It seems I blew my cig lighter today trying to check voltage in the socket using a volt meter. Strangely, the motors of the side view mirrors still work, so I guess it's not the fuse (they're fused together).
Is there another fuse in the unit?
98 Legacy GT Wgn [US]florian /FFF/
There may be an internal fuse in the lighter itself. To get to it you have to remove the lighter from the console. If it's blown you can't really replace it, the proper fix would be a new lighter.
What actually happened? Did you get a short to ground with the meter lead? I assume the lighter no longer works, but you say the mirror motors, on the same circuit still do. It is possible that you have a high resistance contact at the fuse, which still passes enough current to run the mirrors. I suggest pulling the fuse, cleaning the contacts and reinserting it. I fixed my radio that way. Good luck.
Yes, that's most likely it. It stopped working from one second to the next after fiddling with the V- meter.
The Cig Lighter socket is a PITA to remove (in order to avoid breaking things, the center console cover has to come off...)
That'll teach me...
florian /FFF/
...and every electronics student who has ever used a multimeter. :-)
What you probably did was switch the meter to measure amps on the high (20A) scale. That's an unfused dead short through the meter, basically a hunk of calibrated copper going rom the red test lead socket to the black socket.
The low current range will have a fuse, but it would have blown long before the lighter socket fuse was even warm. (maybe it did???)
-John O
Good point - but I had it on 20V actually.
What I did is even dumber: I poked into the socket with the inch-long unisolated probe probably shorting out the contacts without ever measuring a thing.
florian /FFF/
In answer to my original post:
To conclude this and answer my own question:
Yes there's another fuse in the lighter socket. At the rear of the socket, the part of the socket making contact with the lighter unit is connected to the lead with a fuse or insulated wire that melted in my case.
Ignoring snipped-for-privacy@x.files' wise words, I replaced the length of wire with a similar piece of wire from a paper clip.
Coincidentally that works great as a fuse. I was able to witness a beautiful burn-out and arc after accidentally shorting the circuit again. ;-)
The reason was in that case a bent portion in the socket creating a short between the + and _ portions of the socket at the slightest movement.
Problem solved.
florian /FFF/
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