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One for the ICE installers

BigT

BigT

BigT

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
3,518
Location
UK
Apologies if this should be in the Hi-fi forum but I thought I may get more real world experience from visitors to the motors forum.

I could do with someone checking some wiring for me before I attempt an ICE install. While I've done a few basic installations in the past, I've never done one with two amps, nor one with a capacitor involved and it is the electrical wiring I'm most concerned about.

A bit of background info for you:

The car this is going in has the battery under the rear seats, meaning that the cable runs between battery, fuses, capacitor and amps will be very short.

I've not included proper speaker wiring notation below because I'm fine with that, nor have I represented RCA leads or power going to the HU.

Where items have terminals I've tried to label these +ve and -ve. Red wires indicate flow coming from a positive terminal, black ground/negative and blue for the 12v remote power.

The main questions I have are:

1. Is the capacitor wired in correctly in the circuit.

2. Is the inline fuse for the amp to the subs the correct side of the capacitor

3. I've always grounded cables to the car chassis in the past, but since the battery is so close (there'll be less than 50cm cable I think) I was going to run the grounds through a distribution block back to the negative terminal of the battery. Is this OK to do?

4. I've only used distribution blocks for a +ve wire before, but here I'm proposing to use them for all current carrying wires. Is this OK?

5. Will I be OK to use the capacitor for just the sub amp, or should I get one for the amp powering the mids/tweeters? Sub amp is 300W RMS total and mid/tweeter amp 200W RMS. I'm assuming it is only the unexpected demand of having to hit a huge bass note that will cause a potential problem.

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Any help gratefully appreciated.
 
ive done a similar install in my car but didnt use any dist box or capacitor. just ran 2 lots of 8 gage wire from the battery to each amp (had one in allready then put 2nd in). not sure you need all the dist boxs and dont you just run it from battery to capacitor then to amp?

i take it you are grounding on the battery not the car?


also have the fuse 1st after the battery before anything else (ive actually got 1 at the battery then one just before the amps, but that me being over perdantic and also using it to extend the power leads.
 
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why no cap? you not think he needs it ? ive got 2 subs (300rms each running of 1 amps) and i dont seam to have a problem. so i see what u mean if that it.
 
1. Earth shouldnt be going back to the battery, should be going to chassis.
2. Fuses should be closer to the battery not the amps.

Apart from that, looks ok
 
What is the capacitor for because i fitted an amp yesterday for a mate and the speakers whine when the engine is running. I do remember in physics and electronics using a cap to smooth a signal, or am i on totally the wrong lines and it wont make a slight bit of difference?
 
speaker whin is either the alternator or the rca near the power lead bleeding into each other.

a capacitor with stop the drop in base when a real powerfull draw needed more power than can be supplied.
 
A distribution block on the remote line is unecessary imo, i'd just connect it to one and splice another short length of remote into that/run two remote wires
 
If you keep the power cap it should be earthed to the chassi on the shortest length of cable you can use, it should be on a separate earth to stop interference.
 
also surely the remote should be powered with a relay box as the HU might burn out turning on 2 amps? (not instantly, just after time...)


and ive got 3 fuses, 1 right next to the battery to protect cables, and 1 (smaller one) per amp.
 
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