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need general wiring advice


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On 8/31/2020 at 11:41 PM, 1point21gigawatts said:

@never knows best, dude you been on this forum since 2014 and haven’t won any days, which tells me you aren’t helping people on here, which tells me you aren’t the most knowledgeable and helpful on car audio and are just an opinion giver and a hype man on this forum to collaborate with people who are knowledgeable and helpful on car audio. Make some weird Keebler elf noises and go play in your cookies while the grownups talk car audio.

TEEHEE!!! i was high as fuck when i wrote all that.. and im just messing with you, if you havent figured it out... and no i dont really give out too many answers but instead try to get people to think a lil for themselfs. but hey, you know it all you "grown up" cookie hater *giggle*

what the fuck is "won any days" mean? im not interweebs cool?

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hello. i know it's hard helping people with electrical issues over the internet. 

to sum it up, i grounded my rear battery with one 1/0 and one 2/0 wire, about 8/10 inches, about as short as it could be while making the wires easy to work with. i grounded both amps separately and hard to the body on clean metal, bolting through like i was told, which was easier than i thought it'd be. one 1/0 coming from the front battery and one 1/0 from the rear battery onto the fuse block with one 4 gauge coming off and one 2/0. front battery grounded hard onto alternator case and frame with stock ground intact. one 1/0 power coming off of alt and one 1/0 power headed to the trunk.

 

still rarely seeing 14.3/4 when i start it cold, and it never rises back to 14.3/4 after any voltage drop. i'm under the impression that i should be sitting around 14.6 and above. my d3400 in the rear rests at 12.1 after sitting all night. the front battery is around 12.4/5. i'm reading a lot about voltage regulators, but my car is pretty bare bones electronically, and i can't find anything about it online. (2001 mercury grand marquis). revving the engine while playing or idling doesn't change the voltage. the only thing i can think of would be to shorten the engine bay grounds since they have unnecessary length (maybe 5/6 inches longer than need be), i just wanted to hear someone's opinion/fact before, since they came this length out of the box (xs power). in case this is necessary, my smart 3 is wired to 2 ohm, two sa-12v2 d2 in a 32hz box with 5 cubes. smart 3 up until clipping then backed down at 3/4 HU. voltage is good when playing lows, but drops dramatically on highs, down to around 12.5, or even lower on some songs. strong 13-14 when playing lows at idle full tilt. i know full tilt means nothing when you're looking for real numbers. i can clamp the smart 3 if that makes sense to do. 

 

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Where are you reading voltage from? Where did you tap the line at?

 

Use a DMM, compare your voltage between the front alt lug and rear battery while at idle, if they are within 2% then lets stop checking wires.

 

Sometimes when batteries age or stored at low voltage or even when you add more, it can put more of a load on the system, because of this i would attempt to disconnect the rear battery and see if your voltage jumps back up to where you had it, if not you either still have a load you don't know about or a bad diode or two within the alt.

 

Have you tried fully charging those batteries on an external charger? 12.1 is pretty low and would for sure put a bigger load than a fully charged d3100.

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3 hours ago, slowfkncar said:

Where are you reading voltage from? Where did you tap the line at?

 

Use a DMM, compare your voltage between the front alt lug and rear battery while at idle, if they are within 2% then lets stop checking wires.

 

Sometimes when batteries age or stored at low voltage or even when you add more, it can put more of a load on the system, because of this i would attempt to disconnect the rear battery and see if your voltage jumps back up to where you had it, if not you either still have a load you don't know about or a bad diode or two within the alt.

 

Have you tried fully charging those batteries on an external charger? 12.1 is pretty low and would for sure put a bigger load than a fully charged d3100.

i checked the front battery instead of alt, so i'll check that today. i'm losing about .3 from front to rear batteries at idle. i'm checking from the batteries themselves. my interior voltmeter reads at the sub amp, and i checked front to back with a dmm multiple times. interior voltmeter hasn't been calibrated for a second battery, but it still reads the same as the dmm, just for reference. i do want a battery charger, i was just hoping since the battery is relatively new i'd be good for a while. thanks for the suggestions. 

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Just my opinion and some experience...

