24v 12v compatibility

[fogblanket]

I am by know means an electrician but I manage if it is strait forward. I have wired alot of stuff in my car and some in my house so I am not scared of electricity. but prefer directions when tackling an electicity project.
that said I bought a overhead center consul unit for my fj62 that was out of a hj61 the over head cluster has an inside outside temp guage and an altimeter as well as 2 map lights and the wiring for a sunroof. while I don't plan on running an electric sunroof the other gadgets would be nice ot get working. I know with the map lights I can change the bulbs to 12 v. in that I did that on my 24v trailer lights to get them to work on 12v.
anyway I have dual batteries can I rig up a circuit to run just this cluster or do I need to figure something else out?
thanks Jason

 

[Mad Jack]

Well, as I thought about this one, at first I was thinking piece of cake....but as your system is a 12v base and not 24v based and how a dual battery system is hooked up, I hit a wall when trying to come up with a way to hook up batteries in series with you current system. Couldn't come up with much, so I started to look around to see if there was a booster or something like a converter/inverter kind of thing to take 12v and make it 24v. I didn't look too long but I did find that there are marine applications out there for this. No idea how cost effective it is, but It could be a possiblity....

 

[Cruiser_Nerd]

Jason, if the gauges are solid state, they are probably internally regulated to something less than 12V....................so just feed them with power and see what happens. If they're electro-mechanical bimetal gizmos, they'll just be off by a factor of 2.

If you don't feel that brave, do something like this: http://www.powerstream.com/dc-2171.htm
The 2.5A widget should be more than enough to power gauges.

 

[fogblanket]

thanks guys I may try just pluging it in at some point. I was a bit disapointed theat it came with out any of the wiring harness so this is going on the back burner for awhile. will prolly get it mounted up there then have it stare at me not working... that will get it working faster. my other idea if I can't get the inside outside temp guages to work is just find a 12v unit that would fit in there in its place. we will see i will keep you all tposted on my progress here
thanks again
Jason