Ford Scorpio Forum - Print Page


    
      
        Ford Scorpio Forum
        (https://www.fordscorpio.co.uk/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl)
      

        General >> Problems >> Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
        
(Message started by: Scramble on Sep 7^th, 2009, 8:44am)

Title: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by Scramble on Sep 7^th, 2009, 8:44am

I blew a fuse recently -- it was the cigar lighter/heated seats circuit. The fuse is 20 amps but I decided to replace it with 30 amps. This is because I now often have two electrical items plugged into the cigar lighter -- a SatNav, and a speed camera detector. I was thinking that with these two items and the heated seats I might blow a 20 amp fuse again (although you'd think that 20 amps should be adequate).

What I would like to know is whether using a 30 amp fuse rather than 20 amp could cause other problems?

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by wojtekor on Sep 7^th, 2009, 9:09am

You should never swap the fuses for ones with higher amp then recommended or you're risking an electrical fire

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by Simmo on Sep 7^th, 2009, 9:18am

on 09/07/09 at 09:09:15, wojtekor wrote:

You should never swap the fuses for ones with higher amp than recommended or you're risking an electrical fire

Absolutely. []. The fuse is matched to the capacity of the wiring in the loom and if you are blowing fuses then the units you are running are too powerful for the cables and thus overloading them. You could take a separate, fused, link direct from the battery to a suitable socket installed in the car making sure the cable and fuse size is correct.

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by lesterlad on Sep 7^th, 2009, 5:56pm

I wouldn't have thought a Sat Nav, and a speed camera detector used together would draw enough power to blow the 20 amp cigar lighter fuse, obviously you wouldn't ( or would you ? ) be using the heated seats at the same time this time of year.

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by Gazza_UK on Sep 7^th, 2009, 8:25pm

on 09/07/09 at 09:18:57, Simmo wrote:

[] {}

There for you have a fault hence the fuse keeps blowing

Try the seats first if all is ok then the fault must be with the cigar lighter socket as No way the sat nav and speed detector draw that amount

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by Scramble on Sep 7^th, 2009, 8:40pm

Okay, I'll put a 20 amp fuse in instead.

The fault happened after I turned on one of the heated seats the other day while the SatNav and speed camera detector were on as usual.

I've had a look at the SatNav and SCD and they only draw 1.5 amps between them, so that's not very much. The heated seats are more likely to be the problem. I hadn't used them in years, I got out of the habit of it. Perhaps that has left them in bad shape? Or is 18.5 amps just cutting a bit fine to run the heaters? Heaters draw a lot of power, so with a low voltage you need more amps to provide the same power, right?

Or is it possible that the fuse got gradually damaged over the years and finally went (don't know if that's something that really happens to fuses), but that a new fuse will last a few years?

(Nothing blew this morning when I tried everything with the 30 amp fuse, but I didn't test if all for very long. I can't test now with 20 amps as the car is at the garage being MOT'd).

Title: Re: Okay to replace 20 amp fuse with 30?
Post by Tekno on Sep 8^th, 2009, 9:38am

There may be bad connection somewhere (so it draws additional current which goes to heating bad connection) I'd doublecheck every wire and connector which are going to seats...