Ideas on how to ground the PMP if the only bolts nearby are big?

ikjadoon

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Hi. I'm pretty new to hardwiring inside my car. I'm installing my PMP into my 201o Mitsubishi Outlander. It's powering a DR650S-2CH. I'm using two fuse taps: BATT is going to the hazard lights & ACC is going to the cigarette lighter. I'm using 3A purple fuses on fuse taps for the camera.

My biggest issue now is how to ground the PMP, the 3rd black cable. The ground loop provided by Blackvue is on the smaller side and all my bare metal bolts are bigger. Is there a trick or a tip to do this? I have plenty of exposed bare metal around, but no screws/bolts to attach to. I found only one "accessible" bolt (just left of the pedals), but it's big: I did it pretty dirty and tried to sneak in the ground loop behind the washer. No luck: the PMP won't turn on.

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Has anybody encountered this? Any tricks here? I think one possibility may be to cut off the ground loop provided and crimp on a bigger ground loop. Or, is it safe to try to stretch the ground loop "fingers"? It's not an actual loop, but the horseshoe kind.

I will say, my crimping skills are not great and I'm not certain how well my "cold weld" came out; I crimped one so hard the insulator had a little tear. But, I'm learning and I'll likely cut & re-crimp onto a new fuse tap (with less force). FWIW, here's what the rest of the setup looks like. Lots of bolts on plastic, some screws in plastic, and bare metal.

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Any advice (or critique or feedback) is more than welcome.
 
factory grounding point is generally nearby the fuse panel, possibly to the upper left in your last photo but hard to make out as it's not in focus at that section
 
I used pliers to carefully make the "horseshoe" wider to fit around the grounding bolt that I used.
 
factory grounding point is generally nearby the fuse panel, possibly to the upper left in your last photo but hard to make out as it's not in focus at that section

Yes! That's it. But, there are two issues: it's also a big bolt (the only size, seemingly, inside my internal fuse box area). But, it's also rather deep inside, too.

DlbrHEU.jpg
 
I used pliers to carefully make the "horseshoe" wider to fit around the grounding bolt that I used.

Nice, OK! That look like the next best idea. I tried bending it by hand, but that didn't get me far. It is a little malleable then...I'll give that a shot.
 
Nice, OK! That look like the next best idea. I tried bending it by hand, but that didn't get me far. It is a little malleable then...I'll give that a shot.

using that factory grounding point would be the best spot (always good practice to disconnect your battery while doing this) can be fiddly to get to but worth the trouble, you may see other bolts nearby that look ok as a grounding point but if not directly on the vehicle chassis they can often be connected to something that is rubber mounted elsewhere for NVH reasons and provide a poor ground
 
addafuse correct.jpg Firstly I would buy a multimeter than you can be sure of what you are doing and meter out an earth. You can buy various size rings as well as somewhere like Bestbuy or similar Certainly will be big enough for one of those bolts.
Lastly make sure you have the fuse taps the correct way araound as one way is correct the other routes both circuits through the one fuse You will need a meter to check which side of the fuse socket is the live one
 
Are you sure..that it is a grounding issue. That ground that you have shown in picture 1 is more than adequate if.. "it" is a true ground. Not all bolts go into metal in todays cars. I would use a length of extra (temporary) wire to a real definite ground as a test to prove that the supply part of your wiring is good.

Do you have power to the camera as wired with the PMP turned off?
 
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Hii! I apologize for the delay in replying. I wanted to run a time trial, to make sure everything was long-term solid. Fortunately, everything kept working, so I unfortunately forgot to update.

The problem was bad fuse taps! Unexpected, but when I went back to AutoZone, I noticed two fuse taps had been returned by other customers (yes, they just cut the wires). So, I turned around and just bought a pack of 5 fuse taps from Amazon for the price of 1 [broken] fuse tap from AutoZone. I'm not sure how fuse taps can go bad, but the Amazon ones did the trick. It could have been my crimping, but they all felt pretty solid.

using that factory grounding point would be the best spot (always good practice to disconnect your battery while doing this) can be fiddly to get to but worth the trouble, you may see other bolts nearby that look ok as a grounding point but if not directly on the vehicle chassis they can often be connected to something that is rubber mounted elsewhere for NVH reasons and provide a poor ground

Right! I tried for a while to remove the dash, to get to that factory grounding point, but it got complex quick. :( However, good call on checking whether this other bolt was actually grounded or not; I took the suggestion and bought a multimeter: it was a good ground, using the battery's ground chassis connection as reference.

View attachment 29054 Firstly I would buy a multimeter than you can be sure of what you are doing and meter out an earth. You can buy various size rings as well as somewhere like Bestbuy or similar Certainly will be big enough for one of those bolts.
Lastly make sure you have the fuse taps the correct way araound as one way is correct the other routes both circuits through the one fuse You will need a meter to check which side of the fuse socket is the live one

Solid call on the multimeter. With the multimeter, I confirmed the ground was good, the car fuses were hot at the right times in the right places, but the only thing that wasn't working was the wiring after the fuse tap. Which led me to think that the taps were iffy.

Are you sure..that it is a grounding issue. That ground that you have shown in picture 1 is more than adequate if.. "it" is a true ground. Not all bolts go into metal in todays cars. I would use a length of extra (temporary) wire to a real definite ground as a test to prove that the supply part of your wiring is good.

Do you have power to the camera as wired with the PMP turned off?

Yes! You were right; the ground, luckily, wasn't an issue, but it needed to be checked.

It's been working perfectly for ~3 weeks now. It turns on and turns off exactly as intended when I turn on /off the car. You all are awesome. These multimeters are a really solid buy and, with a few other upgrades coming along, it'll get a lot use. And it was only $20 at Lowe's!
 
I have the same EXACT Power Magic Pro (PMP) issue with my 2012 Altima. I installed a DR650S-2CH BlackVue dash cam this week. Got all wires connected, and the PMP did NOT work (would not turn on). Cameras work fine when power is plugged into an "always on" power plug, but the PMP is NOT working (green LED does not turn on). I've tested the 2 fuse taps and both work as expected. One is always on while the other turns on only with the key. I suspect it may be a ground issue, but not sure. I used a screw behind a piece of plastic to use my circuit tester (tester looks like a screw driver with a light in the handle), and it worked perfectly. So I *thought* it was a good ground. I also have a number of other potential spots, but with LARGER nuts where the ground loop ("U") will not fit. I may purchase a larger loop from the local auto parts store and crimp it in place of the one from BlackVue, but not sure if that's my issue either. Sure would like to resolve. I had to reassemble my vehicle since my wife is the primary driver. It means I have to remove the door cover (bottom) and the driver's side kick panel (at least that's what I always called them as a kid).

Anyone able to give very basic instructions on how to use a multi-meter to test for a good ground?

Open to any other suggestions too!
 
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Try touching the PMP ground wire to another metallic part of the body as a test, if it doesnt turn on then check the 12v wires.

The whole chassis/metal body is ground so it should be very easy to find a ground point. The ground wire just needs to touch a bare metal surface (with no paint).

There is usually a factory ground point in the kick panel. If for some reason you really can't find one then get a self tapper screw and drill one in.
 
You "may" have the wires from the PMP wrong... Evidently at some point the mfg changed the color of what wire went where. If your tester shows a light from the wire to the ground you want to use.. the ground is good.
 
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