Well I'm not getting as many replies as I would like to have in my prox sensor thread. I've got the whole damn thing figured out anyways, but I am stumped on one thing.... where to power this thing.

It obviously needs to be powered when the car is off and locked. I am mounting it on the headliner by the dome light. Does the dome light wiring have juice flowing all the time? I think it should since when you open the door the light comes on.

I'm not very familiar with electrical situations or projects at all. I'm sure the packaging will tell me what kind of electricity the sensor will need (or how much I should say), so will I have to be pretty specific with my power source, or will anything in the car pretty much work?

 

You can tap into some extra terminals under the driver's side dash behind the fuse box assembly. It's a grey panel with several unused spade terminals. I used one of those to power my ACURA door sills. There are a few there, some have constant voltage while others go on/off with the ignition. Use a test light to see which ones are which.

 

its probably just a standard 12volt system. Any of the overhead lights have power at all times. There are quite a few sources, just make sure you run a fuse with it, as well as upping the fuse on whatever source you tap into

 

I will probably blow the damn thing up then. Perhaps it's just best to do the add a fuse thing? Probably easier than cutting, splicing, and hoping I did it right anyways. Where can I get those add a fuse things?

 

Any auto-parts place has them. Its a fuse-looking thing that has 2 fuse slots on top -1 for the original component you are tapping power for, 1 for the component you're adding - and a wire coming off with a crimp on the end.

It should say in the manual what amperage fuse to add.

 

if u have a volt meter, find internal resistance on the meter first, then resistance on the prox sensor, then use E/IxR, so 12 volts divide by whatever the value of resistance is = ur current, then go 110% or an amp higher for the fuse, ex. 15amp current draw, put in a 16/17 amp fuse.

for the fuse holder, most elect store have em, didnt really shop around any auto parts but may have it, wire it in series on the power wire

 

Oh good! Thanks so much for the help. I think that's the best way to do this then.

Now - so that's for the red positive wire. This also has a black wire. Anything particular I should do with that? Just ground it somewhere?

 

Just ground it anywhere on the body of the car, might wanna scrape the paint off first.

 

Oh and in case I need to buy wire to run more of it... what kind of wire should I buy? 12 gauge, 18 gauge, etc?

 

whatever size the wiring coming off your proximity system is, use a wire that large or larger.

 

the dome light doesnt have constant power. i put in led door handles and tied them into the dome light and its a switched 12v source. if it was constant power the light would always be on.

 

theres constant be4 the switch

 

of course I meant before the switch