[djdisturbed]

If I'm running that much power I like to have a 2nd battery.

 

[djdisturbed]

If i were you I would put a Auto audio circuit breaker on the main line you are running to the back near the battery connection, This will add an extra level of saftey to the system and also act an a cut off poinbt if you need to be jump started to you dont accidently fry anything (and also run a 2nd battery-like an optima yellow top hidden behind one of the amps in the trunk is realy good if you are running that large of a line back there anyway).

 

[djdisturbed]

Well..... you DONT need a 2nd alternator for a 2nd battery, I used to have bass comp set up and ran a 2nd battery and NEVER had to add a second alternator for it, now if i had more then just the second battery then i would have to add one or more. BUT that also depends on your current alternators output and you can always put a better output alternator in instead of adding a second one. BUT its much better then just using caps alone. I had an issue with killing my main battery with caps alone in my old vehicle, but with a second battery installed i never had an issue and the bass was alot cleaner. But then again, if you are not running that much power then its no big deal. I was pushing 1600 watts out of one amp (in mono) and 800x4 in the other amp.

 

[djdisturbed]

I drilled a hole through my firewall. I wish I could've saw this post beforehand I used another guy's post to run my power cable from engine bay to trunk =(. I couldn't get a grommet to coat the hole because our cars have double firewall one inside the interior and another going through the engine bay. So drilling through this took some extra muscle LOL. Is it safe to have no grommet there? Since I don't want to remove any wires and the time it took me to pull that wire from the very bottom where I drilled a hole can I just improvise and use something like duck tape to coat the hole? What kind of issues can I run into since there is no coating around the hole?

no, its not safe to not have a grommet b/c the sharp edge of the hole will wear the coating off the wire and cause it to short out, or even cause a fire. the grommet keeps this from happening b/c it keeps the sharp edge from cutting into the wire coating. If you cant find a grommet to fit, find you local communications shop (like places that sells $ installs 2 way commercial radios, police radio's and lights and stuff) and talk to the install manager or the guys in the shop, they will normally have a grommet that will fit (i know I used to work at one, they should have like 10-20 diff types of grommets to fit all size holes and all thickness of firewalls)

 

[djdisturbed]

i still think its funny that everyone is running 0 gauge wire and not even using enough power through there system to warrant 0 gauge wire. I ran a 2nd battery on my old bass comp truck with 2000 watts pushing 2 18's and a 400X4 amp and i didnt even have to run 0 gauge wire. I was running 2 gauge to the 2nd batt and 4 gauge wire to the amps, and this was dong by the shop who owned/designed the old stroker van that one the loudest vehicle for 2 straight years (infact my 2nd battery was out of that van). I'm not saying that you sould not do it, I'm just saying its a little overkill unless you are setting up high power audio comp systems.

 

[djdisturbed]

Where did you guys run your rca cables; I'm going to do it along the passenger side, inless there is a better way?

I would say try to run them the opposite side that you ran your power cables, it will help keep any noise issues down

 

[djdisturbed]

I ran both my power cable, remote wire, and rcas down through the center console and there is barely any noise issues. I do hear a slight hissing when I accelerate but I like it =) It makes it sound like im driving a sports car LMAO!! Keep in mind I have kept them about 4-6" apart so they are not touching whatsoever.

Other then that there is no noise and I'm happy to say everything sounds great through my new Pioneer AVH-4000DVD head unit. Much more of an improvement over the stock premium head unit. My stock subwoofer is also unplugged.

well that hiss is what happends, also if its bad enough it can cause issues with your system (b/c it introduces feq. into the systems outside what is supposed to be there)

 

[djdisturbed]

hmmm.. it was there before? that sounds like an alternator issue, you might want to have that checked out. Alot of times when an alternator is starting to go out it will cause that to happen as well.

 

[djdisturbed]

hey dj, ive seen u talking ALOT about stuff that doesnt make ne sense, like once second u had 2000 Watts (by the way ur talking PROBABLY MAX) and then 1000 watts
just for your information
my standard system will MAX out a 4 gauge oversized wire (equals 2.97 awg)
its only 2 amps, a PDX 100.4 @ 60 amps and a KAC-9104d @ 60amps.. thats 120 amps, and pretty much the max of any 4 gauge (over max for cheaper brands) wire on the market

for your future reference, both amps are Class d and extremely efficient. And i dont think you should be giving advice and suggesting having another battery or CAPS
caps are kinda useless for extended listening, great for about a whole 3 secs (if you have a 6 farad with my system for instance) but otherwise, a big empty space
if nething an upgrade of the alternator to a high output alternator is all you need (which also requires replacing the stock ground wire for the alternator!)

