I've hooked up an 800w vibrant amp to a 1000w sony xplode subwoofer and when i turn the head unit off the power light goes out on the amp, but it's still draining the battery overnight.Any ideas, without having to wire in a kill switch!Cheers.
intrade,
Sep 14, 2:26am
well something is not off then well is it
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 14, 2:33am
wot!
thewomble1,
Sep 14, 3:07am
What Intrade said.something is not turned off
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 14, 3:10am
Where do i start to try and figure out where the power is draining if the amp is powering down!
saxman99,
Sep 14, 3:42am
Maybe your alternator can't handle the extra load of having a big amp running as well as everything else and your battery is not actually getting much of a charge on it, leading to hard starting on a cold morning!
Have a go at driving the last 20mins of your trip with no sounds and see how that goes the next day.
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 14, 3:56am
Thanks, the car battery doesn't drain if I disconnect the amp - wouldn't that mean the alternator is okay tho!I've read in a few forums that I can add a kill switch, or check the wiring at the back of the head unit and hook the remote wire up to a switched wire so that it will definately switch off when the car switches off, but I can't for the life of me find a simple colour diagram to tell me which colours do what in the bmw and convert them to a standard radio connection for the back of the head unit - my son (in his infinite wisdom) decided to cut the original harness plug off the car, so I now have to rewire the wires to the back of the head unit.There two wires left over after all the others have been paired up properly and I have no idea what they're for!Any help would be greatly received!I'm going grey every second i spend on this problem lol
miss-shortae,
Sep 14, 3:58am
have you wired it in correctly! iv installed many amps and subs, never heard of this before
ceebee2,
Sep 14, 4:44am
Same here.must be a wiring indiscretion!
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 14, 4:55am
The previous owner (i believe as he also did audio set ups) is the one who has taken off the original bmw harness plug from the radio wires, and has soldered them to standardized coloured wire harness and plug - so I'm assuming (hoping) has has done that part correctly (bmw wire colours are different from todays standardized colour codes).
Is that right!I haven't been able to find a colour code for bmw wiring to make sure they're all hooked up correctly, i'm just assuming it is.
Plus there are two small wires left over from the bmw harness that aren't connected to anything a thin white/brown wire and a thin black/white wire.Any ideas!
miss-shortae,
Sep 14, 5:04am
not sure, with power wires iv always used a curcit tester to find battery wire and ignition wire.
studio1,
Sep 14, 10:30am
Doesn't matter what coloured wires are hooked up to what - in any case colours don't mean much in terms of this issue. What you need to do is grab a multi-meter and check to see if the amp is drawing any power when it's turned off. If it is, there's your problem. I also have not heard of an amp flattening a battery when it's powered down - unless it has a fault, which is quite possible.
_peas,
Sep 14, 8:40pm
They usually have a remote wire front eh head unit to the amp to turn it off when the head unit is turned off.Make sure that you have a wire into the terminal on the amp and then set about clarifying that this is the actual one that you need.In aftermarket head units it is normally blue.If your car has an automatic aerial this output will do as well.
4piggy,
Sep 15, 7:54am
if it has capacitor on power supply to amp try without it as they make little difference unless over 1000watts and can cause current draw had a few do this in the past causing flat batteries
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 15, 8:56am
Yep that's on my list to do, gotta get down to the shop and buy me a multimeter
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 15, 8:58am
Yep, even tho in a bmw everything is backward and nothing is standard, it actually does have the blue remote wire, and when I switch off the head unit, the amp does power down.Gotta get me that multimeter.
tumeke4ueh,
Sep 15, 9:02am
I don't know if it does, what would I be looking for what does it look like!There's a fuse on the power wire running from the battery to the amp, that's not what you're talking about tho is it!
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