Tale of the Toad Part 3: Modifying the Toad

When we bought the SMART car that serves as our Toad, I knew it needed a battery disconnect for towing. "No Problem", I thought. Disconnects are cheap and easy to install. After we got the car, I discovered you have to have battery to lock/unlock the Toad. Smart is unique in that normally you only use the Fob to unlock the car. Using the key is considered an destructive emergency procedure that can only unlock the car.


This was double-plus-ungood. It was my intention to have expensive electronics in the Toad (GPS and a Ham Radio) as well as use it for storage when we were on the road. Another complication was the location of the battery: underneath the passenger seat. Since we didn't want the thing looted while we were inside Joe's Truck Stop, we had to figure out someway to switch the battery on-off while the doors were locked.


Fortunately through the good services of Google, we discovered that Intelletec makes a latching 12v relay. This relay toggles the battery on/off and latches so there is no battery drain holding the latch in position. 


We then discovered a set of momentary contact marine buttons and keys that were waterproof. It would be more secure to have a key, but we've got too many darn keys anyway.


 I was a bit concerned that road debris might slap the battery switch, but it is stiff enough that if anything hit us that hard, we'd be pulling over to look for damage anyway.


In the Smart, the passenger floorboard - a large chunk of foam - lifts out so you can service the battery. I decided to embed the relay in the foam - in retrospect a bad choice. If I had to do it over, I would put the relay in the battery compartment.


So with this relay, the electrical in the car is getting a bit complex:

1. The remote controlled battery relay
2. Since we use a Brake Buddy supplemental breaking system, I need a full time cigarette lighter socket not controlled by the remote control relay
3. We decided we wanted the coach to trickle charge the battery in the event of long pull - particularly since the Brake Buddy can pull down the battery.
4. There is a 2 meter Ham Rig that I wanted full time off of the battery.

We put long enough cables on it to lift out the foam to service the battery.  We also thought it prudent to have instructions made both in English and Spanish on how to service the battery.

 

 

We wired it up and requested the base plate installer to route the wires for the switch and the trickle charger.


Then it was off for the baseplate....