Charging Gps With Cigarette Lighter

[wendell2643]

This is a post I recently submitted at a GPS site forum:"I own the Garmin 660 and just recently bought an auto charger for it at Radio Shack. I have since been told by my nephew that he had one (an auto charger), which "killed" his almost new car (Jeep) battery when he left the charger plugged in when he started the car. He had to buy a new car battery. He says he was told to remove it (the plug that goes in the cigarette lighter) when he started the car, then to re-insert it after the car was started. Is this a problem with Garmin? Or with other GPSs? Or could this have been an isolated and aberrant happening?"

The response was that it could not have "killed" the battery, but that it might have fried the GPS device under certain circumstances. Do you think that might be the case? Or am I safe leaving the GPS charger inserted in the cigarette lighter receptacle at all times with my Lexus ES 300?

Thanks,

Wendell

[total1]

This is a post I recently submitted at a GPS site forum:"I own the Garmin 660 and just recently bought an auto charger for it at Radio Shack. I have since been told by my nephew that he had one (an auto charger), which "killed" his almost new car (Jeep) battery when he left the charger plugged in when he started the car. He had to buy a new car battery. He says he was told to remove it (the plug that goes in the cigarette lighter) when he started the car, then to re-insert it after the car was started. Is this a problem with Garmin? Or with other GPSs? Or could this have been an isolated and aberrant happening?"

The response was that it could not have "killed" the battery, but that it might have fried the GPS device under certain circumstances. Do you think that might be the case? Or am I safe leaving the GPS charger inserted in the cigarette lighter receptacle at all times with my Lexus ES 300?

Thanks,

Wendell

Presuming your ES300 is 97-01 vintage, I'd not recommend the cigarette lighter. Instead use the 12V recepticle in the center console area. I have found that the cigarette lighter 'comes-n-goes' or doesn't come back on after an initial 'on' condition. I would also presume that later ES3xx's would do the same thing relative to the cigarette lighter and center console area, but I don't know.

I have a GPS enabled cell phone that is plugged into its charger that in turn is plugged into the center console 12V recepticle and I've had absolutely no problems.. except it seems that my cell phone GPS system sometimes uses more juice than it's supplied in the course of an 8-hour "GPS-day". I own a Motorola Q9c.

HTH & FWIW...

[wendell2643]

Thanks . . . looks like I'll have no problem with my Garmin plugged in when i start the car.

Wendell

[TA in KC]

Thanks . . . looks like I'll have no problem with my Garmin plugged in when i start the car.

Wendell

I once had a cell phone salesman tell me the same thing...to unplug the charger when starting the car. Apparently, leaving it plugged in while starting is hard on the cell phone's battery. I would imagine it is probably the same for your GPS.