Cigar lighter poor voltage/ampage

[piemanpaul]

On a recent road trip through Europe I was planning on using the cigar lighter to change my mobile phone and TomTom. However charging of the devices was either unsuccessful or painfully slow due I think to poor voltage/ampage through the cigar lighter. (I will test to confirm with voltmeter tonight).

I know it's not a blown fuse as you do get some power through the socket.

Does anyone have a possible solution to this?

('93 Chim)

[TVR keith]

Probably the socket needs cleaning. Lighting cigs with it will make it dirty and spoil the contact. Disconnect the fuse or battery and spray switch cleaner on it and scrape the dirt of with a screwdriver

[Cider Andy]

I've had the same problem, a maximum of 10V at the socket (which strangely dropped to about 2V with the fuse removed, which would indicate an earth fault. Suspect the wiring in the door, behind the speaker. Probably through messing about with mine it works properly again, but I haven't yet found the cause.

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Cider Andy said:

I've had the same problem, a maximum of 10V at the socket (which strangely dropped to about 2V with the fuse removed, which would indicate an earth fault. Suspect the wiring in the door, behind the speaker. Probably through messing about with mine it works properly again, but I haven't yet found the cause.

I had exactly the same problem. Mine turned out to be the multi-plug in the door. Cleaned it up, put it together and it now works properly.
The multi-plug is located about half way along the door, you should be able to fit it through the hole in the door that the wires for the cigar lighter come through.