i have a 83 ta. i took the shifter plate off and the white plastic pigtail connector off the cig lighter itself. i took a multimeter to that white plastic pigtail and with the multimeter i put the red on the positive of the white plastic pigtail(center) and then the black i touched and close by metal. i was getting 14.10 volts while car was on, however i am not getting anything when everythings reconnected and i try to charge my cell phone. what you guys think is problem?

 

Is the socket rusty?

 

You should be getting voltage to the socket regardless of whether the car is on.

 

It's not rusty.and when cars not on its at 12.25v

 

That sounds ok. How about the socket ground? If there is a good ground connection, then the socket is just bad or not making contact for some reason.

 

This. If your socket is rusty like mine was it won't make a difference what voltage you're getting. Wiggle your charger around, if you get power to it when you move it a certain way just replace the lighter socket and save yourself some headache.

 

Another possible reason is that these things are cigarette lighter sockets and not mobile power sockets, if you know what I mean. If you look at the business end of a cigarette lighter, you can see that they look nothing like most plugs for radar detectors and what not. It's hit or miss sometimes with power cables and these antique styled sockets, some things just won't work, or they are real temperamental about it.