Has anyone wired their truck for this? How is it done and what power supply to use? I'm not looking to do shows, just sick of killing my battery when playing at parties. I'm running about 1600 - 1800 watts Rms. Thanks!

,Marc

 

It really depends upon how much you are willing to spend. The first thing would be to replace your stock battery with a battery made for this type of thing, and while your at it buy a second one. You will want to divide the power coming from the alternator to be split between both batteries. Speaking of alternator you will want to replace this with a high output alternator. Stinger, will make you an alternator to your specs. Tell them what type of vehicle and how many amps you want. Not a cheap option. The last thing would be to add a capacitor. 1 farad per 1000 watts, but a 5 farad cap should do you fine. Plus you will want to use 0 AWG wire for all of this.

There you go, a competition breakdown. Now you have to ask yourself are you willing to spend the money to do it.

 

Well I've already replaced the stock battery with a Yellow-top Optima, I'm running 2ga wiring and I've got a cap. I was thinking more along the lines of a 12 volt power supply to be plugged into your average 110v home outlet or portable gas generator for use in remote areas. At car shows you see guys with a wierd plug about 2 or 3 inches wide permanently mounted somewhere on the vehicle (like under the bumper or something) and connected to a power supply. What I want to know is what kinda plug are those and how are they wired-up? Sounddomain.com sells a power supply but they don't give much for technical or setup details.

 

Those are AC to DC convertors. Allows for conversion of 110vAC to 12vDC to power the vehicle. Not that hard to install.

 

I would definately get a HO alternator...if your stock one can't keep up with the power you are drawing you always gonna be "killing" your battery.

I think caps are a waste...just my opinion. After they deliver their stored power, they just drain it from the battery again anyway. Add another battery close to your amp(s). If room is a problem, look at a Batcap 800 from Xstatic (no way am I affiliated w/ them), half the size of a battery with just as much CCAs.

Last but not least, by no means...do a Big 3 upgrade. Alot of people don't think about it but it helps. Click this link for more info.

 

Thanks for the suggestions guys, I'm defenitely going to look into doing the "big 3" because my lights do dim on hard bass hits and I do have a little alternator buzz at low volume. There's a lot of good info there. I still would like to know where to start with the 12 volt power supply and that strange plug you see under show cars... has anyone done this or know someone who has and how they did it?

 

Hah! You want power is it?!?!?

Check one of these switcher puppies out. You have a choice of just about as much 120V->12V wattage you can ever imagine, all in a little box. I think some can be set to 13.8V output.

http://www.power-one.com/products/acdcintro.html

Now, keep in mind the most you'll ever pull out of a standard 120VAC outlet is 15 or 20A, meaning about 2400W max. Realistically, you can pull about 1600W at most. From that, subtract about 10-15% for conversion losses in the supply itself. If you need more, you'll need a 240VAC connection such as those that run electric dryers at home. Maybe that's the strange plugs?

These ain't cheap, and they're not something you can go down to Walmart or RadioShack and pick up the next day. Generally speaking, you can get these for less than $1 per watt output.

Power-One isn't the only mfr of high power supplies. There are others such as Qualidyne, Astec, and many many others who cater to the big mainframe or rack-mount equipment market.

Power to-da People!

 

Ok guys, I was able to snap a picture of one of those "strange plugs" I was talking about with my cell phone today. Have any of you seen these?

 

Those are 240V plugs typically found on electric forklifts. Basically, the red plug in your picture get plugged into a power invertor that is plugged into the wall. Converts 240VAC to 12VDC