Maintenance Charging

7173Mustangs.com

Help Support 7173Mustangs.com:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Nov 15, 2010
Messages
932
Reaction score
18
Location
annapolis-maryland
My Car
73 Mustang Convertable
Over the years, I've gone from:

Removing the battery from the car during the winter months, using a standard charger with trickle charge to maintain it, and then re-installing it every time I wanted to start the car or take a ride.

Buying a maintenance charger, opening the hood every time I wanted to use it and using the alligator clips that came with it to attach it to the battery.

Wiring in the trickle charger, using the supplied wire that has the connector on the end so that the charger can be plugged in.

Until this weekend :D

I wired in a cigarette style receptacle and and modifying an retractable electrical device for ease of connection. I can also use this in case I ever want to power a 12v device from the outside of the car.

I bought a marine grade receptacle and a nice LED lighted plug and set out for a day of tinkering. Had the stereo cranked and the heat on, heating the shop to a tropical 58F :D

I went through a couple hiccups. The first was trying to use a piece of Lexan that I had l laying around the shop. Cutting it to size with the table saw was a piece of cake. So far so good.

Because of where i intended to mount it, the screws couldn't protrude on the opposite side. No problem, I'll just tap some holes. Hmm, i lost my tap handle somewhere, probably buried in some other project. No worries, ViceGrips to the rescue.

P1010008_1.jpg


P1010011.jpg


Well, the screws I could find where too long, but they were "easy" to shorten using the bench grinder holding them with the versatile Vise Grips.

Of course they were not exactly line up with the holes in the receptacle,so I would up stripping out the threads.

THIS WAS NOT GOING TO WORK.

I have a huge selection of wood pieces hanging around waiting for a new life, so i grabbed a piece of 3/4" oak and started over. This would be thick enough so that could attach the receptacle with wood screws and not have to worry about them going through to the other side.

P1010014.jpg


I was a little concerned about using wood, rotting over time, splitting, looking ugly, but talked my self past those concerns, since i didn't want to buy a chuck of Aluminum and have to deal with that.

P1010012.jpg


P1010015.jpg


I used a vise to squash the head of the bolt i as going to use to attach everything to the frame, so that it wouldn't spin when bolting on.

P3010024.jpg


And used a little Eastwood Under Hood Black (got cans of this and Chassis Black taking up space anyway)

P3010026.jpg


Enough carpentry, time to hone those electrical skills.

P3010016.jpg


P3010018.jpg


Add a little RTV, nobody is going to see this end anyway, so sloppy is OK.

P3010020.jpg


And it is ready to install to the frame. Right outside of where the battery sits.

P3010033.jpg


P3010034.jpg


P3010035.jpg


Phase 2 completed. Onto the house wiring.

I tried to find a 12v retractable cord, but could only come up with a cord from a vacuum. But these did not retract by pulling on the cord, only by pushing a button. That wasn't going to work because I'd have to climb up to the ceiling everytime i wanted to use.

So I bought a standard 115VAC device and did some elecrical hacking to splice in the charger.

P3010031.jpg


P3010041.jpg


Made a little loop for strain relief, which is also a nice handle to pulling it down.

P1020049.jpg


Plug er in

P3010045.jpg


P3010043.jpg


And the cover fits without around everything.

mustang


 
Thanks for the post. It's always interesting to see what solutions forum members come up with to address problems or to make life easier.

I wouldn't worry about the oak rotting out, Ford used painted oak for many years for the spacer between the bed and frame on their pickups.

 
Back
Top