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BIG 3 Upgrade

acarmody

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Actually I'm interested in any advice that would stop my light dimming problem. When I turn on some real bass my whole dash dims and I can actually notice my headlights dim (can't be good for them). I decided to turn on the dash voltmetre and play Bass I Love You (love it). Pretty much the whole song the volts sat around 11.8v-12v. Even dipped to 11.4 at one point.

I'm only running 1400wrms to the subs and 600wrms to the splits. I already have 0gauge to the amps and 0gauge from the negative terminal to the strut tower. Next on my list is replacing the alternator to positive wire with 0gauge. I was holding off placing som 0gauge from the negative to chassis because I would have thought the the factory wire and the 0 to the strut tower would easily handle my power demands. I have a spare bosch gold battery if that will help. But I'm hoping that I won't have to get a bigger alternator as they are quite expensive.

Oh and yes my grounds are good. Professionally installed amp by a good installer and I still checked the grounds myself.
 

holdenboy

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acarmody.....its always good to also add a 0g earth from the engine to the negative terminal or the strut tower. This ensures the alternator itself can produce as many amps as possible.

If you do this and still have a problem, maybe a proper high capacity battery is an option. I have over 4000wrms running my 2 15s and upgraded the earths under the bonnet something crazy....but still had headlight dimming problems (i had a second battery too). When i upgraded the second battery to an Optima D31 (the biggest they make) i almost have no headlight problems and the voltage stayed above 12v ALL the time.

So firstly i would say upgrade the "big 3" to 0g and if that dosent solve your problems go with a better or second battery.
 

acarmody

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I probably should have mentioned that my battery is a D34 Optima, nice battery.

I was just checking out the specs of the D31, hopy crap that has a lot of cranking amps, probably about 1000 at room temperature.
 

holdenboy

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Yep, not cheap either ;)

Well if youve already upgraded the battery the next step is to do your earths.
 

Deutscher

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Actually I'm interested in any advice that would stop my light dimming problem. When I turn on some real bass my whole dash dims and I can actually notice my headlights dim (can't be good for them). I decided to turn on the dash voltmetre and play Bass I Love You (love it). Pretty much the whole song the volts sat around 11.8v-12v. Even dipped to 11.4 at one point.

I'm only running 1400wrms to the subs and 600wrms to the splits. I already have 0gauge to the amps and 0gauge from the negative terminal to the strut tower. Next on my list is replacing the alternator to positive wire with 0gauge. I was holding off placing som 0gauge from the negative to chassis because I would have thought the the factory wire and the 0 to the strut tower would easily handle my power demands. I have a spare bosch gold battery if that will help. But I'm hoping that I won't have to get a bigger alternator as they are quite expensive.

Oh and yes my grounds are good. Professionally installed amp by a good installer and I still checked the grounds myself.

Sup Acarmody,
May i ask what you are running? 600wrms for splits? (this has to be fronts and rears? still a nice number haha.)

(I haven't figured out how to quote multiple things)

Holdenboy - what the hell are you running? 4000wrms? guess in ur sig u do mention 150db :thumbsup: nice! you own a wagon ye? wish I could fit more into my boot :cry: just no room with gas tank.

Also, how hard is it to re-wire the big 3? Had a quick look in the engine bay of my VS and it seems pretty unkeen!!
 

holdenboy

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lol....yeah its a wagon. The amp is a Schneider SPA 7000X, and people in the SPL scene think i should run more power ;)

You dont need to "re-wire" the big three, just adding them on top of the stock earths is fine. One thing that i do which makes it easier is just run one (or maybe two) runs of 0g to the strut tower etc, then run your other earths to this. That way your not overcrowding your neg. terminal. Ive actually got a peice of alum. screwed to my chassis rail near the battery, then all my earths run to that (engine, 2 x chassis and 2 x neg terminal runs). I'll post up some pics if you want to give you some ideas?
 

acarmody

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Sup Acarmody,
May i ask what you are running? 600wrms for splits? (this has to be fronts and rears? still a nice number haha.)

(I haven't figured out how to quote multiple things)

Yeah 300wrms to the front splits and 300wrms to the rears. All door mounted (except front tweeters, they are in factory location) and all are PolkAudio MMC-6500. Deck is a Kenwood KDC-X9006U. Amps are all Cadence, one ZRS-7504, one ZRS-1502, and two ZRS-6000D. Subs are two L7s, each getting 700wrms.

Its plenty loud enough and I am finding myself adjusting the bass on the H/U to like -9 to level the system out to play quality music, except bass songs of course then it goes back to zero.
 

Denno

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lol....yeah its a wagon. The amp is a Schneider SPA 7000X, and people in the SPL scene think i should run more power ;)

You dont need to "re-wire" the big three, just adding them on top of the stock earths is fine. One thing that i do which makes it easier is just run one (or maybe two) runs of 0g to the strut tower etc, then run your other earths to this. That way your not overcrowding your neg. terminal. Ive actually got a peice of alum. screwed to my chassis rail near the battery, then all my earths run to that (engine, 2 x chassis and 2 x neg terminal runs). I'll post up some pics if you want to give you some ideas?

I wouldn't mind seeing some photos of your engine bay extra wiring if that's cool. If possible can you include some photos about how to upgrade the alternator to battery? I am not really sure where on the alternator I'm supposed to connect the wire.
And excuse me if this is a stupid question, but strut tower? What is it?
 

acarmody

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Strut tower is where the top bolt of you front shock absorbers is bolted too.
 

Denno

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Oh ok then.. So undoing the bolt won't affect the shock?
 
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