery... standard T5 equipment and not part of the habitation package.

ta, I could have done with a supply that works only with ignition so not on all the time, it isn't a major problem been on all the time but im not sure how power hungry these cameras are.

 

[GrannyJen]

ta, I could have done with a supply that works only with ignition so not on all the time, it isn't a major problem been on all the time but im not sure how power hungry these cameras are.

I have the same, dash cam not turning off.

It draws very little current, mine has been left recording for 3 days, but as a precaution I would advise either disconnecting or turning the cam off every time that you park up to avoid draining the battery.

 

[larrylamb]

Think the socket on the top of the dash is from the leisure batteries and cigarette lighter socket from the main engine battery. There was a recent thread on this "Flat engine battery"

 

[motacyclist]

If you don't mind some dismantling of the dash, there will be an ignition sense wire going to the radio. If you can identify this you may be able to tap in on it. It will on the standard DIN connector to the radio, Google should know which one it is.

On second thoughts, maybe you shouldn't do this - might upset the canbus system and odd things may happen - someone may give advice on this.

 

[AlanC]

Hanover re-wire the cup holder 12volt socket for the SE. This is certainly fed from the leisure batteries on my 2010 van, as I pulled a fuse under the seat to wire in the dash top version I fitted. This was confirmed by a volt meter waving VW tech before I did the mod.

Alan

 

[Pete M]

My cup holder 12v socket blows the fuse every couple of months! Anyone have this issue?
I've checked the wiring I can see and it all looks ok, don't think it's a good idea to put my 240v Mega on it
Oh yeah it's not being caused by coffee/beer ingress.

 

[Rhyddin]

I also bought a dash cam and had this same challenge. I decided to buy the hardwire kit for mine (£11 from Amazon for the Next Base kit). This plugs directly into the fuse box, behind the centre console (which does, as people have said, feed from the main battery). It piggy backs off a current fuse without interrupting that particular circuit - simple but clever.

However, like you have pointed out, every larger fuse I tested with a multimeter carries 12v with or without the key. But, I found that one of the physically smaller fuses at the top middle of the board does power down without the key. The kit came with an adaptor for both so I popped it in, fed the cable through the dash & up the pillar to the camera and it now powers up when I turn the key and down when I get out.

You do need to earth the feed to complete the circuit and I found using the body coloured bolt behind the side panel of the dash was the perfect solution: when you open the door, that end panel which sits flush against the closed door just pulls off and the bolt is visible behind.

I'm no auto electrician, by the way - this really is quite easy to do yourself. Mines a T6 but I'm confident most things will be in the same place.

Hope that helps.