Armrest Socket

[BrewsterBear]

I've just been rolling around in the passenger footwell of my 2006 Vantage to no avail. I have a Parrot bluetooth kit fitted, which is crap, but it came with the car and it's better than nothing. It stopped working a while ago and coincided with the armrest socket losing power too so I assumed it was the fuse popped. I took it in to an auto electrician to have a dashcam professionally installed and mentioned the Parrot. When I collected it they had fixed the Parrot too and it worked for a few weeks.

It's now not working again and I have no power to the armrest socket either. Convinced it must just be fuse F55 I took the cover off and checked the fuse to find it was fine. I checked the other one for the socket illumination and it was fine too. Both checked visually and with a meter. Now I'm stumped. Both fuses are fine but still no power to the socket itself, it's illumination ring, or to the Parrot. The camera works fine still. I called them and asked what they did but they can't remember.

Does anyone have any clues?

[Lawts0908]

Hi,
I’ve now got the V12V, but I’m guessing the armrest sockets are in identical positions.
I lifted my armrest the other day and (extremely fortunately) saw sparks near the socket causing me great alarm. I then saw that the cause of the sparks was a set of house keys contacting against the outer rim of the socket. I’m pretty sure that none of the keys had found their way deep down to connect to the positive terminal, so I remain confused as to how the keys managed to connect to earth in order to create the sparks.
Anyway, lesson learnt for me as I hurriedly fitted the provided plastic blanking cap into the socket to prevent this happening again. Fortunately, no fuses have blown and all electrics seem ok, but I’m grateful for your post which reminded me to highlight this risk for all P/H’ers!!

So is it possible that you’ve had something metallic (like keys, phone etc) drifting around in the armrest which has shorted against the socket and caused your problem??

[philip600]

My socket hasn't worked since I got my '06 V8V last year & reading this spurred me into action. I'd checked the fuses last year & found them to be ok so decided to remove the centre arm rest & check if there was power to the socket connections, anyway when I lifted the panel up I found the cables weren't even connected !? Even the illumination cable was unplugged ? Not sure if someone has forgotten to refit them or they've been unplugged for a reason ( like coins or keys falling into the socket as above ) but now it's all reconnected all is working again 😀

[TR-Spider]

The armrest socket in my 07 V8V had a blown fuse when I got the car...I guess it's a common problem.

The socket in the trunck had a plastic cover , imprinted "Power Outlet" - I got me a second one of these that should protect against shortcuts.

I believe it has humble Ford origins:

Edited by TR-Spider on Thursday 21st June 08:18

[BrewsterBear]

philip600 said:

My socket hasn't worked since I got my '06 V8V last year & reading this spurred me into action. I'd checked the fuses last year & found them to be ok so decided to remove the centre arm rest & check if there was power to the socket connections, anyway when I lifted the panel up I found the cables weren't even connected !? Even the illumination cable was unplugged ? Not sure if someone has forgotten to refit them or they've been unplugged for a reason ( like coins or keys falling into the socket as above ) but now it's all reconnected all is working again ??

How easy/difficult is it to remove the tunnel console?

[philip600]

Very easy. Lift out the shelf behind the seats, remove screws securing aluminium trim & lift it out. Rear arm rest part should now slide out by pushing it back towards the rear of the car. Once that's out of the way there's access to 2 screws securing the front section which you can then lift up to access the cables connected to the power socket.
Took me about 10 mins.
Phil

[BrewsterBear]

Cheers, I'll give it a go tomorrow.