Help with hardwiring aftermarket USB port into dash

I get pretty frustrated with the location of my 12v charge socket in the rear of the centre console of my 2009 gen 3 Prius. I have a phone holder mounted on my dash but the usb cable can't reach the phone when in it's mount being so far from the power source. It would seem the tidiest option would be to use one of the many spare ports (with the pop off black blanking plates) and to hardwire an auxiliary USB charge port into this...or at the very least another 12v lighter socket.

Does anyone have any advice as to where would be the most appropriate location to tap into the 12v electrics to power this port? I haven't purchased it yet but would expect this should be a reasonably easy install.

BTW my Prius is a right hand drive (Japanese import).

 

Thanks Sabby....great suggestion but unfortunately my Prius doesn't have either the lighter socket or the blank plate in that area (only in the centre storage console).
I really just need to figure out where/how to wire into a stable 12v power supply that comes on with the rest of the car electrics.

 

Yes, might be the way forward. I was kind of hoping that there would be a nice easy access point under the front dash. I do have a multimeter so I'll do some more exploring. The other option might be to tap into the spare fuse box under the front hood. There was a great thread explaining how to do this for someone that wanted to add some day running lights. I'll update this post when I complete my mission. Any suggestions from seasoned electrical experts appreciated

 

That's a brilliant solution!! I'll try and find one of those. Just out of curiosity it looks like two different amp fuses in the picture. Shouldn't they both be the same?

 

Yes, it'll be 2.1 amps for sure. Thanks for the help. Got to find all these bits now & I'll keep you updated how I get on.

 

Well thanks to all the helpful advice on this forum I finished the job today. I've thrown in some pics of the job.

In the end I couldn't use any of the OEM blank plate holes because Toyota seemed to make them ridiculously small and the plate itself looks like it was designed to make it impossible to modify without huge effort to cut away all the needless plastic (see the image to know what I mean).
The USB socket I bought was 22mm in diameter and came with optional under dash mounting bracket so after staring intently at my dashboard area I settled on installing into the tiny storage area that in some Prius versions actually has an extra 12v socket anyway.

The little fuse tap suggestion was perfect and I located an unused fuse port which I tried in accessory / ready mode and it worked perfectly (& off of when the car is switched off of course). I added the ground connection to a chassis bolt nest to the fuse box that had enough residual thread to simply add another nut to..perfecto!

Thanks everyone





The unused Toyota blank plate & hole (too small)

 

Yeah when I was looking to buy one I noticed that some had the plate with 12v socket as standard. Makes more sense to me.