Club 80-90 Forums

This one is for the electrical/electronic geeks!
I have a Panasonic Toughbook which uses a Li Ion battery with output of 10.6V 3.75Ah. The mains unit output is 16V 3.36A.
Is it possible to 'wire' the laptop into the vans 12V system rather via an inverter etc.
I believe that the US police used this laptop in their patrol cars running directly from the vehicle's electrical system.

This might suit your needs..

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?Mod ... r&doy=21m8

I use one of those for my laptop for VagCom and that, works well.
Not much use I know, but the adapter seems to do it's job, I can vouch for the maplin one.

You have to be careful of uneven voltages on 12v as electronic components are quite sensetive. Might not break but casue unusual symptoms. Maplins thing stabilises the voltage so a good thing. You may be able to do this with a couple of cheap components and solder if researched enough.

Many thanks - didn't think it would be that easy.
I was thinking along the lines of identifying the battery's +ve and -ve terminals and connecting, somehow, to the corresponding terminals in the laptop with a resistoror or something to reduce voltage to that of the battery thus doing away with the battery.
The reason for going this route is that I intend installing a laptop permanently in the van to run Memory Maps and VAG-COM.
I have just got a 12in Point of Sale TFT screen which works with 12V DC - this has now been fitted on a bracket in the van!
And one last thing, I've got a Track Ball to operate the cursor etc which I envisage sticking somewhere on the dash within easy reach of my right hand.

Well, Afew days ago I would have said wire it in with a simple voltage regulator, but.....
after reading an article on Li ion batts (Toms hardware site) and hearing that Sony have recalled millions of laptop batteries, I'd say NO......

Apparently Li ion batts are very sensitive to charging voltage, (yes laptops have charging circuits to compensate) an over voltage of 0.5 V will destroy them.

Beware of leaving the Laptop charging 24 hours a day!!!!

T

At BT all our engineers have Panasonic toughbooks, the guys all have use chargers from the 12V system, the new CF 29's have new type ones, I can find out make etc if you would like Doug.

I have used the upper end Maplins 12V laptop charger for the last year on my Toshiba, it is on charge permanently, I cut a hole in the dash where the radio used to sit so the Laptop cradle sits "into" the dash permanently. I run my GPS and all my music runs via iTunes into the car, while on holiday I upload all my photos onto the laptop(very geeky? I know!). The modern laptop is very durable, you have to do something really silly to fry one.

This all sounds like the system i am puttin together at the mo, im gonna run the sounds through my head unit with a http://www.allcam.biz/catalog/product_i ... 0e8c4e59f0some where under it. Lap top in the back running gps ect. Put a fold down screen above the drivers seat on the roof that will be able to watch in the pop top and the down stairs, and on and on

Again, thanks for all the info.
Big Tam, would be interested to know what charger BT use as they use the same laptop as me.

That thing from maplin, i take it, it has a 10a fuse in the cigaret lighter bit? cos I would want to cut it off and wire it in somewhere else.

I've got one of these (easy to read Memory Maps):
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... :IT&ih=002
made a bracket to mount on dash.

Synchrodoug do you have the cf27 or cf29, let me know and I will get relevant info.

CF-27

I brought a 12v laptop charger off ebay, £7, works well, do a search theres loads.