Power for speakers?

[Sentient Loon]

(Wasn’t sure where to post this. Mods, feel free to move it if necessary)

Good evening. I’m trying to calculate my electrical needs and have a question. I LOVE listening to music, and plan on having decent speakers + subwoofer in the van that I can play while driving and (when it won’t bother neighbors) parked.

I am quite naive when it comes to a vehicle’s electrical and sound system, so there’s a lot of research needed. However, my main question is wondering what is the best way to power the van’s sound system when the engine isn’t running. Do the speakers need to be wired exclusively to the house battery, or can it be hooked up to automatically switch between multiple power sources? I’m leaning towards a minivan so there will be speakers already built in.

In the end I’ll probably end up relying on headphones and a small portable speaker, but I’d like to indulge my inner rockstar when the opportunity presents itself.

 

[ahh_me2]

(Wasn’t sure where to post this. Mods, feel free to move it if necessary)

Good evening. I’m trying to calculate my electrical needs and have a question. I LOVE listening to music, and plan on having decent speakers + subwoofer in the van that I can play while driving and (when it won’t bother neighbors) parked.

I am quite naive when it comes to a vehicle’s electrical and sound system, so there’s a lot of research needed. However, my main question is wondering what is the best way to power the van’s sound system when the engine isn’t running. Do the speakers need to be wired exclusively to the house battery, or can it be hooked up to automatically switch between multiple power sources? I’m leaning towards a minivan so there will be speakers already built in.

In the end I’ll probably end up relying on headphones and a small portable speaker, but I’d like to indulge my inner rockstar when the opportunity presents itself.

It is not the speakers that connect to the battery but the amplifier that drives the speakers.
Are you talking about a car stereo, house type stereo, or a one box thing that has it all?
Is it to run from an inverte?

Car stereo's can deplete a battery fairly quickly as would a normal house stereo, what becomes important is what is the power consumption of the unit you are looking at using.
The louder the music system(or more powerful it is) the more current it will draw.
Loud is also relative, as in loud ina 500 seat hall, or loud as in the inside of a vehicle.

If you are using the built in speakers, does that mean you will use the built in stereo/radio as well?
If so, you would have to access the back of the unit in order to gain access to the +12 volt wire that feeds it in order to cut it and add a switch for use with either the starting battery or the house battery.

Can you provide more info on what you have or are planning to use?

 

[TMG51]

I considered the same thing and just ended up buying a portable bluetooth speaker. These things are pretty good, if you haven't played around with one yet I suggest going to a box store and checking them out. The inside of a vehicle isn't that big... I bought this one, and even though it's small I still sometimes worry I have it up too loud for the neighbors.
http://www.amazon.com/Party-Wireless-Boom-Gray-HX-P730GY/dp/B00CDGSOGG

There are plenty of bigger models with more base. Battery power means you can choose when to charge it (during the day or while driving) and use it later. Bluetooth it to your phone and play your own music or stream Pandora (plenty of places you can snag wifi, ask if you want to know more about that).

I'm sure there are purists who wouldn't be happy with less than a serious amp set up but I wouldn't recommend devoting your whole house power to an entertainment system.

 

[SternWake]

The first thing I did when I got my Van was pull out the original stereo and speakers and install a new head unit and some 6x9's in the front doors.  The 6x9s are underpowered but this is only evident to my ears on 8 out of 10 or higher volume.


When I first set up a house battery system, first thing I did was move the power lead for the stereo to the house battery.  I really despised having to have the key in the ignition and turned to acc to listen to the stereo.  Also I hated how the stereo would turn off during engine starting.  When in acc( stereo listening mode) there were also other parasitic draws on the battery.

A subwoofer uses a lot of electricity, bass requires lots more electricity.

I'm on my 3rd head unit since 2002, all of them have claimed an output of 52x4 watts, and at max volume they do seem to consume about 10 amps, which is a lot.   Music with a lot of bass will chew up more battery power than music without.
 Very light volume and it is about 0.8 amps, but the CD player consumes another 0.6 amps compared to using my phone as an MP3 player.

I used to spend weeks at a time parked in Baja without moving or idling to recharge and no Solar, and would ration battery power.  I thought using the fader to use only the small tinny speakers in back would use less electricity, but that stereo just turned that juice into heat, unknowingly to me at the time as I had no tools to measure current consumption.

I think my Newer Stereo does use less juice when the fader takes out the large 6x9 speakers, but I have not really checked recently as I am not so worried about battery consumption now, and taking the 6x9's out of the equation sucks as the bass disappears.

