Hoping someone has an answer. A while back I lost the cigarette lighter on my 2011 FLHTK while going down the road (don't smoke and didn't know it even had a cigarette lighter at the time). With this new found knowledge, the "good idea fairy" told me I should hook my Garmin GPS to the cigarette lighter. It worked for about five minutes before it quit. I noticed the ACC Switch was no longer working, so I took it in to the dealer (you don't have to say it, BIG mistake). They told me the fuse and switch were fine, but that a wire had grounded out.(Seems odd for a brand new bike). They got the switch working again, so I hooked up my GPS again and within a minute or two, the GPS quit working and so did the ACC switch.

I have not replaced the cigarette lighter that fell out, figured there was no need since I don't smoke, so I don't know if the cigarette lighter is working. I checked the ACC fuse and it is good. I saw in another post that the P&A fuse is actually the fuse that controls the cigarette lighter, so I am going to check it when I get home today, however, and I am not by any means an electrical SME, but the power outlet in my tour pack is also a 15A fuse and the GPS works fine when plugged in to that port.

All this being said, I know the service manual states that the cigarette lighter is not "intended" to be used with external accessories, but I want to MAKE IT work. My initial thought is to put in a bigger fuse, 20A instead of the 15A? Thanks in advance for the help.

 

Do ****NOT**** put a larger fuse in there. Fuses are intended to blow rather than cooking the electronic device or the wiring. If you put a larger fuse in there, you risk the chance of burning out the wiring or your GPS.

 

there must be something wrong with your ground or something i have a GPS on my bike and my wife has one on hers. we both use the cig lighter to power them and no problems what so ever. just saying.

 

There is one thing I can tell you for sure... the problem is NOT your GPS drawing too much current. Trust me, a metal coil heating to red hot (cig lighter) draws a lot more juice than a GPS.

I believe the owners manual warns against using the cig lighter for accessories is simply because unless your accessory has a very short plug, it will hit the tank.

Did you buy the bike new? I doubt the cig lighter "fell out." It was probably removed because plugging anything into the socket causes something to short out. I believe the cig lighter assembly is defective somehow.

 

Replace the lighter, see if it's use will also cause the problem. Then take it back so the dealer can find the short

 

agree that the problem is not the current draw difference between a lighter and a gps. so , does using a lighter blow the fuse. also agree that putting in a large fuse is the wrong answer. also agree that the warning not to use the cig lighter socket for accessory is more likely an issue related to urn clearance with the gas tank. Do we know if anything else is connected to the ACC switch since you indicate that when the cig lighter fuse blows the acc switch goes out as well.

 

You are absolutely right, 15 amps is quite a bit of power and a GPS draws at most somewhere around 3 or 4 amps. It is a very small "computer", nothing more. Definitely not anything like the small fire breathing cigarette lighter that goes in that socket.

 

check the wiring on your lighter socket. there have been quite a few folks that have found that they were wired backwards. the center piece should be hot, and the outer is your ground.

 

As another said; check to make sure the orange wire is hot and the black is connected to the case (ground) and don't change the fuse size. On my Ultra I had to replace the socket with the accessory socket (direct replacement) that HD sells because the lighter socket would not work as a power point.

 

I think your problem is that it's wired backwards, the cigarette lighter test will not work it doesn't care where the power comes from, but the GPS does, use a meter and check it. Like was said before the center should be 12v and the case to ground.