Ok I installed a dvd player and tw screens in my truck, and all of the are wired directly to the positive terminal on my truck battery. My problem is whenever I accelerate my screens start flashing whenever the dvd is off. It also flashes whenever my bass hits (I also have an amp installed on this battery. I have seen power connection on crutchfield that hooks onto the terminal as well, but then i wouldnt know how to hook up the amp as well as this multipoint power terminal. Anyone here know how I can solve this problem. Its not disabling but it is annoying as heck.

 

Where do you have your ground(s) connected?

John

 

I have my grounds connected to the iside to the firewall on the metal part

 

What exactly do you mean by flashing? Are the screens on or off at the time? Do they have on/off buttons or do they detect the signal and turn themselves on?

 

These thoughts may/may not help you, but I'll give it a shot.

Did you ground all the devices to the exact same point on the vehicle? If you do, I'm not sure I would do that.

Also, does you headlights dim at night when your subwoofers hit? If so, you need to get a bass cap. It sounds like your amp is pulling more power than your alternator is putting out. This would affect other electrical devices also, such as your screens.

Hope this helps, if not, let us know what it is when you find out.

 

well they turn on whenever I turn on my DVD player, and when i accelerate etc. it flashes white, then black, then white at a high speed, and I've never had a problem with my headlights dimming, I have the alternator that came with the towing package which i think is heavier duty then the regular one. I have all my devices connected to the positive terminal at different placesaround the little connecter. And I'm pretty sure everything is grounded at different locations

 

I'm probably stating the obvious here, but it seems like there is some type of power surge that is causing the auto turn-on circuit in the screens to cycle on/off. As I think Sandman_A_C is implying, your amplifier could be causing enough drain on the system when it hits a bass note, to pull your voltage down enough to possibly cause this.

Another thing to check: Disconnect your screens video cables, one at a time, from the DVD player end and then the screen end. See if the problem goes away. This will tell you if you are getting an induced signal into your video cable somewhere. Make sure all of your video cables are not close to any power cables.

If you can't fix the problem, just run all of your screens power leads through a switch. Then you can turn them on only when you want to watch a DVD.

Good luck!

 

I just want to clarify a statement made by Sandman_A_C...

"Also, does you headlights dim at night when your subwoofers hit? If so, you need to get a bass cap. It sounds like your amp is pulling more power than your alternator is putting out. This would affect other electrical devices also, such as your screens."

A "bass cap" will not fix your problems. It will hurt you more than it will help because it will be drawing power from your alternator along with your amp. The cap might cover up your problem with the headlights dimming but should not be used as a permanent solution.

I highly recommend upgrading the 3 most important wires in your electrical system. Battery, alternator & ground. Replace the factory wire with 4awg or bigger and connect your ground to the chasis as well as the block.

Whatever you do, make sure you base your decision on facts...not opinions.

John

 

I got this off of the best site I have found for car audio

"I've never seen any proof anywhere that a large capacitor does anything to improve the quality of the amplifier's output. Some people claim tat they help to prevent your headlights from dimming but in most cases it's simply a placebo effect. If the capacitors did what they were supposed to do, every capacitor manfacturer would have a demo vehicle showing how the output changed by xdBs when the caps when the caps were in or out of the circuit. To my knowledge, no company has proven that they do anything. Take the money that you would spend on a capacitor and spend it on an alternator upgrade."

think about it

heres a link

http://www.eatel.net/~amptech/elecdisc/caraudio.htm

 

I don't know where the question was brought up that a CAP increased the performance of a amplifier.

First, if you happen to know what a capacitor actually does.......the capacitor can certainly ease the strain that a "high performance" system can put on a OEM electrical system.

Second, A cap has the ability to recharge itself to its original states in a spit second vs, a battery that takes time to recharge, OEM alternators do ( even towing package ) not have the ability nor where they intended to withstand bursts of amps being demanded from them. A cap(s) with additional batteries and a competition grade alternator is in fact the only way to allow your amplifiers to perform to there PEAK potential as often as possible.

 

I'm not trying to start an argument....but where do you think a cap recharges itself from?

And your statement:

"A cap(s) with additional batteries and a competition grade alternator is in fact the only way to allow your amplifiers to perform to there PEAK potential as often as possible."

The key words in your statement are "additional batteries" and "a competition grade alternator"

A cap is nothing more than eye candy and a coverup for an inferior electrical system.

John

 

Briefly..............
capacitors and batteries impose a load on the alternator

a second battery is gonna do more bad than good.......unless you are listening to your system when your car is off

so if your alternator cant keep up in the first place why would you put more load on it?

does a cap really do enough good for its worth? It only fills the small voltage drops for a tiny fraction of a second and it doesn't fill up the big drops all the way

so I just say get a big a$$ alternator..............or two

 

i agree with 2trucks1wife a second batterie is what is needed. In high school and in college i installed car stereos. I dont know how many time i installed batteries for systems that were pulling to much juice from the car batterie. look around there are batteries that are made just for car stereos. Just my 2 cents

 

Capacitors are used to provide a current source for extremely fast transients, such as the ones found in music. Car batteries are no where near as fast at supplying current as a capacitor, especially across the 12-15ft of distance (from the battery to the amp). In order to use any of the current stored in the capacitor, it is important to make sure there is a very low inductance path for the current to travel to your amp. A low inductance path is a path that is as close as possible in proximity to your amp. and that is through an adequately sized wire. If you are unfamiliar with the term, inductance can be defined as a circuits ability to resist a change in current. High inductance means there will be a very slow change in current to a sudden, high demand...not good in music.

You can think of it like this... An amplifier is made up of a bunch of storage capacitors (among other stuff). By using a stiffening cap, you are merely supplying a faster current source to re-fill all of the smaller caps inside the amp during fast, high demand transients (Bass).

Therefore a large stiffening capacitor located very close to your amp, wired with heavy guage (4AWG or better) wire could provide some help in a high wattage system.

As for second batteries. They will do nothing to help maintain the current demand of a high wattage stereo system. They will only lengthen your listening time with the engine off.

As for alternators, for the most part, they will simply charge the battery more efficiently.

In my opinion, and I have had large systems that did use stiffening caps, the first step is to make sure you have adequately sized power cables connecting your amps to the battery. I would recommend 4 guage minimum for anything approaching 300watts MAX. Better to be oversized here. Make sure there is good power distribution, i.e. use a distribution block of good quality (keep the inductance down), and good, solid connection to your positive battery terminal and ground. Add a stiffening cap for system over 300 watts with lots of subs, but make sure it is wired with heavy guage cable and located close to the amp using it! And don't hook it up backwards...that could hurt!

That's my $.02....errrrr...make that $.04