Quote Originally Posted by BuffCyclist View Post
My niece put pennies in the little dispenser in the back seat of my in-laws minivan.

You might know that little coin dispenser as a cigarette outlet.

And yes, when they turned on the van, it shorted the whole vans wiring harness, fried everything. For whatever reason, there wasn't a fuse on that outlet.
There was something jammed into the cig lighter / Aux 12 volt port on the 1993 Explorer I bought earlier this year. It had arced and blown the big fuse for it. I pulled out the offending piece of metal and think it is one of the good luck charms, traveling saint /angel or something. I got lucky and replacing the fuse was all I needed to do to get a 12V aux power supply for my phone.