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How To Install?

Trooper

By Trooper,
in Car Audio & Electrical

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Trooper Experienced

Trooper

Posted
Posted

Ive just bought a capacitor for my new setup (Soundstream 5 Farad cap) and just wondering if there any "Dont's" associated with the install? As i understand they can be a bit nasty if 'accidentally' discharged.

I am drawing up a basic wiring diagram and just wanting to confirm exactly what happens with the capacitor is this right?

Power wire from battery to capacitor

Then continue to the power input on the amp

With the earth does the amp get earthed via the cap or do I run an earth for the amp and a second one for the cap? or is the cap not earthed seperately?

Any advice would be great

This is what I have bought so far

Pioneer Splits (Already installed)

P4004 Rockford amp

P3 10' Rockford sub

Soundstream 5farad capacitor

Later on I will buy a monoblock and run a second P3 sub and also move the pioneer speakers into the rear of the car and buy some decent focal splits for the front.

I will have my old sub and amp to sell (less than a year old) not sure what they are worth

The sub is a kicker 10' dual voice coil sub (the silver shiny patterned cone one)

and the amp is coustic 4 ch.

I cant remember how much I paid for these, any ideas what I should ask for when I sell them?

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Freddy Kruger Mentor

Freddy Kruger

Posted
Posted

you got a 5 farad capacitor for A 10 inch sub? how much you pay?

dont get me started on capacitors. i ran a 12" with 950wrms thru it and i hammered it everytime i drove the car... the most modification i did for the power is re earth the car with a bigger guage cable and bought a better battery (was still 'only' a Bond silver/calcium battery).

never had a flat battery except for one time i left the interior light on over a long weekend.

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LiQuid IcE Experienced

LiQuid IcE

Posted
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Iv'e got a positive cable from battery to cap and a negative cable from batter to cap.

and left the amps the way they were, battery to amp, amp grounded to the body.

Essentially it works out to be the same as what your saying... shouldn't matter whether you get the power for the amp from the cap or the battery, its all the same wire.

Im an ameture though :( so get a 2nd opinion...

on the same topic, does the cap help save the battery from going dead that much?? I got it to stop my lights from dimming when the sub thumped.

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Medium Dave Proficient

Medium Dave

Posted
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Hey Heath, you are on the money here, power to cap then amp, as for the negative it shouldnt matter if you give it a seperate earth or not. You are also right about an accidental discharge, there is a lot of potential energy stored in them and they are designed to discharge very quickly, hopefully the worst thing that would happen is that it would scare the sh*t out of you :banana: -keep that in mind when you are removing it too, they will stay charged for days after being unhooked from the battery.

Also, they wont stop your battery from going flat as they only store charge that is already there, they can not create power, cheers

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Trooper Experienced

Trooper

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Hey Heath, you are on the money here, power to cap then amp, as for the negative it shouldnt matter if you give it a seperate earth or not. You are also right about an accidental discharge, there is a lot of potential energy stored in them and they are designed to discharge very quickly, hopefully the worst thing that would happen is that it would scare the sh*t out of you :banana: -keep that in mind when you are removing it too, they will stay charged for days after being unhooked from the battery.

Also, they wont stop your battery from going flat as they only store charge that is already there, they can not create power, cheers

Thanks for that mate

I think I will run a common earth for battery and cap then. I remember playing with very little caps at school playing pranks on people with them, and the TINY ones still hurt, this is a lot bigger so i suppose the hurt will be a lot bigger too.

Now it is just a case of watching the tracking updates on the net and waiting for the postman!!

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frx026 Proficient

frx026

Posted
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Paid a few hundred for it, looking to upgrade later so I thought I would be better off doing things properly the first time -cheaper in th long run.

I get a flat battery all of the time, dont think the cap will help that (i think its the alarm draining my battery) thinking about possibly installing a second battery in parallel. I do get a few blown headlights though due to the constant dimming with the base. Hopefully that will stop now

You are 100% right, any cap will not help your battery from running flat. It wont help with your headlights dimming etc.

Honestly, if you are having problems with your lights dimming to the point where the hedlights fail due to lack of voltage you need to

- upgrade your alternator

- upgrade your regulator

- upgrade all the earths from your main devices, engine, battery, chasis.

If you do decide to put in a second battery without doing these you will just run that battery down to.

As for your alarm draining your battery, it is possible, but highly unlikely, an alarm at rest ( not going off) draws very little current and wont make your car go flat. Check to see if your boot light is staying on or some other device is constantly active. This will drain the battery.

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  • 2 weeks later...
VB- Veteran

VB-

Posted
Posted

the main 'dont' when it comes to capacitors is buying/using/installing one in the first place. while i haven't much experience with these, i believe what the pro's write. take a look on car audio australia as to what they say about caps.. a general consesis is 'uterly useless'

if u want to stop lights dimming, upgrade all earths, get a better battery, upgrade charge wire from alternator to battery, make sure all ground/connections are clean with good contact

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Trooper Experienced

Trooper

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Thanks for the advice mate... I might sell the cap (i bought one for my bro too)

Any idea what they are worth? ive seen 1farad ones selling for like $400and ive got a 5 farad one (soundstream too). My brother was told they are worth about $1000 at autobahn :S crazy (he is the one that bought it for me actually)

If i can sell it for enough $ it should pay for a new alternator/wiring etc

Good news re battery drain though....it WAS the alarm after all

Damn idiots installed it incorrectly to begin with :happy:

All fixed for under $100 at an auto elec

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Kinks Grand Master

Kinks

Posted
Posted
ive seen 1farad ones selling for like $400

Wow, people are getting ripped the hell off.

A small auxiliary battery would shit all over a capacitor for energy storage. The pulse current of a cap might be a bit higher but if you're drawing that much current you won't have much hearing left soon.

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