USB Charging Adapter

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Gray Ghost

Filing Flight Plan
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Gray Ghost
I am a complete newb to aviation, so please indulge me. I recently purchased a 1965 Cessna P206. The avionics are decent (Avidyne ID-550), and I am pleased with the airplane so far. It does not have a USB charging port on the panel. It does have a cigarette lighter. My inclination is to insert one of those cigarette lighter to USB adapters that they sell at the gas station and call it good, so I can charge my iPad.

But the airplane has a 24V system, as opposed to the 12V system in cars. I can check the voltage on the plug with a meter, and I can make sure the adapter I buy can handle 24V if that is what it is.

Am I missing anything else? Do I need a special, FAA approved adapter?

Thanks in advance.
 
No approval to plug in an adapter needed….The problem is they tend to give feedback to the radios… I’ve used em with some luck… but I just broke down n got a garmin usb charger for planes. It was$300 but now no radio feedback and it charges fast!
 
Don't get the gas station adapter, they're junk and will likely interfere with your radios.

Get on Amazon and order an Anker-brand charger. They're moderately priced and work well. I've got a couple in different airplanes, no interference problems.
 
The IFD-550 USB port for uploading databases and firm-ware can also be used for charging devices, per the manual. Just don’t plug it in until after boot-up because otherwise it’ll go into maintenance mode thinking you want to upload something.
 
Buy the cheapest one you can find. If it produces radio interference, buy another, different unit. Repeat. You will find one which does not produce radio interference for much less than $300. Find one with two USB ports.

I've bought three cheap units. None of them produced radio feedback in my Warrior. They now live in the plane, car, and truck.
 
Wait, a '65 model P206 with a 28 Volt system? T-41's not with standing, I always thought that single engine Cessna's didn't get a 28 Volt system until 1978...
 
The <$10 Anker cig lighter adapters I use are dual voltage and have not created interference in any plane I've flown in the last decade or so.
 
Thanks all for the excellent responses.

@a572mike The POH is pretty minimal for this plane. I will verify the electrical system. I may very well be wrong.
 
I would suggest you get one from Sportys, cost 20 bucks, has a voltage read out and works reliably for years now with no noise.
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It seems that every few years the standard changes. Now it's more amps and USB C. Thus, I'd get a cigarette lighter adaptor that can be easily be upgraded/replaced vs a hard wired Garmin USB port.
 
I did have a cheap one catch fire about 2 hours into a 4 hour flight. I now have one from Sporty's and agree that they are cheap and fine to use. The digital voltage display also gives an indication of battery health and alternator output.
 
WDD said:
It seems that every few years the standard changes. Now it's more amps and USB C. Thus, I'd get a cigarette lighter adaptor that can be easily be upgraded/replaced vs a hard wired Garmin USB port.
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No kidding - technology ages in dog-years. A hard-wired USB port can be a useless brick before you know it.

I have the same apprehension seeing people cut into panels for these ipad docks. Watch a couple of years go by, you need a new iPad, and it might mean you need to re-cut a panel because your dock is 1/4" incorrect in some dimension for the newest iPad.

So in addition to your $600 ipad, comes a $4,500 avionics technician bill for re-doing the panel. Sigh.....
 
Rgbeard said:
No kidding - technology ages in dog-years. A hard-wired USB port can be a useless brick before you know it.

I have the same apprehension seeing people cut into panels for these ipad docks. Watch a couple of years go by, you need a new iPad, and it might mean you need to re-cut a panel because your dock is 1/4" incorrect in some dimension for the newest iPad.

So in addition to your $600 ipad, comes a $4,500 avionics technician bill for re-doing the panel. Sigh.....
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yeah - our club has a dock with an old Garmin GPS that looks like a PS2 controller. It hasn’t been turned on in years.
 
Wait....you have an ifd 550 and are saying the avionics are just "decent"?
 
There are several choices for panel-mount USB power delivery units: Stratus, Garmin, TrueBlue, etc. These units will definitely not cause any nav/com interference. There are choices with USB-A, USB-C, and both ports. Most portable USB-C devices will charge or maintain just fine using the 2.4-2.5A USB-A ports when using a USB-A to USB-C cable. For more power-hungry devices, a USB-C or PD port can deliver 3.0 A of current. They are certainly pricey, but they are neat and very reliable. The main weakness of the lighter socket units is often the lighter socket, which can have poor grounds and corroded contacts, increasing the chance of electrical noise or worse. My lighter socket was...cheap to say the least, mounted in a flimsy plastic hole, and was a source of constant maintenance.

I installed a Stratus dual port USB-A charging port many years ago. Each port can deliver 2.5A which is plenty for tablets/phones in the cockpit used for EFB display. The charger is handily and securely mounted where the ashtray would have been on the center console of my Grumman, easily accessible from either front seat. A 3 foot cable is ample. A longer (6 foot) charging cable would work for a rear seat passenger. I don't regret the cost. If it needs to be replaced with a different cable format, the newer Stratus units will swap and mount easily in the existing hole.
 
chemgeek said:
.......

The main weakness of the lighter socket units is often the lighter socket, which can have poor grounds and corroded contacts, increasing the chance of electrical noise or worse. My lighter socket was...cheap to say the least, mounted in a flimsy plastic hole, and was a source of constant maintenance.

.......
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The "Cigarette lighter" plug is about the worst-engineered design for the reliable transmission of 12vdc power out there.

Oh wait, it was never intended for this purpose. Ever..... It was intended to put power across the spiral nichrome metal strip of a cigarette lighter, and nothing more.

I'd like to meet the first dude that said to himself... I bet that'd make a great way to power my (CB radio, radar detector, whatever). He deserves a firm slap.

In the motorcycle world they improved on it with the Powerlet. It's far, far better than a cigo-plug, but still is far from mainstream.
 
I had the interference/radio noise issue even after trying several different "quality" USB car chargers from Amazon. The solution was to add an inexpensive ferrite bead near each end of the charge cable. No noise now, going on 5+ years.
 
I had no idea what those things were all these years.
 
I'm waiting for someone reputable to come out with a 100W PD panel mount, then I'll install a pair of them.. Trueblue is almost there with their 60W. I think 100W should feed my hungry hungry iDevices for a decade or two.
 
You will need at least 2A to keep the ipad happy; get the highest you can. I think 2.4A was the highest, last time I checked.
1A is a waste of time.
I am flying 2 a/c with panel-mount usb charge ports that wont keep my iphone charged. I’m thinking they are one of the first models of panel-mounts with very low amperage.
 
Rgbeard said:
The "Cigarette lighter" plug is about the worst-engineered design for the reliable transmission of 12vdc power out there.

Oh wait, it was never intended for this purpose. Ever..... It was intended to put power across the spiral nichrome metal strip of a cigarette lighter, and nothing more.

I'd like to meet the first dude that said to himself... I bet that'd make a great way to power my (CB radio, radar detector, whatever). He deserves a firm slap.
Click to expand...

Many years ago, my only a few months old brand new (first new car I had bought) Saturn one day had a few electrical things stop working. I saw a fuse had blown, and when replaced it immediately popped. Took it to friendly Saturn dealership. A few hours later they called and said car was all fixed. Apparently someone's 4 year old son who liked getting in Dad's new car saw that the cigarette lighter outlet was the perfect size to put pennies into.
 
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