ACC wire in E30

[Nobimmer 694]

I got the day off tommorow and figured I'd fix up my stereo wiring...not that many people have seen my ghetto wiring but dayam its a shocker haha

Anyways,I don't want to wire the headunit or amp straight to the battery again so I have to find a wire that is connected to the ignition.I was thinking maybe the cigarette lighter but I don't think mine works all together ha.

Anyone know what I can tap into?

Cheers

Ashkan

Edit:Also should I be wiring the amp to the acc or straight to the battery?

Edited October 15, 2006 by blackbma

[TronSpec 0]

Yeah good question. I have mine hooked up to the cigarette lighter but if I turn my headunit up heaps then it cuts out..

[ED1RTY 2]

Headunit should have a 12V negative Earth, 12V power and ACC wires going into the plug. You will need to connect all three of these, always run a new (Preferrably fused 20 amps is good) 12V power wire straight from the battery. And a new 12V Earth to a bare metal piece of chassis. Pull the steering wheel off and the surround and look on the back of the ignition and using a circuit tester try the wire connections until you find an 'ACC' wire (You will know this if the circuit tester only lights up when key is turned) strip a section of this wire and attach your new ACC wire (solder and then tape/heatshrink should be used)

As for the amp you should run a fused wire (ampere ratings will depend on how many amps you are running and how much load the fuse will need to accept before blowing) straight from the battery to the amps power input. Also run a new earth to a bare metal chassis point. The 'ACC' on the amp is alternatively known as the remote wire. you will need to hook this up to the 'remote out' wire on your headunit. Therefore the amp will turn on when the headunit does but will still hold the memory/tuning setting if it is a digital amp.

Hope that helps, pictures speak a thousand words but i dont have any so tough. Also look at some of the car audio guides stickied in the apperance/audio forum

[Nobimmer 694]

Yeh,I opened my heady up and it had the acc and power wires twisted together and the power wire from the battery is connected to the both of them which I guess is a tad ghetto haha.So yeh guess its more fun with the multimeter yusss.

As for the amp,I got the lil blue wire hooked up to the remote antenna wire on the back of heady and it only ever turns on when the head unit is on.Only thing is,last time I had the amp going it drained the f**K out of the battery,so much that the car wouldn't even run properlu after jumping it.Charged the battery back up and car runs sweet...so kinda scared of hooking amp back up lol.

Alternativly,could I put a switch between the power cable on the amp and turn it off alltogether when the car is off?

Any help would be much appreciated

Churrrr

[petone 0]

Um don't you only want the amp on when the headunit is?

Yes you could wire up a switch but you'll forgot to turn it off and next morning your battery is flat, just sort it properly.

Chris is exactly right but I think you might be getting a little confused still.. There are 3 wires relating to power FOR the head unit: EARTH (usually black or brown), 12V POWERr (should be fused (10AMP) and come straight from battery) and IGNITION (or accessory i suppose), I used the wire from the factory radio, otherwise you'll have to hunt down a wire that will be on when the key is in ACC or ON.

Once you've got that sorted you need the remote wire for the amp, this is so the amp is only on when the head unit is and doesn't drain your battery. Make sure you use the proper REMOTE wire for this and not antenna as some headunits will only raise the antenna when the radio is on, meaning you'd only have subs for the radio.

Other things to note, some headunits might share an antenna and remote wire, mine does. Also, there is a limit to how much current you can draw this, from memory 2 amplifiers should be sweet but I'm not sure about more than that.

ALWAYS pull the negative cable off the battery before you do any work so you don't accidently short something.

Lastly don't forget fuses and don't pull ghetto sh*t, either solder and then heatshrink connections or use proper crimp connection. If you don't you'll regret when your sounds turn off over bumps or worse, you fry something important.

[nz320i 0]

just get a tester and find the wire that turns on when your car is ON, not running, and then what i did was found a spare in the fuse box to use for my headunit so it had its own circuit, and put the big positive for the amp to the battery and the amp acc to the same one as my headunit acc. holla

[Nobimmer 694]

Sweet as,fixed the headunit problem..wired a 20 amp fused wire to the head,negative to a bolt and acc to the clock.SWEET.

Checked for amp coming on and it comes on when you turn the heady on and supposidly turns off when the head is off..ie the power light on the amp is off.That has been the case the whole time and the power was off when I checked after I turned the stereo off.So I think it's still sucking power,I can't see how but yeh something is deffinitly draining the battery.So yeh I don't really want to hook it all up and have it die again lol.

I checked and the amp was on "full" on the amp output thing so maybe thats the problem?

Cheers

[petone 0]

in regards to the amp being on "full" I assume you talking bout the gain? That wont be draining your battery. If the light is off then your amp should be tunred off and wont suck power, I'll be very surprised if there is a problem with the amp.

The gain control shouldn't be on full either though, this controls how much the amp is amplifiing the signal, or effectively how loud the subs will be.

[Nobimmer 694]

Sweet as,I'll hook it up haha hooook uuuup..and see if it's all gravy.

Thanks for the help

[Nobimmer 694]

Woop,if anyone cares I hooked amp and subs up,goes sweeeeet and battery hasn't died..yet haha

Cheers for the help

Ashkan