G'day Gents,

I recently bought a Wifi OBD interface plug which can be used, with a smart phone APP, instead of a plug in diagnostic tool.

After I finished interrogating the system I thought that I'd leave the Wifi interface plug in the diagnostic socket in the car rather than remove it and then replace it when I needed to use it in the future.

Big mistake as it turns out, Pin 16 in the socket is an unswitched power supply so the Wifi adapter was draining the battery while ever it was plugged in regardless of IGN switch position.

The result was that the car battery was completely flat after not having driver the car for several days.

The car in question was my XJ12.

I won't be doing that again.

Cheers,
Jeff.

 

Jeff, I leave mine plugged in. I bought the Kiwi3, which uses a faster version of Bluetooth and uses negligible power. I can’t remember the numbers but they are on the Kiwi3 website.

 

G’day Al,

It probably would’ve been OK to leave the Wifi adapter plugged in if the car was driven daily but it had been parked for a week and so drained the battery.

Cheers,
Jeff.

 

I realize that Jeff. I was just letting people know that there are some good ‘new generation’ blue tooth OBDII devices that use very little power. I got the PLX Kiwi3 from the States as it is compatible with Apple Devices, unlike most of the cheaper ones.