How not to install into a clients vehicle.

It has been said that mistakes are a good learning experience. I certainly did learn yesterday doing an install in a *NEW* Holden Statesman. I mean 63Km on the clock. This seems like a nice vehicle. Anyway I needed to install a GPRS tracker. Getting the GPS and the cellphone installed were not hard. Power was another issue.

In the Statesman, there is a cigarette lighter in the boot. OK, so I place the unit paralell with this. Good idea. Except that during install I short the power. Fine. It is not turned on. But it was turned on I found. This is ALWAYS ON. So I search for the fuse. Like, how hard can it be. There must be a dedicated fuse. After too long searching I cannot find it, and decide to look for another power source. The client did not care since he never intends to use the socket.

So I find another power outlet – another T connector. Decide to test this first. No voltage. Cant understand it. Decide after a while to use the F-Set to use tones to find the fuse. Ahh, the 20A fuse is not installed. Put one in – borrow one in fact. Looks like a 20A SLOW BLOW. Still no power according to my multi-meter. OK. Something strange. I have a screwdriver with a light. Put that to earth, and found that both the connectors had power on them. Ahh. One is switched and one is unswitched. Perfect. Find an earth and all is sweet…

Well, except for the fact that I put the power cable in backwards. Quick fix of removing a surface mount part from the PCB, and placing a link there.

And so the story ends. Except that the vehicle would not start later when the client tried. Seems that the cigarette was in paralell with the engine management computer or something and the fuse blew…