I am going to change my existing 12S and 12N sockets to a 13 pin socket. It looks to be a straightforward job but a Practical Caravan article about how to do it says disconnect the battery earth terminal first. How essential is this if the two fuses supplying power to the existing sockets are removed? I had always believed that modern cars don't really like having the battery disconnected for any length of time - but I may be mistaken. Any advice welcome.
Changing to 13 Pin Socket
- Thread starter JohnM20
- Start date
it is just a safety issue. to avoid shorts you can do it without, if your careful just isolate the power circuits. there are some cars that rely on battery power to keep the ICU memory live, but off hand could not say which ones, and of course the radio would need the code to get it working
the only one you have to watch is the perminent live feed in grey plug everything else is dead with the engine switched off .
that is usually powered by a 20amp fuse but you know this already
did mine without disconnection the battery cos I didn't have the radio code. it up to you safer with possible without.
the only one you have to watch is the perminent live feed in grey plug everything else is dead with the engine switched off .
that is usually powered by a 20amp fuse but you know this already
did mine without disconnection the battery cos I didn't have the radio code. it up to you safer with possible without.
Damian
Moderator
Quote " but a Practical Caravan article about how to do it says disconnect the battery earth terminal first."
They have to err on the side of safety and to avoid litigation by A. Plonker who tries to do the change with the permanent live still "live" and blows his whole electrics to pieces and then tries to claim that he was not specifically told to disconnect the battery earth cable .
Too far fetched??????? don't believe it,,,,,it DOES happen, some people have to be led by the hand (or nose) and have every simple step in triplicate.
Don't forget, "Where there is blame there is a Claim"................................
They have to err on the side of safety and to avoid litigation by A. Plonker who tries to do the change with the permanent live still "live" and blows his whole electrics to pieces and then tries to claim that he was not specifically told to disconnect the battery earth cable .
Too far fetched??????? don't believe it,,,,,it DOES happen, some people have to be led by the hand (or nose) and have every simple step in triplicate.
Don't forget, "Where there is blame there is a Claim"................................
I was always taught to disconnect earth first when TOTALLY disconnecting the battery - the reason being that if the spanner accidentally touches something while on the earth terminal then unless the thing it's touching is the +12V or something connected to it, it's harmless - likewise once the earth is disconnected then it doesn't matter what the spanner accidentally touches when disconnecting the +12.
Howeer in the situation described I wouldn't think of disconnecting the battery at all, I'd just pull the fuses as described and test the sockets with a meter to make sure I'd pulled the right ones!
Howeer in the situation described I wouldn't think of disconnecting the battery at all, I'd just pull the fuses as described and test the sockets with a meter to make sure I'd pulled the right ones!
I thought about going this route when we bought our 2010 caravan with 13 pin as standard but then thought what do we do when we tow a small trailer or use a trailer board to use when we use the bikes?
Answer for me was for me to use a 7n/7s adapter to 13 pin. Had no issues whatsoever and still retain the capability of towing 'older' vehicles!!
Answer for me was for me to use a 7n/7s adapter to 13 pin. Had no issues whatsoever and still retain the capability of towing 'older' vehicles!!
colin-yorkshire said:
Most modern cars using CanBus or similar will not suffer the battery being disconnected not matter for how long. Also most such vehicles have the radio code programmed into the ECU so upon reconnection the radio will work - that is unless of course you have fitted an after-market sound system, but then you will have the code anyway.
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