I had recently asked where some of you mounted your external GPS units. I didn't get an overwhelming response so I figured I'd do my own thing. I'm VERY picky about visible wires and don't like leaving things plugged in to the cig lighter.
Wife bought me a TomTom GPS for Xmas and an ipod to OEM adapter. The TomTom was too wide to put behind the panel where the tractional control is. Here's what I did:
Here is where I mounted it, you have to get rid of the traction control button
Go get something like this from radio shack for 9 bucks. From what I've read you can't just cut the cig cord and hardwire a GPS or you'll fry it b/c of the volts. I just cut these clamps off, hardwired this and plugged the GPS cig plug into that
Alcohol is your friend. Scrub the hell out of any surface your going to put the adhesive plate onto
Remove the dash trim
Traction control button once you take the box apart...I also shorted the light out. I just tucked the button back into the dash. That light gets hot and I didn't want it to touch a wire loom or something and end up burning through it
Put the blanks back in place and wipe them down with alcohol
Cut the clamps off. The positive can stay bare wire. Take the negative and crimp a horseshoe terminal on the wire...you'll be grounding it next.
I grounded it to this screw just above the parking brake
Now you need power. Make sure you use a fuse that has power ONLY when the key is on ACC or the truck is running. I used this 15A fuse on the top left part of the panel.
Put the adhesive disc on the blanks. Let it sit for awhile before mounting the GPS on it. Run the wire behind the carpet and up behind the dash over to the blanks and put the dash trim back in place
Final product
All in all I like having it here. I can unhook it easily when I'm not in the car and no wires are visible anywhere. I wanted to have power running to it when the truck is on but didn't want to have to plug and unplug it each time to get it. This works out well.
Wife bought me a TomTom GPS for Xmas and an ipod to OEM adapter. The TomTom was too wide to put behind the panel where the tractional control is. Here's what I did:
Here is where I mounted it, you have to get rid of the traction control button
Go get something like this from radio shack for 9 bucks. From what I've read you can't just cut the cig cord and hardwire a GPS or you'll fry it b/c of the volts. I just cut these clamps off, hardwired this and plugged the GPS cig plug into that
Alcohol is your friend. Scrub the hell out of any surface your going to put the adhesive plate onto
Remove the dash trim
Traction control button once you take the box apart...I also shorted the light out. I just tucked the button back into the dash. That light gets hot and I didn't want it to touch a wire loom or something and end up burning through it
Put the blanks back in place and wipe them down with alcohol
Cut the clamps off. The positive can stay bare wire. Take the negative and crimp a horseshoe terminal on the wire...you'll be grounding it next.
I grounded it to this screw just above the parking brake
Now you need power. Make sure you use a fuse that has power ONLY when the key is on ACC or the truck is running. I used this 15A fuse on the top left part of the panel.
Put the adhesive disc on the blanks. Let it sit for awhile before mounting the GPS on it. Run the wire behind the carpet and up behind the dash over to the blanks and put the dash trim back in place
Final product
All in all I like having it here. I can unhook it easily when I'm not in the car and no wires are visible anywhere. I wanted to have power running to it when the truck is on but didn't want to have to plug and unplug it each time to get it. This works out well.
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