69 cigarette lighter

[Dino]

My cigarette lighter has never worked properly.  I use it for my GPS or to charge the mp3 player but as time went on, it would only work intermittently until one day it went dead.  The power wire is live so I took the ashtray apart and removed the lighter.  The lighter housing has some serious rust in it and I don't know if it can be saved.  Is this a pretty generic housing that I should just replace or should I try to repair it?

[XH29N0G]

I think it depends on what you want.  I bought a generic lighter and it went right in.  I kept the old one. 

[Dino]

Good question  I like functionality over originality.  But if I can have my cake and eat it then I want both.  I am assuming the one I have now is the stock lighter.  It has a big housing that screws on from the back to hold the lighter in place. I suppose I can stick just about any lighter in there and make it work so I'll see what's out there.

[MaximRecoil]

Yeah, it is generic/standardized. The one in my '69 didn't work very well, even though I'd cleaned it up, and I found a never-used-even-once, OEM lighter installed in a 1970s Dodge pickup in my friend's junkyard (the previous owners apparently weren't smokers), so I installed it in my car. I suspect that OEM lighters are better quality than a generic one from e.g. Wal-Mart, plus the old ones are all metal, while generic ones usually have a plastic knob.

Make sure it has a good ground; cigarette lighters draw a surprisingly high amount of juice, at least when being used as cigarette lighters (when used as a power outlet, the current draw depends on the device being powered of course).

[myk]

Guys quick question: how is the lighter housing wired up?  Is it just a 12 volt wire and a ground?

[MaximRecoil]

Guys quick question: how is the lighter housing wired up?  Is it just a 12 volt wire and a ground?

Yes. If I remember right, the original is grounded via simple contact of its housing with the ashtray, so you only plug the 12 VDC wire onto the stud in the back of the lighter. The new lighter I got out of the Dodge truck has a QD terminal tab on its housing for a ground wire, which makes for a better / more secure ground:

[Dino]

That's odd, mine does not have the ground tab on the housing, nor is there a ground wire to be seen in that location, only the red power wire.  I guess mine is grounded through the dash?

[MaximRecoil]

That's odd, mine does not have the ground tab on the housing, nor is there a ground wire to be seen in that location, only the red power wire.

Yeah, that confirms my memory (see my previous post). Mine has the ground wire tab because it is from a late '70s Dodge pickup instead of a '69 Charger. I took the ground wire and QD terminal from the Dodge truck too (though a generic crimp-on QD terminal would work just as well), and then ran it to ground in my car.

I guess mine is grounded through the dash?

Yes, it is grounded via contact of its housing to the ashtray, which is screwed to the dash frame. Mine is also grounded that way of course, which means it would still work if I disconnected the ground wire, but the ground wire provides good ground redundancy, which I like.

[Just 6T9 CHGR]

Dino, leave the original for show & just add a 12v+ outlet in your console....did that to mine 

[Dino]

That's odd, mine does not have the ground tab on the housing, nor is there a ground wire to be seen in that location, only the red power wire.

Yeah, that confirms my memory (see my previous post). Mine has the ground wire tab because it is from a late '70s Dodge pickup instead of a '69 Charger. I took the ground wire and QD terminal from the Dodge truck too (though a generic crimp-on QD terminal would work just as well), and then ran it to ground in my car.

I guess mine is grounded through the dash?

Yes, it is grounded via contact of its housing to the ashtray, which is screwed to the dash frame. Mine is also grounded that way of course, which means it would still work if I disconnected the ground wire, but the ground wire provides good ground redundancy, which I like.

That makes sense then.  I agree, an extra ground is nice security.

Dino, leave the original for show & just add a 12v+ outlet in your console....did that to mine 

Great idea!   

[myk]

12V power outlet-what a cool idea!