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TR2/3/3A Wiring again: Fuse box

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K

karls59tr

Obi Wan
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I have a newer fuse box that takes 4 fuses. Someone on the forum recommended it. I believe its from a Landrover. It looks period correct with the addition of two extra fuse outlets. I plan to use one of the fuse outlets for an electric fan I have installed. What would be best to use the extra fuse outlet for?
It seems like practically everything besides the horns are connected to the one fuse! Would it be beneficial to isolate anything in particular in the system now that I have an extra fuse outlet?
 
Does your car already have the in-line fuse for the tail lights? If not, that would be my choice.

If you do already have the fuse for the tail lights, my next choice would be brake lights.
 
Randall, are the tail lights prone to shorting? Why this recommended upgrade? Thanks, Mike
 
The main shorting danger in the tail circuit is the tag lite. My car originally had a unit with the hot wire connection peened(sp?) around the bottom center axis of the bulb holder. It rotated, shorted and I had to unwrap the entire sub-loom, replace the red wire, and rewrap.
Bob
 
It also takes just the barest tap in a parking lot to crush the corner lamps and potentially short them. That was supposedly why the factory added the fuse for the tail lights. And, if you add a separate fuse for the brake lights (instead of feeding them from the common fuse), then you can still have turn signals, wipers, fuel gauge and so on after someone has hit a lamp.

FWIW, it also allows you the choice of having the brake lights active all the time instead of only when the key is on. Back when I was running the stock mechanical fan, one technique I used for dealing with overheating in heavy traffic was to switch the engine off whenever I could. Ie start the engine when traffic starts to move, then shut it off and coast up to the next stop. Always bugged me knowing I wasn't showing brake lights. Anyway, not for everyone, just what I did.

You're right, Karl, there is no fuse for the headlights either. But I believe it is a Bad Idea to have only one fuse for all the headlights, and you asked about having one spare fuse. The problem is that fuses sometimes fail even when there is no overload; and it's really disconcerting to have that happen while you're driving down a mountain at night. Wasn't so bad the next time it happened, as it was just a gloomy day and there was light enough to drive without the headlights. But it still wasn't an experience I care to repeat. (My problem was apparently corrosion on the fuse holder contacts, so light that I could not see there was any corrosion. No doubt the high power headlights played a role as well. But it was causing a heat buildup that would eventually melt the solder inside the fuse. Cleaning the contacts made the problem go away.)

So my feeling is that if you want to add something to protect the headlight circuit, you need either a separate fuse for each side (as Stags had from the factory) or else use either a self-resetting circuit breaker or a fusible link.

There is more that could be done as well. A fusible link to protect the wiring to the ammeter seems like a good idea (but I haven't bothered to do that one yet).
 
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