Quest power from bike without having to spend £40!

bumble beemer

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I wish to power up my Garmin Quest from my bikes power socket. The only option I have found is to purchase a pack from GPS warehouse which includes an audio cable, for £40.

Is anyone aware of a cheaper option?. I am not interested in the audio cable and I already have a BMW power socket plug.

TIA
 
bumble beemer said:
I wish to power up my Garmin Quest from my bikes power socket. The only option I have found is to purchase a pack from GPS warehouse which includes an audio cable, for £40.

Is anyone aware of a cheaper option?. I am not interested in the audio cable and I already have a BMW power socket plug.

TIA
Click to expand...


Hello, my first post here.

I´m dealing with the same thing, I have just cut the ac-adaptor cable, and now I´m planning to make some kind of power-regulator, could´t be so hard?
As far as I know, the quest requires a voltage from 4.75-5-45, right?

Can anyone with some more experince tell me how to do?

B.R /Henrik, Sweden
 
Get it wrong and it will cost you more than £40 !!!

... but I would be interested to know how you get on as the Garmin unit can be troublesome and provide intermittent supply.
 
Buying the Garmin unit will allow you to hear the Quest though. I'd have thought that this alone as a safety feature (not having to take your eyes from the road) was worth £40. Remember the Quest has a very small screen. On my recent trip to Europe I found I didnt always have time at busy junctions to read the screen and found the voice directions invaluable. Considering how much you will already have paid for the Quest it would be a real shame to miss out on the voice function. OK so you will need to factor in an Autocom or Starcom, but the benefits imo are worth the overall costs. If you are on a tight budget then butchering the car unit will work, but if you drive a car you might not want to go down that route and it will reduce the future resale value.
 
JohnC said:
Buying the Garmin unit will allow you to hear the Quest though. I'd have thought that alone as a safety feature (not having to take your eyes from the road) was worth £40. Especially considering how much you will already have paid for the Quest it would be a shame to lose such functionality. OK so you will need to factor in an Autocom or Starcom but the benefits imo are worth the overall costs. If you are on a budget then butchering the car unit will work, but if you drive a car you might not want to go down that route.
Click to expand...


Yeah, I´m with you all the way.
This is my scenario:

I want to use the Quest for my snowmobile. I don´t want to attach any cords, either to my helmet, or my gps, so, I don´t need the audio-option.
Either way, we don´t have any routing or so in the mountains anyway.

Since my snowmobile has a electric start, I already have a battery, which I thought would be easy to connect the gps to.

To the point, I can in NO way, see why I should pay 40£ for an power-cable...

As I said before, I will cut my ac-adaptor, then I still have the car-cradle, to use in my car, and I can experiment with the other cable..

I have asked a few guys at work, all I need is an Vreg, and some kind of source that will draw 0.5mV, just to keep the Vreg running...

I´ll get back as soon as I have tested it out!

//Henrik
 
solution

£12.99 from Halfords £8.99 from Maplin

They both sell a cigarette adaptor with variable voltage. Swooper has this set up running power only and I've been running the same thing through a modified car kit so I could get audio straight away when I bought the Quest 14 months ago and the audio options were no where in sight for months. Neither of us have had any problems at all this way, and infact I installed the same as Swooper on a mates Triumph Tiger a few months ago. Looks like a trip to Halfords is your cheapest option.

Hope this helps

Sherpa ;)
 
STOP PRESS!!!

sherpa said:
£12.99 from Halfords £8.99 from Maplin

They both sell a cigarette adaptor with variable voltage. Swooper has this set up running power only and I've been running the same thing through a modified car kit so I could get audio straight away when I bought the Quest 14 months ago and the audio options were no where in sight for months. Neither of us have had any problems at all this way, and infact I installed the same as Swooper on a mates Triumph Tiger a few months ago. Looks like a trip to Halfords is your cheapest option.

Hope this helps

Sherpa ;)
Click to expand...

Maplin catalogue arrived in the post tonight and now selling at £4.99

Sherpa ;)
 
sherpa said:
Maplin catalogue arrived in the post tonight and now selling at £4.99

Sherpa ;)
Click to expand...


do you have the Maplin part number or reference?
 
Quest say the battery last for up to 20 hours without audio.

How long do you reckon the battery lasts with audio?
 
I suggest you all read thru the forum on the subject of Quest power, intermittent power to Quest and QPAC. This subject has been thrashed out and I do not intent to repeat the message.

Nick is right - get it wrong and it will cost you. The only clues I shall repeat.. The Vreg chipset in the garmin bike cradle and QPAC are higher temp rated (125 deg C), the Garmin car adapor is lower rated and not sealed/intended for outside use. The other flaw in this suggestion is getting the Quest connector pad to marry onto the Quest or worst getting the Quest connector pad onto the power adaptor. Think again guys!

RAM-man
 
Pondboy said:
Snowmobile??
BMW seem to be bringing out new models every month. This must be a 1200 Adventure variant. :) :thumb PB
Click to expand...


Sorry guys, did´t notice this was an all BMW-forum :) got the link from a swedish friend.

As I said, I´ll get back as soon as a got any other info.

//Henrik
 
The response I received from Garmin

These are the replies I received from Garmin (complete with grammatical mistakes!) when I asked whether the intermittent Quest power problem had been sorted......

My original Question:
> Problem:
> I want to mount my Quest onto my BMW R1150GS motorcycle and am
thinking
> about buying the Garmin motorcycle mounting kit. However, I have read
that
> there is a bit of an issue with vibration causing the power to be
> interrupted intermittently. Has this problem now been resolved? I was
> informed that the software had been updated to compensate for the
'fault' -
> is this now available? I have downloaded version 3.50, is this the
version
> that has been updated?
> Thanks,
> Paul

Reply from Garmin:
> Dear Russell
> I have not hear about any problems with are mounts for motorcycle so
you
> can go and buy a mount and you should not get any problems.
>
> Regards,
> Brad Rose
> Product Support
> Garmin (Europe) Ltd

My response:
Brad,

I had a conversation with another Quest owner at a BMW dealer yesterday
and
he had the problem I described. He was intending to purchase an
alternative
RAM Mount as he was so unhappy with the Garmin one. Some people are
definitely having connection issues.

Best regards,

Paul

Final word from Garmin:
Dear paul russell
if there is a problem with are mounts that is the first I hear about it.
But there is other mounts you can buy.
 
My Garmin mount is one that fails intermittently.

I finally got around to calling Garmin earlier this week.

"Yes, it's a known problem. We will send you a new one."

It hasn't arrived yet, so I have not tested it so cannot be sure it works, but I was amazed that Garmin were so willing to help and send me a replacement without proof of purchase or promise to return the original. Full marks.

I can only assume that early production models were known to be at fault (I bought mine in March).
 
ok, here is the solution

Ok, took a few days, but now I have a solution...

I started by taking my car charger/speaker.
Had a electronic guy at work looked at it.

This thing now has even more electronics than the original!

If anyone wants a picture, or a schemtics, feel free to contact me...
It´s sick how people could charge soo much for a simple cable like this.
The hardware cost me less then 1.5£ !!

b.r //Henrik
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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