Question for any car electrical gurus

[NRG]

So I am trying to install a dashcam which it gets its power from a 12v cigarette socket. Now I want to hardwire this to the fuse box so I can free up the socket in the cabin.

I have located the cigarette lighter fuse and it has a 15amp fuse in it and I plan to use a "tap a fuse" to hardwire this in.

Now my first question is if I tap it here, would I overload the circuit somehow? For example if it is hardwired to the cam and then I tried to charge a phone with the cabin socket.

My second question is could I tap it to another fuse location which has higher than 15amp fuse? This leads to my third question which is how do I know how high of an amp fuse that will work with the cam if it doesn't state it.

Thanks in advance!

[Macky]

if you hardwire it to the cigarette socket fuse, then yes, it will blow the fuse once you plug in something to the power socket. i would wire it to something else with at least 15A. doesnt the camera plug tell you the rating?

[NRG]

I looked everywhere in the manual and on the plug itself and didn't find any ratings...I am assuming since it has a cigarette lighter adapter, it is safe with 15amps...But now the question is if I wire it to say 20 amps, would that do harm to either the charger or the camera....

[Macky]

i wouldnt go higher. find another 15A free fuse in the fuse box. since it was designed to be plugged on the socket, then its assumed it is rated for the max on that, which is 15A.

[NRG]

So I did find out that it is DC 5volts if that means anything...Not sure how that relates to amps

[Macky]

how many watts? volts alone dont mean anything

[NRG]

No idea, it didn't disclose this...but anyhow thanks for confirming some information for me. I will just try to find another 15a source which also need to be ignition triggered so it is not always on. Thanks again!

[Macky]

no problem. ive been tinkering about adding stuff to the car too by directly wiring through the fuse box using those add-a-circuit plugs.

just follow the rule of thumb, since its being plugged in to the socket, its already assumed even the fuse in the camera plug should be a 15A fuse.

good luck!

[rawger]

If I wasn't buzzed and drinking I would help you cuz I have electrical experience cuz that's what I do but to much reading for me. But your in good hands with Macky. I'll read tomorrow and if nobody hasn't said anything that can help you then I'll post it tomrrow. But for now nothing but fun for me.

[NRG]

Just a quick update on this. I was not able to find any other switched 15 amp locations so I ended up just piggybacking the cigarette fuse and it works fine even when I have another accessory charging a phone in the cabin socket so no blown fuse...all good.