 

In terms of grounding what I've found works best is a "star" ground also known as "single point ground" .  Typically this can be implemented as a comparatively short thick wire running from the battery negative to a rather large stud where the stud serves as a point to where all other ground wires are connected.   In this case and ideally:  One ground wire to the engine block, another to the starter motor, another to the alternator case, and others to amplifiers, head units, etc.    What this does is two things:  One is the elimination of "ground loops"   and two provides a superior electrical connection over relying on the integrity of the welds, screws, nuts and bolts used to hold the car together.  Yes it can be almost impractical to implement and drive the wiring cost through the roof however it's worth it. 

 

If I had a nickel for every ground related problem...  

 

 

 

 

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me removing the rear battery didn't do much besides lower voltage under load. singer suggested an aftermarket voltage regulator so i can boost idle voltage myself up from 13.9-14.4 max.. would a higher idle voltage gain anything noticeable under load, or is it just for show?

honestly, i could run it as is.. idling i rarely drop into mid 12s. 

singer also suggested adding a second d3400 to the trunk, and i was thinking about running two smart 3s eventually. i bought an md-5k from a taramps dealer and the fans didn't work, so i don't know if i should try another one or just double up. 

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hey ive got a random question ive read through most of this thread and the troubleshooting but does anyone know if this car is uni-body? ive ran into this problem before just a random thought sorry if i butted in to yall trouble shooting the problem and dealing with a person that is just making issues worse by not giving any information or helping the subject at all

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On 9/5/2020 at 6:38 PM, 3000iphones said:

hello. i know it's hard helping people with electrical issues over the internet. 

to sum it up, i grounded my rear battery with one 1/0 and one 2/0 wire, about 8/10 inches, about as short as it could be while making the wires easy to work with. i grounded both amps separately and hard to the body on clean metal, bolting through like i was told, which was easier than i thought it'd be. one 1/0 coming from the front battery and one 1/0 from the rear battery onto the fuse block with one 4 gauge coming off and one 2/0. front battery grounded hard onto alternator case and frame with stock ground intact. one 1/0 power coming off of alt and one 1/0 power headed to the trunk.

 

still rarely seeing 14.3/4 when i start it cold, and it never rises back to 14.3/4 after any voltage drop. i'm under the impression that i should be sitting around 14.6 and above. my d3400 in the rear rests at 12.1 after sitting all night. the front battery is around 12.4/5. i'm reading a lot about voltage regulators, but my car is pretty bare bones electronically, and i can't find anything about it online. (2001 mercury grand marquis). revving the engine while playing or idling doesn't change the voltage. the only thing i can think of would be to shorten the engine bay grounds since they have unnecessary length (maybe 5/6 inches longer than need be), i just wanted to hear someone's opinion/fact before, since they came this length out of the box (xs power). in case this is necessary, my smart 3 is wired to 2 ohm, two sa-12v2 d2 in a 32hz box with 5 cubes. smart 3 up until clipping then backed down at 3/4 HU. voltage is good when playing lows, but drops dramatically on highs, down to around 12.5, or even lower on some songs. strong 13-14 when playing lows at idle full tilt. i know full tilt means nothing when you're looking for real numbers. i can clamp the smart 3 if that makes sense to do. 

 

222884666_PhotoSep05175853.thumb.jpg.659545853d12ca48d910cf4bca119fb1.jpg1443993565_PhotoSep05180802.thumb.jpg.70503c0d498bb6c3e444d9664ac51030.jpg330396329_PhotoSep03145457.thumb.jpg.885f507599c6f769b81376aa97746f1b.jpg241232384_PhotoSep05175459.thumb.jpg.e92ddc31e88387f34798aed00eca809a.jpg

If your rear battery is resting that low then you need to charge it. An agm should be resting around 12.85 or higher when fully charged. An agm shouldn’t rest that low. That agm battery is discharged like fugh. No wonder your voltage is crappy, you have a super discharged battery in the circuit. I forgot to even ask you about resting voltage to see if a battery was discharged. Since that battery wasn’t grounded good, it got discharged and now needs to be charge now that the grounds are good. I hope you wired the grounds like we talked about and now you just have to charge that rear battery and you are good.

:stupid:“How can we help you?”
:guido:
“And don’t forget to tell them that 
the customer isn’t always right.”

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