Modifying a car’s electrical system is one of the most common changes introduced by vehicle owners. In fact, it is often a necessary step if you wish to upgrade your car or adapt it to specific tasks, such as off-road driving, which involves installing additional lighting and winches. In order to make interventions in the factory-fitted power supply systems that are both safe and pleasing to the eye, it is advisable to go with components that are designed precisely for such a purpose.
The need to customise the car’s electrical system may arise for a variety of reasons. One of them may be the necessity to adapt the vehicle to make it suitable for a specific function (taxi, cargo transport), to attach retrofitted equipment (towing winch, trailer), sometimes it is carried out due to the owner’s individual preferences, e.g. the desire to modify the cockpit, furnish the interior with additional USB connections. Whichever the case, the modifications involve interfering with the original circuitry, and often also reworking of the panels that make up the interior. The power supply accessories presented below are designed to ensure that such modifications are durable, fault-free, safe and don’t compromise the appearance of the vehicle (which indirectly translates into its value).
Adapters with USB connector
AK-CH-08
USB adapter compatible with Quick Charge 3.0 standard.
One of the most popular automotive accessories is the adapter which converts the 12 V DC supplied to the cigarette lighter socket into 5 V DC to power USB devices. Almost all additional devices used by drivers employ this popular type of connector, even if they do not use it to transmit data but only to draw power. This is the case with video recorders, smartphones, credit card terminals or cash registers. Adapters usually come with more than one USB socket, sometimes of varying current capacity (one of them allowing to connect a laptop or tablet, i.e. devices with a relatively high power rating). Selected adapters that are available from TME are QuickCharge (QC) compliant, i.e. they are capable of negotiating the output voltage and delivering energy to the receiver in the most efficient way possible. Such a method significantly reduces the charging time of compatible devices equipped with rechargeable batteries.
Car cigarette lighter sockets
There are many appliances available on the market that can be powered directly from the vehicle’s electrical system – including inverters, compressors and even refrigerators and vacuum cleaners. Usually these are fitted with a cigarette lighter plug, simply because every car is equipped with a lighter socket. Unfortunately, there are very few such connectors installed at the factory, very often only one (which usually means that it is permanently in use). In this case, you may decide to install additional connectors. Such products typically come in a panel mount format. The two most common types of this accessory are recessed sockets and those enclosed in a body/housing (they only require making an additional slot for the wires, which are plugged in using flat connectors.
A13-22665A
A panel-mounted connector equipped with a protective cap.
When properly installed, the socket offers typical electrical characteristics (12 V to 24 V DC, current up to 20 A), which means it can supply power to virtually any compatible device. Such accessories can be applied to enhance the interior of a passenger car, make a connection in the boot compartment, or conveniently arrange outlets in an RV. Most of these products available in the TME catalogue are equipped with caps which protect the contact surface against environmental factors such as moisture and dust. The caps also provide high IP rating when the socket is not in use.
Car cigarette lighter housings
The lighter socket housings are a complementary product. With these housings, it is possible to reduce the intervention in the original panels of the car and at the same time make a significant extension to the electrical system. They can be fixed in any place, near the cockpit, in the glove compartment or in the boot. The housings feature from 1 to 3 holes matched to the dimensions of a typical panel-mounted cigarette lighter socket. They are available both in a built-in version (socket hidden inside the body) and a flat version, designed to finish reworked surfaces.
A13-142-16
Ammeters and voltmeters
A25-4
Panel indicator showing the battery level.
Where the car’s electrical system is used to power non-standard equipment, it is advisable to monitor the battery level and/or the flow of current that is drawn from it. This will also help avoid cable overload if a high power-consuming appliance, such as a garden power tool supplied via an inverter, is connected to the vehicle. This can be done with modular ammeters and voltmeters. Like the sockets described above, the meters are designed with quick installation in mind to facilitate easy connection to the existing wiring. They usually come with terminals in the form of flat connectors (or pre-installed, colour-coded input leads). The value of the measured parameter (e.g. current battery voltage) is visualised by means of indicators or an LED display.
Car cigarette lighter extension cables and splitters
Not every car user will opt for the installation of additional cigarette lighter sockets, as such a modification is quite an invasive one. An alternative solution is to use an extension cable or splitter, which (as in the case of mains power supply) make it possible to connect more devices and use them as you prefer. Such accessories will also prove useful when you wish to have access the power supply connection point outside the vehicle cab. Keep in mind that the TME catalogue includes extension cables (up to 5 m) with a cigarette lighter socket, as well as those fitted with a USB connector at one end. In both cases, these accessories are available with either a 12/24 V plug or electrical wires (any electromechanical engineer will be able to connect them to the factory-fitted car electrical harness with little effort) at the other end.
PROCAR-67848000
A 12 V/24 V cable designed for modifying vehicle accessories.
It is also worth mentioning here that our range includes standard cigarette lighter plugs attached to a convenient spiral cable – with this product, any device intended for use in the car can be fitted with a long cable that provides freedom of movement.
AUX/USB adapters
C0003
Power/data and audio connections complement the functionality of your car radio.
Up to now, we have focused on power supply accessories. However, cars users very often find it troublesome to connect their phone to the radio and the on-board audio system. What is more, the actual needs may go beyond that: sometimes, you even have to feed an audio signal to the amplifier’s input line while charging a smartphone or even plugging it to the data transmission connector (this is required by the CarPlay standard by Apple and Android Auto by Google, among others). This is where accessories provided by brands such as 4CARMEDIA, ACV or PER.PIC come to the rescue. These are USB A panel sockets (the most common type of this standard) packaged in a single housing together with a 3.5 mm jack connector (which is simply a headphone socket). This pretty much exhausts the wired interfaces available with most mobile devices – and the signals from the connectors (routed via cables concealed behind the panel) can be connected to the receivers or power sources.
Most of the components available in the TME catalogue are dedicated to specific models of passenger cars (e.g. VW, Fiat, Alfa Romeo), in which they replace a particular panel or plug. However, their design is so versatile that they can be installed in any vehicle.
Other power accessories
Feel invited to browse the full range of car accessories available in our catalogue. In addition to a wide selection of audio components, we also offer mounting aids (frames, speaker adapters) and other accessories. However, keep in mind that the TME offer of car power supply accessories is not limited to the products described above. Other solutions include, among other things, inductive (wireless) chargers, available in the form of a cockpit-mounted drawer (DIN or ISO) and a suction cup holder. Furthermore, accessories supplied by GEMBIRD include popular transmitters, i.e. devices that use FM modulation to transmit sound from a phone to any radio (without the need for any modifications). If you are interested in improving sound quality and suppressing noise in your audio system, you should also consider purchasing a voltage stabiliser, which is a device designed to filter the power line at the car audio player’s connection (on-board equipment may cause audible interference, which, thanks to the stabiliser, is minimised).
TA-CHU3
FM transmitters
C0001-ST12V
Voltage stabilisers
CHARGER-DIN
Inductive chargers
