I have to say, you cannot have too many 12v plugs in your rig. That said, I have had two Marinco plugs in the rear wired to my Aux battery/household circuits for some time.
This summer while camping, I found out that with my fridge, and trying to keep all the family electronics charged it was time to engineer a better setup.
So, I looked at some offerings for pre-built panels from OZ, but decided to build my own.
Here was the basic design that I worked out. All of the items are marine-grade.
The panel itself was a piece of $1 scrap of black textured ABS from TAP Plastics. I drilled the holes undersized, and filed them to exact fit for the plugs. I used blue tape on the face to work on my layout, then drilled and used the dremel to make it work.
Removed the ash tray, as it was never used, and never would be used. Cut a nice big square hole in the panel, then attached the new panel to the truck using four nut-serts which I have left over from my roof rack.
Here are a few pics.
Steve
Both banks charging nicely, but still need the Engel plug
Relabeled the aux panel
Just a few wires behind the curtain! Plus the pure-sine inverter hiding below the ARB fit kit.
This summer while camping, I found out that with my fridge, and trying to keep all the family electronics charged it was time to engineer a better setup.
So, I looked at some offerings for pre-built panels from OZ, but decided to build my own.
Here was the basic design that I worked out. All of the items are marine-grade.
- Dual Battery Gauge - from Topo - wired to both main and aux
- Two standard "ciga" style sockets - the Marinco's I already had. Each fed by dedicated 10ga wires direct to panel
- One dedicated Topo Engel plug (waiting for this one still, was sent the wrong plug). Also dedicated 10ga wires
- One BlueSea dual 2.1amp USB to charge iPhones, iPad, and Kindle, you name it
- Hazard Switch repurposed and relabeled to turn the gauge and USB on and off
- Two marine fuse plugs for the gauge
The panel itself was a piece of $1 scrap of black textured ABS from TAP Plastics. I drilled the holes undersized, and filed them to exact fit for the plugs. I used blue tape on the face to work on my layout, then drilled and used the dremel to make it work.
Removed the ash tray, as it was never used, and never would be used. Cut a nice big square hole in the panel, then attached the new panel to the truck using four nut-serts which I have left over from my roof rack.
Here are a few pics.
Steve
Both banks charging nicely, but still need the Engel plug
Relabeled the aux panel
Just a few wires behind the curtain! Plus the pure-sine inverter hiding below the ARB fit kit.
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