Dometic Fridge + Jackery Wiring Help

[balbright18]

Hey everyone, I'll try to keep this short and to the point!

I have a Dometic 45 and a jackery that I'm trying to wire up in my Jeep JL.

Current Situation: Jackery is plugged into factory 12V, dometic into the jackery; when jeep is running the jackery charges + runs the fridge; when the jeep is off jackery powers the fridge (REAR FACTORY 12V is ONLY HOT WHEN IGNITION IS ON, which is what I want!)

What I'd like to do: Add a new dedicated 12V accessory panel to the rear of the JL so I don't have to use the horribly located factory outlet which also has a very thin gauge wire. I bought the accessory panel already which comes with wiring to go directly to the battery. PROBLEM: I want the new accessory panel to be ignition controlled like the factory 12V is so that when the Jeep is off my jackery doesn't pull from the battery as the fridge runs.

I've been researching all day and came across some ideas (fuse taps & a relay switch's) but even though I'm pretty skilled working on my jeep...electrical is not my specialty!. I don't want to do any fancy switches at this point or major mods want to keep it simple just for the fridge set up for the time being. Any and all suggestions would be great!

Thanks
Brendan

 

[Z Adventures]

You could make it real simple and just put an ON/OFF switch on the hot wire and turn it off manually when you turn off the Jeep. It's simple but yes, you can forget. Don't forget.

 

[balbright18]

The 12V accessory outlet has on on/off…which yes would work. I just don’t want to forget! Was hoping for it to not be hot when ignition is off.

 

[Kevin108]

Do you want the USB ports to power on and off with the 12v port?

 

[balbright18]

They can but don’t have to. My primary goal is to have the 12V off when the ignition is off. If as a result the USB are off as well that’s fine.

 

[Kevin108]

There is more than one way to do this, but this is the conventional method I use. Power will come from the battery through a relay. The relay will switch on when it gets voltage from the OEM 12v plug.

In the back of the Jeep, mount your accessory panel and find a place to secure and ground a relay.

Run a fused 10-gauge minimum wire from the battery to pin 30 on the relay.

Splice in a trigger wire from your factory 12v port to pin 85 on the relay.

The relay gets a ground wire to pin 86. I often add a ring terminal to the wire and find an existing bolt nearby.

Run a wire from pin 87 to power the accessory panel. The accessory panel will also need a ground.

 

[reaver]

There is more than one way to do this, but this is the conventional method I use. Power will come from the battery through a relay. The relay will switch on when it gets voltage from the OEM 12v plug.

In the back of the Jeep, mount your accessory panel and find a place to secure and ground a relay.

Run a fused 10-gauge minimum wire from the battery to pin 30 on the relay.

Splice in a trigger wire from your factory 12v port to pin 85 on the relay.

The relay gets a ground wire to pin 86. I often add a ring terminal to the wire and find an existing bolt nearby.

Run a wire from pin 87 to power the accessory panel. The accessory panel will also need a ground.

View attachment 232623

This is the way. Although, 10ga is a bit overkill. The fridge draws at most 6A on startup, then likely settles down to 4A when running. Based in the distance in the jeep, 12ga should be more than enough to handle the current and voltage drop.

Other than that, I agree with everything above. The diagram @Kevin108 posted is exactly how I would wire it up.

I'd recommend buying a spool of 12ga tinned marine wire (I use wire from Anchor Marine).

Though, if you have to run a wire to the battery, why not run a larger gauge wire to a fuse block so that you have expandability in case you want to add more stuff in the future?

Wiring can be intimidating at first, but once you figure out what you're doing, it's actually pretty easy.

This is what I built in the back of my Xterra, which has worked very well over the past year or so...

 

[balbright18]

Kevin,

This is such a great idea I didn’t think about tapping in to the factory 12V. My plan at the end of the day yesterday was to run a relay off a fuse tap in the engine bay. But I like this idea better and don’t have to worry about messing with the fuse tap. Thank you so much!

 

[trail_runn4r]

Kevin,

This is such a great idea I didn’t think about tapping in to the factory 12V. My plan at the end of the day yesterday was to run a relay off a fuse tap in the engine bay. But I like this idea better and don’t have to worry about messing with the fuse tap. Thank you so much!

The above solution looks great, but your domestic fridge should have a battery protection system, that is if the battery will fall under a certain voltage it *should* automatically turn the fridge off. Maybe you can give it a go at home first.

 

[balbright18]

Kevin,

This is such a great idea I didn’t think about tapping in to the factory 12V. My plan at the end of the day yesterday was to run a relay off a fuse tap in the engine bay. But I like this idea better and don’t have to worry about messing with the fuse tap. Thank you so much!

The above solution looks great, but your domestic fridge should have a battery protection system, that is if the battery will fall under a certain voltage it *should* automatically turn the fridge off. Maybe you can give it a go at home first.

I believe since I have the dometic plugged in through the Jackery then into the 12V that the emergency shut off won’t work. Since the dometic will just pull power from the jackery when it needs it and then the jackery will recharge from the battery. Thanks though for the input.

 

[trail_runn4r]

I believe since I have the dometic plugged in through the Jackery then into the 12V that the emergency shut off won’t work. Since the dometic will just pull power from the jackery when it needs it and then the jackery will recharge from the battery. Thanks though for the input.

