Guest starspirit Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 How does Swifts alteration stop the radio from draining the main battery? Or is it connected via the leisure battery? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Newell Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Well Starspirit there's the rub. The Swift bodge doesn't stop it draining the battery. The fact is that if you bought a van with the radio wired as per Fiat's original design (or any other manufacturer for that matter) and parked it up for two to three weeks it will drain the engine battery. Car/van radios when "switched off" typically take 100 to 200 milliamps which is sufficient to flatten a typical engine battery in about two weeks. the Swift bodge is intended to allow you to listen to the radio, un-interrupted, for as long as you like while on site. Sadly they usually get it wrong and the damned radio will only operate for 20 minutes at a time regardless of whether the ignition is on or off. (By the way Swift aren't the only ones who get this wrong, Don's is a Timberland and he suffers the same problem.). D. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michele Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Dave, Swift make Bessie, We have no prob's mind you that's the only thing we havn't got a prob with haha. ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Newell Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 In that case Michele maybe it's the dealers who bodge the radio wiring not Swift, maybe I've been maligning the wrong people all along! D. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest starspirit Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 My bodge solution is to link the two positive supply wires together via a toggle switch that I fit into the gear stick surround. That way I switch the radio off at the gearstick when the van is not in use, and when the van is in use I switch it on. That way the radio works continuously without any problems - so far - but I've only done it on four vans over the last 10 years so it's early days yet. I also got rid of the crappy Peugeot radio for one where the volume returns to where it last was when turned off. This which makes for better bedtime listening and turning on and off without cold feet syndrome resetting the volume. Lazy git that I am! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Newell Posted August 14, 2006 Share Posted August 14, 2006 Right Folks, having just sorted Don Madges radio out for this problem I can now tell you the colour of the ignition fed trigger wire, it's yellow/blue. So to recap; If you just want to be able to switch the radio on and off regardless of the ignition key position and don't mind it not coming on with the ignition then cut the yellow/blue and connect the radio sideof this wire to the permanent live (thick red wire). If you want to retain the ignition triggering the radio then cut the yellow/blue and insert a diode then connect a wire from the peramnent live to a switch in a convenient position of your choice and the other side of this switch to the radio side of the diode. While I was doing Don's radio I checked the current drawn. In Standby (after the mod) the radio drew 0.05 Amps, switched on and at a moderate volume it took 0.75 Amps. Obviously playing a tape (or CD) will take more current. hope this helps, D. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Posted December 28, 2006 Share Posted December 28, 2006 I've spent ages searching for information and this is the only thing I've come across, but I still have some questions. I have 2 feeds into the radio, one is switched from the ignition (pin 7) and the other is permanant (pin 4). Or at least that's how my new radio wants it although the oruginal Peugeot fitted Blaupunkt had these 2 the other way round. I have connected pin 7 to the leisure battery and pin 4 to the pemanant feed from the van. This seems to work OK but I'm concerned that it's not right. Firstly should I have feeds from both batteries in this way? Am I connecting the 2 together via the radio? Should I perhaps use a diode? Secondly, I have assumed that the actual power being drawn to operate the radio is via the switched pin but on the original radio this was just a light wire and the permanant was heavy. Help would be much appreciated. Ralph Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Newell Posted December 29, 2006 Share Posted December 29, 2006 Hi Ralph, if you go by the colours of wires as I identified above you should be able to sort it. The ignition switched wire (thin yellow/blue) does NOT power the radio, this is the trigger that tells the unit to switch on when the ignition is switched on. The heavier red wire is the power supply and this is the one to take from the leisure battery. As you have discovered there are two versions of the ISO socket wiring where the permanent live and switched live are transposed (pins 4 and 7). If your new radio requires the permanent powere feed on the thinner wire then get an ISO adapter, this will plug into the existing socket but has swappable connections in the two feed wires, cross them over and voila no problem. If you have difficulty following this then I would respectfully suggest you consult an auto electrician who should charge no more than an hours labour to sort it out. D. In edit: if you haven't already Ralph you need to read page onew of this thread where I outlined how to alter the wiring to sort this out. D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ralph Posted December 29, 2006 Share Posted December 29, 2006 Thanks Dave. I had originally assumed that the permanant lead just kept the memory going and the switched powered the radio. That would have seemed simpler. Indeed on my new radio the permanant (4) is labelled as "12V memory" which re-enforced my error. When I asked for the new radio for Xmas I expected it to be a doddle to change. How wrong I was! Fistly there was the problem of reversing the 2 wires, but then I looked deeper using a meter... On standby the radio draws 140mA which was much more than I expected. Disconnect the ignition feed and it drops to 9mA. It turns out that this is because with the ignition on it powers up a couple of LEDs etc. which only go out when the ignition goes off. Now I realise that this is just the radio that I've bought but I wonder if others work in a similar manner? 140mA doesn't sound a lot but adds up to about 20AH off the battery in a week. So now I've decided to adopt your diode and switch suggestion perhaps with the main power feed coming from the leisure side. Happy New Year :-D I've certainly read page one and your advice. In fact it was Googling for help that made me find the forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Newell Posted December 29, 2006 Share Posted December 29, 2006 Hi Ralph, you seem to be on the right track now. I have my radio wired from the leisure battery so that when on site we can use the radio/CD without worrying about running the engine battery down. I put the remote switch in the living area so I can switch the radio on or off from bed. D. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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