Honda Civic Electrical, Wiring, and In Car EntertainmentThere's no limit when it comes to in car entertainment for your Honda Civic. It takes experience to make a car for show or even your average car audio enthusiast. Get the information needed to work on your Honda Civic Electrical Wiring and I.C.E.
I'm using an amplifier to power a 12 inch subwoofer, another amplifier to power my 4 stock speakers and I'm also running a 90 watt power supply on a car computer. If the bass gets really intense, my lights fade in and out so I want to fix it. I know a capacitor will stop the fading lights but it only masks the problem, a capacitor doesn't actually fix anything. So my question is between a battery or an alternator, which should I upgrade first? And I'll be upgrading the 3 grounds while I'm at it as well. And lastly, which kind of battery should I get and where?
if you upgrade the alt, should not need a better battery. optima sucks, they barely last a year or two. the $50 autocraft battery i got so far lasted longer and works a ton better.
So far I read alternator and I understand they're about $300, that right? Can you explain to me why I should get that first? And where I should get one?
alternator is the weakest part of the system. if you are drawing more power than you are making, thats not good. and it will eventually drain the battery or mess it up. now if you have a good alternator making lots of power, there will be plenty left to keep the battery charged, and it wont matter if you have a "good" battery, whatever that even means.
alternator is the weakest part of the system. if you are drawing more power than you are making, thats not good. and it will eventually drain the battery or mess it up. now if you have a good alternator making lots of power, there will be plenty left to keep the battery charged, and it wont matter if you have a "good" battery, whatever that even means.
couldn't have said it better. listen to this guy! he knows his stuff!!!
do you have a schematic of the factory one? maybe we can figure a way to improve on it?
One of these links should work as a wiring diagram.
Anyway, the whole issue the way I see it is things like amplifiers don't draw current thru the ELD. The amp's power connection is straight to the batt so it bypasses the ELD. So, the ECM/PCM doesn't tell the alternator to work any harder to make up for that power out of the battery.
That's why an outboard regulator seems crucial to me.
Last edited by christmaspie : 11-30-2007 at 08:52 PM.
Reason: trying to be more clear
the problem with the alternator working harder is, it will burn out faster. its such a weak pos that if you have an amp telling it to stay on forever, youre gonna need a new one very soon. idk. same happened when i had the aem pulley on it. the voltmeter showed it working non stop to keep up with normal power demands, then a few months later it just burned up.
- Command, we have reports of a hijack in the area.
- Copy that, have you got a description of the suspects?
- Looks to be a single car enthusiast going by the alias christmaspie. Request for use of deadly force.
- Roger that, stand by for confirmation.