Yes, that's right. Sorry I thought you wanted to get rid of the hackery and go straight to the 12v battery. Good luck!

 

[reaver]

I believe since I have the dometic plugged in through the Jackery then into the 12V that the emergency shut off won’t work. Since the dometic will just pull power from the jackery when it needs it and then the jackery will recharge from the battery. Thanks though for the input.

Do you know if your jackery has a regulated 12v outlet? If not, you won't get full use out of the battery before the fridge shuts off. I had to add an inline stabilizer to my power station to keep the fridge running. Really easy to do. Stabilizer plugs into the 12v outlet on the battery, then the fridge plugs into that. It allows me to run the battery all the way until it's empty.

 

[T4R13]

Jackery only charges at 85 watts with the 12v charger. So I wouldn’t worry about the factory jeep plug wiring . I got a 12 splitter with usbs that I plug into the jackery plug then acceries hook to it. Runs my fridge, or compressor with 3 iPads and my light chargers at the same time. Works great.

 

[T4R13]

I believe since I have the dometic plugged in through the Jackery then into the 12V that the emergency shut off won’t work. Since the dometic will just pull power from the jackery when it needs it and then the jackery will recharge from the battery. Thanks though for the input.

Do you know if your jackery has a regulated 12v outlet? If not, you won't get full use out of the battery before the fridge shuts off. I had to add an inline stabilizer to my power station to keep the fridge running. Really easy to do. Stabilizer plugs into the 12v outlet on the battery, then the fridge plugs into that. It allows me to run the battery all the way until it's empty.

The jackery battery is 23 ish volts. Plug is regulated

 

[OTH Overland]

We have been running our fridge from a Jackery (1000) for a couple of years, never had the fridge shut down as the voltage appears to be regulated and will drop the Jackery down to pretty much empty. The factory 12 volt outlet did not provided enough capacity to the Jackery for proper charging, the WJ charged it slowly, and in the Ram it popped the fuse every time. We did the same configuration as @Kevin108 except added in a double pole double throw switch so we can select between relay controled and constant on for the outlet. That way on shorter trips we do not have to bring the Jackery and can leave the fridge powered from the vehicle battery.

@reaver, well done on the schematic, looks good and easy to follow:)

 

[T4R13]

Also if u have roof space for a solar panel to keep from discharging the jackery so deep it will last longer before u start loosing storage compacity

 

[Kevin108]

This is the way. Although, 10ga is a bit overkill. The fridge draws at most 6A on startup, then likely settles down to 4A when running. Based in the distance in the jeep, 12ga should be more than enough to handle the current and voltage drop.

I should have clarified: I would use 10 ga for the long run from the battery back to the relay. For everything else, it's way overkill.

 

[reaver]

We have been running our fridge from a Jackery (1000) for a couple of years, never had the fridge shut down as the voltage appears to be regulated and will drop the Jackery down to pretty much empty. The factory 12 volt outlet did not provided enough capacity to the Jackery for proper charging, the WJ charged it slowly, and in the Ram it popped the fuse every time. We did the same configuration as @Kevin108 except added in a double pole double throw switch so we can select between relay controled and constant on for the outlet. That way on shorter trips we do not have to bring the Jackery and can leave the fridge powered from the vehicle battery.

@reaver, well done on the schematic, looks good and easy to follow:)

I noticed the same issue when trying to charge my power station off 12v, but I was using an added 12v socket that switched on with my ignition, and powered off my fuse block. My solution was to switch on my 400w inverter after starting the rig, and use that to charge while driving. It worked fairly well. I now have a 100Ah lifepo4 battery in the trailer I'm going to convert to a portable battery that I can swap between the Xterra and the trailer. I would merely need to add a circuit breaker and charging in/power out via Anderson plugs.

 

[Kevin108]

The above solution looks great, but your domestic fridge should have a battery protection system, that is if the battery will fall under a certain voltage it *should* automatically turn the fridge off. Maybe you can give it a go at home first.

I am uncertain of the OP's exact model, but the CFX3 line has a pretty decent app that lets you control temperature/battery protection and see the power usage over various periods of time.

 

[OTH Overland]

I noticed the same issue when trying to charge my power station off 12v, but I was using an added 12v socket that switched on with my ignition, and powered off my fuse block. My solution was to switch on my 400w inverter after starting the rig, and use that to charge while driving. It worked fairly well. I now have a 100Ah lifepo4 battery in the trailer I'm going to convert to a portable battery that I can swap between the Xterra and the trailer. I would merely need to add a circuit breaker and charging in/power out via Anderson plugs.

On our current JK build, I am going with a switch pro system for the vehicle / operation based functions (lights etc.) and a dedicated 100 lifepo4 with RedArc manager 30 and redvision for the rear "house functions" That way except for two taps off the battery the Jeep wiring stays factory and all accessories can be disconnected if there is an issue, and hopfully the rest is set it and forget it. Have not figured a way to get a solar panel installed as of yet due to soft roof top tent and a sunrider there is no real estate. We do travel most days so the battery should be recharged by next destination, but 200 watts of portable panels if we base camp for a while. Dometic 30 quart drawer fridge in the WJ is super convenient, but sucks up a 100ah in two days if its warm out. The ARB chest style we have for the JK will run 5 days on a full charge. Will have anderson plugs set up for solar in, and accessory power out, along with a shore power connection for when the rig is parked at home between trips.