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Photo by Hendi Kaf, in Cambodia

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Photo by Hendi Kaf,
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  #1  
Old 29 May 2002
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TIP: Strengthen power supply

I've met a few travellers which had problems with components on the inside of factory and home-made power supplies to come loose on longer motorcycle trips off-road.

I've solved this by generously applying hot-glue to the inside of the power supply.

Definately a should-do!

Happy Travels, Roger
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  #2  
Old 29 May 2002
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I’ve heard that before, but what about escaping heat? Do you apply it on heat sinks as well?

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  #3  
Old 10 Jun 2002
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What I've done is purchase a 12v Cigarette lighter adapter for my Garmin, the cut it open. I then filled the entire unit with epoxy, efectivly enasing everything. The I harwired the leads to a power source that is switched with the ignition, and mounted the unit under the seat. It has held up great. Bridge rectifiers, and volage regulators used on enduro bikes often have their electronics encased in epoxy.
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  #4  
Old 12 Jun 2002
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Off to the hardware store I go ......

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  #5  
Old 12 Jun 2002
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Is all this needed? I've just wired my Garmin power lead straight into the loom
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  #6  
Old 13 Jun 2002
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Kurt, sometimes it is when you do a lot of off-roading. I've had a laptop power supply fail on me once in the Sahara. Back home I found that an IC inside the unit was dislodged by the vibration. It's an attempt to make your equipment last longer with little down time, that's all.

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  #7  
Old 13 Jun 2002
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I get what your saying - My question was is there a need to have anything more than just a cable running from the battery to the unit - In other words is a power supply needed.
It was more of a Gramin specific question. Sorry if I caused confusion
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  #8  
Old 23 Jun 2002
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Both my Garmin GPS V and my friend's GPS III are directly wired into our Honda XRs power sources. It's all you need to do to maintain the power source. Both bikes get a good work out every weekend over high dunes and bumpy camel grass and the wiring has never been a problem.

We mount them on Touratech mounts which are good except for the stupid perspex U-support for the antenna. One got broken and both have now been replaced by aluminium pieces. Much better.

If you want to protect the internal batteries from vibration use electrical tape to hold them together. See this link, it works:
http://www.cycoactive.com/gps/GPS_ba...2and3plus.html

Stephano
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  #9  
Old 24 Jun 2002
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Be carful. Some Garmin units like the GPSIII+ have a variable input internal power supply, and they can be wired directly providing your bike isn't AC (ex. Honda XR's). My Garmin Etrex Vista, requires a 3 volt input, so an external power supply is required.
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  #10  
Old 19 Jul 2002
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I´ve been running my Street Pilot with a Garmin lead to the fuse box for some time with no problems, but when I tried to run it from rechargable batteries, it became very sensitive to movement (not vibration). For example, the unit will sometimes cut out when it´s held in both hands and slowly turned screen face down. I can´t reproduce this problem with Duracell or other normal batteries... Whats going on???

Cheers, Baldrick.

PS. I think the Touratech mounts are the dogs bollocks, but I´ll be binning the perspex and putting the anntenna elsewhere ASAP.
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  #11  
Old 20 Jul 2002
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You will find that rechargeable ( Nicads anyways) batteries are a tiny bit shorter than alkalines . This could be your problem .

Try stretching the battery contact springs , or soldering a shim to the battery .
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