Hi Guys

Having lot of confusion about to where my Ammeter should go , as i understood by looking at some online discussion , it should not have Ground Earth, so the other line is to where ?

Any Electrical mate ?

Thanks
Regards
Sumith

that was over my head are you talking to measure something? or what? for measurement purposes it is connected in series so in the circuit but i dont understand what your trying to do bit more of an inside and i might be able to help you.

Howdy,

if you are talking about mounting an ammeter in your dash to keep an eye on the charging system it needs to go in series with all of the cars electrical load except for the starter motor.

This can get quite messy as the ammeter can have upto 80 amps flowing through it and the cabelling needs to be large enough to cope.

for example: average car,

headlights 100 watts each
tail lights 15 watts each
brake lights 21 watts each
ignition (no injection or electronics) 50 watts
windscreen wipers, demisters, heater fan upto 200 watts.

so total watts used = 522 watts

Amps = watts / volts

522 / 12 = 43.5 amps

this is before you have added that "sick" CD player and amp (coupe of hundred more watts) and driving lights (200 more watts)
now we equal 922 watts =76 amps

Your best and safest bet is to use a volt meter instead. it is wired from any switched positive to ground and does not carry any load.
if the voltage is over 12 volts (13.8 is perfect) the battery is charging and if it is below 12 volts it is being discharged and will go flat sooner or later.

hope this helps.

Cheers,

Geoff

Some ammeters are inductive and some are serial -- wired different ways.

What kind of ammeter do you have? Where did you get it?

Hi ddgonzal

don't remember what kind of it , it has max -30 , +30 amp
i did not buy it it was fixed to my car from the day i know it so just wanted to fix it up

Thanks
Reagrds
Sumith

dont bother with it....

good idea but its just going to be a reliability risk

if its only 30amp forget it

and like was said if you want it in your dash you essentially need to run all the cars power from battery to dash and then distribute to everything from their

an inductive ammeter is potential a much better prospect in theory but i havent actually seen one of them

but then my multimeter has an induction loop and that works well.... so there it is... get an induction one or forget it