It's doable, but unless you plan on leaving it on constantly, I probably wouldn't recommend it.

I believe that the nuvi systems have a SOLID 3-4 hours of battery life (I think this because I've used mine for over 2 hours and still had 1/2 the bars remaining). So, if you just use it if needed, you can charge it as needed too.

Now, the TomTom on the other hand, got about 1.5-2 hours on the battery tops, before it started blinking that the battery was low.

 

BTW, there's really no need to use a female 12v cig adapter, unless you want to have an extra cig adapter and/or want to salvage the nav's charger cable.

You could easily just cut off the male adapter on the nav charger, determine which side is negative and which is positive, and then use the add-a-fuse to wire it up. Whichever way works is fine...they both use the same logic, just one salvages the adapter, and one doesn't.

In terms of finding a good power source: you have to determine how you want it to work (ie- just in the on position, works in ACC, or works all the time even with ign off). If you use an add-a-fuse, you just tap into an appropriate fuse that does what you want.

HOWEVER, be careful with what you tap in to. Theoretically, you don't want to tap into things that will affect the car immensely if the fuse blows due to the nav system. For example, tapping into things like the gauge cluster, air bags, headlights, etc would not be advised. Things like the radio itself (assuming nothing else feeds off the same circuit) could possibly be ok. But, you have to check your owner's manual to see what fuse does what. Some fuses may have more than one function.

Now for the disclosure statement: I am NOT an electrician...I'm just providing some statements based off personal experience of observing/doing similar things before.

 

About hardwiring... Don't know which model you're planning to get, but for the 660, the cigarette lighter adapter is also the traffic receiver. So you'll need a female adapter if you want to keep that feature. I pay for the traffic service and it comes in handy sometimes.

 

I was thinking in case i ever went into someone else's car that didn't have nav and we needed it, it would be nice to have the power cable. Also, if I ever decide to sell the unit and upgrade...gotta have the power cable!

So for the add-a-circuit adapter, how does that tap into the fuse box? Can I just run it to the fuse box on the driver's side?

Thanks for the help mike, phoenx!

 

The add-a-fuse plugs into an existing fuse. So, you take out the factory fuse, then place the add a fuse in it's place. Then, you place the factory fuse into the add-a-fuse, and also insert a fuse to handle the accessory that's being added. Basically, it's like a Y connection. You have the factory fuse in it's correct location, and have a wire coming off the add-a-fuse that goes to your power wire for the accessory. And, I'm almost positive that you still have to connect the ground wire from your accessory to an appropriate chassis ground.

Now, another thing you could do, if you're thinking about just adding a female cig adapter: theoretically you could just splice it into the existing cig adapter, at the wires behind the factory adapter. Again, this makes like a Y connection.

Unfortunately, this is just about all the help that I can provide. I've only personally observed all of the aforementioned "changes" that I've talked about. I know the concepts behind all of them, and know that they should work (based off personal experience), but couldn't tell you the best way to go about doing the mods yourself. Sorry.

 

Ah...I see how that works now...

Another theory question...if you create the Y connection like you mentioned to the factory cig adapter and I have two components hooked up to it (say, the nav unit and my phone charger..). They won't be receiving the "full" amount of power anymore right? So in other words, I wouldn't be able to feed 2 power sources at the same time..yes?

 

doesn't the antenna need to have clear view of the sky? and those that have these stand alone units in the concrete jungle (aka NYC) how is the reception? is the unit having hard time locking onto the satellites?

 

can you get more pictures of that friction mount... I have a Navman and i've been trying to find a good stable mount to go on my dash and not the windshield

 

I would just get a second power cable for when you want to use it on another car. It will make the hardwire install much neater and easier when you have to transport it to another car.

 

Actually, I think the answer is NO, and that it would probably be OK. It should be no different than just buying a male to 2 female DC adapter from Radio Shack. My only concern would be perhaps having too much load on the 12V, which may blow a fuse. But, with those two power sources, I don't think it would be a problem, especially for the short time that they may be used together. But, I'm honestly not sure.

 

It's the same one that's available from best buy, etc, made by Garmin specifically for their ball mount set-up. It's the 4-arm based one, with a spot in the center to slide the bottom of the male ball mount in to, which is then used hold the power mount for the garmin. The center arm can rotate 360* if you unlock the mount, so that you can fine tune the adjustment.

There is another one available at best buy, which is a circular bean bag with a disk in the center that can be used for any nav system. All you do is connect the windshield mount to disk in the center.

I really like the garmin one. I got that one because it is the right one for my nav system. It doesn't slide at all, and has some nice features to ensure that the mount stays locked in to it. If you just go to best buy's website, and type in friction mount, it should come up. It looks identical to that, except that it doesn't say garmin in gold....it doesn't say anything there (must be an old pic)

 

It gets very good reception. I even get a reception from my living room. Plus my IS has a moonroof, so that allows an extra view of the sky. Even with the moonroof cover closed, I still get a good reception. Usually less than 20 feet of accuracy. The new Nuvi reception is amazing. I also bought an external antenna, but never even opened it because I was surprised how well the internal antenna worked. I use to have an old Garmin V and you definitely needed a clear view of the sky.

 

I'll concur. I can get reception inside my house too, assuming I'm somewhat close to a wall.

 

Before you go any further with this... on my IS250, the fuse box in the engine compartment just above the ECU on the driver's side. How would you wire it from there to inside the passenger compartment? Wouldn't that require drilling?

 

I also want to mount an iMate PDA2L PDAphone that I use as a GPS and I'm thinking about the Kuda center vent mount. It's much closer to the horizon line so you don't need to take your eyes of the roas as much as you would if looking at a low-mounted GPS in the center console. Also, it doesn't block one vent because it straddles that space between the two front vents.

The pics at the link are of a mounted iPod, but the mount supports larger devices. Click through to go to kudausa.com and they have pictures of the center vent mount with a PSP.