12V Fridge Direct Wiring To House Battery

[Quint]

I have a WAECO CF-25 12v fridge with a 12v plug in my camper. It sits on the floor about a foot away from the house battery under the couch. The house battery runs back to the fuse box near the heater by the door. If I install a 12v receptacle right next to the fridge near the house battery can I wire it directly from the battery to the receptacle with something like 12 gauge wire or should I tap off the fuse box and run it all the way back to this receptacle? The fridge has a built in fuse in the 12v plug. Basically, can I directly wire the fridge to the house battery while the battery also is wired back to the fuse box? This would be two wire leads going to different places on each of the battery terminals. Thanks all.

 

[keith]

I would think you'd want to put a fuse or a breaker as close to the battery as possible and then to the outlet.

 

[Quint]

The 12v plug on the WAECO has a built in fuse is this enough?

 

[BSS]

Yeah, don't run straight off the battery to a 12V receptacle. It's okay to not run it through the fuse box (if that's your thing,) but the +12v lead still should be fused between the receptacle and the battery. Doesn't matter what's on the waeco power wire. What if you or someone else plugs something else in there one day? Just fuse it.

 

[keith]

Any number of things could happen. The outlet could short out. Without a fuse, it's a accident waiting to happen.

 

[pods8]

As mentioned fuse the outlet, its easy enough/cheap to install one of those inline fuse holders and be done with it. An in general the wiring scheme you are talking about is parallel to the other wiring in the camper which is exactly how you need to wire it (parallel is constant voltage across all circuits).