Need help wiring up a TomTom Rider Satnav to the battery!

Freeman

Freeman

Freeman

Soldato
Joined
24 Jul 2004
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5,565
I recently purchased a TomTom Rider. Great bit of kit, but I have no idea how to hook it up to my Bonneville's battery.

I initially thought I'd just connect the red to the red, and black to the black but it turns out I'd probably need to undo/unravel this which seems a bit odd (I know I'd need to strip the ends...) because the wires don't reach each terminal. Which got me thinking, should it be directly connected to the battery anyway?

ra2t91.jpg


I've read online and it just confuses me more. Some people say connect it to the light, some say it'll blow the Satnav and other say straight to the battery. Surely if it's meant to connect straight to the battery, TomTom would have supplied me with the necessary connectors to make it a bit easier?

I have no idea about the electrics on my bike, but here's a pic. Maybe someone can help me out a bit? I don't have any experience with this sort of thing unfortunately.

Thanks.

1z14iys.jpg
 
TallPaul_S said:
Fit a relay.

It's really not that hard once you understand how it works.

I have heated grips and a 12v socket on my bike powered this way.

In simple terms, a relay is a switched switch. One side of the relay has power coming from a switched live - i.e. one that is only live when the bike ignition is on. Rear light is perfect for this. The other 'end' of this goes to ground/battery negative. The other side of the relay goes to the battery positive, this side actually powers your things. The other end of this goes to the thing you want to power.

So, you need a wire from a switched live, straight to the relay.
One from the relay to ground/battery negative.

Then, one from battery positive - this will need an inline fuse
the remaining wire from the relay to your tomom.

doing it this way means your tomtom is powered directly from the battery, but is protected and won't discharge your bike if left on when the engine is turned off.


(I've actually done a little more than this, with a connector block for the power and ground so that i can power multiple things, but ignore this for now ;) )
Click to expand...

That all sounds good, but I'd have no idea where to put what wire. What's an inline fuse? Where do I buy them? How do I connect them?

Literally peeps the most I know about wiring is how to change a fuse in a plug.

Are there any guides I can look at? Reading seems to be no use to me because I don't understand the technical terms.

Thanks for the help so far though.
 
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