Id have to say that your car would have had to be running 2 gauge or smaller in order to run a 2000 RMS amp and a 400 RMS x4 amp... in fact it should have ran 1/0 or even 2/0!!!!

if you are talking bout systems that are bought from walmart, no they prolly wont need 4 gauge... BUTTT and thats a big but they might

for instance, my gfs system was walmart type stuff... a jensen 400 RMS amp and a pioneer 60x4 RMS amp... this put me just over the 60 amp max of 8 gauge wire, so in this case 4 gauge was just perfect.... but only to a distribution block where it broke down to 2 8 gauge wires ;-P

no, the system was designed by me and a spon in Ral who held the loudest vechicle in the world status for 3 years, Creative Acustics, Stroker Van. I was running 1-bd1000 Rockford Fostage amp with the dual VC speakers set up as a 1 ohm load), a Rockford fostage 400a4, all these went into a fuse box mounted on the amp wall (front part of the sub enclosure, but not part of the actual sub box), also into the sub box was a 600watt dc/ac converter to run playstation (also ran my dj euiptment off of it), off this cam a 2gauge wire to the 2nd batt (optima yellow top) concealed in the base of the wall. The 2nd batt got power from a 2gauge wire running from the first battery/altenator with a 40amp circuit breaker on it (originally used a 40 amp fuse, but the fuse kept breaking (like cracking in half) due to vibrations. stock alt. and normal batt under the hood. My mids/highs were MB Quarz componant speakers (before they got bought out) and my head unit was a kenwood Video touchscreen (before they started putting dvd players in them) will TV reciever. this was in a 97 dodge dakota extended cab, with the full backseat removed and replaced with the subs and amp, the 2 18" dual VC rockford subs pointed straight up with a comp. tuned box, pushing 145.9bd of bass to the front windshield, i could have gotten more db by adding a 2nd bd1000 to the system with a 2 ohm load on each b/c it was designed to do this if we wanted without having to re-do too much of the set up (if you saw it you would know what im talking about), but i didnt feel like re-enforcing my windows, also if i would have taken the head liner out i would have gotten a few more db's but at the same time, i wanted it to look somewhat good inside. this was back in 1999 or so ( give or take a year or so)

As for what I know about running power things in vehicles, I worked for a Communication shop for a long while, installing police lighting and 2way radios (with some of the larger ones pulling ALOT more power then any audio system you will put in a civic, think about a fire dept moble command truck). We didnt even keep 0gauge wire in the shop b/c it was never really needed, Exp when you can run 2 smaller power wires for much cheeper then running 0gauge. But then again, what Do I know, i just studies lighting and sound system design for theatres in college (wich those amps draw even more power than any veichle can handle, i know, diff type of thing, but i still have to design the power source for these things as well when i design a system). Plus I have been install car audio since 1995, and police lighting and 2 way radios since 2000. Plus, did i say I'm a FCC licends radio operator, witch means i had to take many test on electrical systems (FCC id KF4ZZE)

 

[djdisturbed]

Now I'm not saying NOT to use 0 gauge wire, use it if you want BUT, in MOST set-ups its a little overkill. unless you are running a very high power system with LONG wire runs you typically wont need it. Part of the reason that we didnt have to use 0gauge wire on my set up was the run from the 2nd battery to the amps was short and i was not getting much resistance from a long wire run. same thing with the wire going to the 2nd battery (wich was about the same length as going to the trunk in the civic b/c i had to cross over the engine bay to the other side to run it in the truck). There have been times when i DID need to use 0gauge (and bigger) on set ups, but they were pushing alot more power then i was in the truck (wich i dont see you average 8th gen owner trying todo, i many civic owners spending 0ver $6000 on just speakers,amps and custom boxes/installs when that $ is much better spent on our engines:vtec I have had to run 00gauge wires for one of my friends set-ups, but he was also doing a bass comp walled van. he was hitting 160.1 db of bass with that system, with a 57 hrz feq. on a 2 second burp, my system was 145.9 with a 54hrz burp, gotta love tuned systems to optimize you spl's).

I think my set-up for the mugen is NOT going to be a bass set up, its going to be a IASCA type set up, going for overall sound quality not SPL's. I'm already well known in this area's club scene for my great sounding club audio systems i design, so next I'm going for that hifi Home theatre sround sound type thing in the mugen. I got a sub box design that if it works right will give me both the strong punch i like with a a good sounding rumble without havingto put in the big guns and taking up all my trunk space (using some of my club style sub designs, using both a front mounted sub and a short throw horn type sub enclosure using 2 diff size subs). but its goingto be REALLY fun getting that IASCA sound without all the rattles that the civics are bad for, i might want to buy stock in dynamat... lol

 

[djdisturbed]

OK, tda1337 and djdisturbed, whatever is going on here needs to end now, because a thread filled with people bickering and attacking each other provides no useful information to anyone, so please both of you be mature and drop it.

ok ill stop, you posted while i was typing....

 

[djdisturbed]

people WILL most likely need 4 gauge wire, some 1/0 2 gauge is perfect for most

:yeahthat: EXACTLY!!!!!!! (not saying this sarcasticly (sp)) very much agreeeing with you!!! )