Cigarette to cigarette jump leads do they work?

[Asda Bongo]

My littel chappie who loves the campervan to play in has flattened my battery by leaving the lights on. I have a jump lead set that work from the cigarette lighter, but when I try to charge it up the Bongo a fan comes on. I have removed all 3 fn fuses and it still starts up. Is it possible to by pass all this as it will be draining my other car battery. Or is it not possible to charge up via the cigarette lighter?

Thanks in advance for the advice and help.

Will

[missfixit70]

Short answer I'd say is no. If you want to jump start it, get some proper beefy jump leads, to expect to start a big diesel lump through such feeble wiring is rather optimistic. Make sure you have the engine running on the car you're jumping from with a few revs (as you always should) then it won't flatten it.
Welcome to the forum

[westonwarrior]

I agree with Kirsty use proper jump leads

[dave_aber]

Don't know about the fan, but if you connect 2 cigarette lighter sockets together, and one car starts out with a full battery and the other starts out with a flat battery, then the best you can end up with is 2 half flat batteries (less than half if you think about losses, etc). I am assuming that your comment about the fan draining your good battery is based on the fact that neither engine is running at this point?

If you do this with the engine running on the 'good' car, then you could in theory end up with 2 full(ish) batteries. But it could take a while.

Either get a proper mains battery charger, and fully charge the dead battery, or get some proper jump leads, and start the dead car using a good one. Or use a jump-start pack.

You certainly can't plug in a cig lighter <-> cig lighter lead and expect to start the engine in the dead car. The leads would just melt.

[Asda Bongo]

I thought as much, I scanned the forum for advice on jumplead sizes and assumed I would need thicker ones. So Halfords here I go. I have a trickle solar charger going on at the moment, but don't really expect it to do too much, even though it is sunny. When the kid wakes from his nap he will have to have a trip in a CAR. He will be dissapointed. At least I'm not in the middle of no where with the feeble cigarette lighter charging leads.

Thanks for your help.

I was hoping that as the leads are just transfering charge (the do not jump the car and the ignition is on on both vehicles and but neither running) that I could just take the car for a quick spin and the Bongo for a longer drive.

Will

[missfixit70]

Just running car to car with em sat there will just end up with two dead cars, solar charge won't do a lot to recharge a dead battery, once it's started you'll need to either go for a couple of hours drive to get anywhere near fully recharging it, or stick it on charge with a trickle charger for a a day or 2, or it'll keep letting you down.

[Asda Bongo]

Planning on heading to Cornwall on Thursday so it will get a good run then. Lets hope the rain stays away.

[missfixit70]

Make sure you take your jumpleads just in case

[scanner]

Make sure you take your jumpleads just in case

Or leave the litl'un at home.............

[missfixit70]

Or maybe utilise some gaffer tape & cable ties

[Asda Bongo]

They learn so quickly that he will probably be jumpstarting other peoples cars behind my back. Well he is up now so off the get some long strands of copper. I like the tip that someone had to put the leads in with the battery in the front. There should be room and then I will know where they are for when the tike does it again as I am sure on a camping trip he will manage it again and at 2 he does not seem to understand the word no.