Hardwirng an Passport 8500

**Red Truck** · 08-27-2009, 02:22 PM

Can someone tell me where I can tap into a 12V line that turns off with the ignition key? I've made several vain attempts to locate a 12V wire with a volt meter. What color should I be looking for?
Thanks

**Crawdaddy** · 08-27-2009, 02:37 PM

Passport, is that a brake controller? If so, you can wire it up to constant power. They don't consume enough power to worry about a dead battery and having trailer brakes when the truck is off might come in handy...

**Crawdaddy** · 08-27-2009, 02:49 PM

Oh sorry, radar detector... what year make and model of vehicle do you have? The most common place to get a switched 12 volt from would be the fuse panel. You can pull a tap off of the radio fuse most probably with little issue.

**dsrtne1** · 08-27-2009, 03:16 PM

There was someone on this site that hardwired their radar detector into their rearview mirror. That will work if you have the mirror with the compass and thermometer and you can just mount it under the mirror.

**Red Truck** · 08-27-2009, 03:29 PM

Thanks for the replies...it's a 2008 model. I don't have a "powered" mirror so I can't use that option and the fusebox is under the hood...how would I get through the firewall. Isn't there any easy pick up under the dash. Would the 12V wire be orange?

**Kaiser-Wave** · 08-27-2009, 10:26 PM

If its a 2008 truck the wire you are looking for is under your dash, pull off the knee board where your hood relase is and its in the ignition harness, wire color is pink and is sort of small just make sure you test the wire with key all the way forward and it will read 12volts then use a 5 amp fuse on the radar detector's wire down there because the NBS trucks have a sensitive LAN-BUS system and you dont want to mess that up, any questions feel free to ask!