The Bluetooth Speaker idea is a great one.  I am rather amazed at the sound quality from something that is so small and has an internal battery and can be charged by USB.  Rocking out with it is not going to happen, the real stereo is required when i need to tickle the inside of my skull with my music at the appropriate volume, but for what it is it sounds great, and is very efficient electricity consumption wise.  Mine consumes only 2 watts to charge for about an hour, and I can get 5 to 6 hours at near full volume from a single charge.  It can also use a cord to phone/mp3 player and this uses even less battery and sounds a smidge better as well.

I have this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Turcom-Enhanc...89201&sr=8-2-fkmr0&keywords=turcom+bt+speaker

It sees about 4 to 8 hours of use per day.

Sometimes it an my phone disagree on something and BT connection is lost.  I know not which device is at fault, and the speaker has nearly gotten launched into low earth orbit by the fury of my temper when it cuts out when I've got my groove on.  I suspect it is my Samsungs4 mini where the issue resides, as it happens less or not at all when I turn off Wifi, close everything, and clear the RAM.

I was using the 3.5mm stereo mini plug cable provided at times with my TV, whose speakers are awful, but the unit vibrated itself off of a shelf and broke a connection on the circuit board which I could not repair myself, so now it only works on BT.

Figuring out how much your current stereo consumes at middling level should be considered.  Try and find someone with a clamp on DC ammeter to put over one battery cable and play with volume and the bass levels.  Some stock stereos in vehicles can really be vAMPires and consume a large amount of battery power.

 

[Dust-In-the-Wind]

Bose Wave Radio and iPod are the ticket for me.

 

[highdesertranger]

it used to be real easy to switch your stereo from starter battery to house battery. nowadays not so easy. recently on a 2013 chevy truck I tried this , puled all the radio, amp fuses and the stereo would still play had no effect on it what so ever. I told the owner I needed the wire schematic to figure this all out. highdesertranger

 

[eDJ_]

I'm not a big audiophile, so I carry a Boom Box that has an aux input and RCA outputs. It has AM/FM/FM stereo,
cassette & CD players.  It works on 6 D cell batteries or 115 vac.   I can patch my Short Wave Radio or Mp3 Player through it and the sound is more than adequate in the Van and I can take it outside of the Van or along in a fishing boat if I decide to rent one and go fish all night and listen to music or baseball games in the more western time zones.  For me Mobility is an added value.

 

[RVTravel]

EDJ, which boom box do you like?

 

[Sentient Loon]

Wow! Thank you all so much for your experiences and thorough responses. I hope to be able to return the favor someday.

Ok so from what’s being said, car stereos and especially subwoofers use more energy than I anticipated. As for volume levels, I’m not looking to rattle other people’s windows, but I blew out the stock speakers in my last two vehicles and need something that can handle a load. So it looks like the best plan is to use the car stereo while driving, and a small portable speaker when stationary. I’m still interested in being able to switch power sources, but whether it’s possible or worthwhile will be determined by the complexity of the set-up.

To answer a few questions, I don’t currently have a van so I can’t test energy consumption levels yet. I will be looking up the power draw on various car stereo systems soon to write down on paper to plan out the conversion process. I’m guessing they’re 12 volt and don’t require an inverter, but I’m still learning. My plan is to utilize the radio, mp3 player, laptop, and cell phone / Pandora for music. No CD’s. I tend to have music playing almost constantly, even while sleeping. Nature tends to satisfy my auditory needs while camping, so that last habit shouldn’t be too hard to break in order to save energy.

Considering the power draw, having a beefy stereo + subwoofer will be an additional factor in determining what sort of upgrade the alternator (and starter battery?) the vehicle needs, correct? This is in addition to charging the house battery.

 

[eDJ_]

I actually have several.  Most of these have been given to me when the owners realized that they needed
to be serviced.  They know I work on them and tinker with them and can generally get them working
right.  Meanwhile they just go buy a new one as no one around here works on this stuff any more.

I have a couple older ones that I like as I can work on them easily.  One is a Sharp and the other is a Magnavox.  The Magnavox is a real piece of work and where I was saying it used 6 D cell's above it actually uses 8 to produce 12vdc.  It runs on 120/220/240 vac (as this model shipped all over the world.

My HAM buddies and I can take them apart and put new bands in them when the cassettes start slipping.
But with the Aux input I can use an Mp3 player or my Short Wave Radio  with the Boom Box for an
amplifier. Likewise with the laptop into it for streaming radio of loads of genre's. 

These things sit around resale shops  and pawn stores and what you really need is the aux input type
that will work on battery or 110 VAC.    Then you can patch anything into them. 
There are some very small ones which have the Aux input that would do.  

But the detachable speakers allows to separate the sound better.


It is a model AZ 8700 GY0l  

There is a CD player, dual Cassette auto reverse high speed dubbing, 5 ban graphic equalizer and the speakers have plenty of volume to play it very loud in the van.  It's about 26 inches long 11 inches deep and stands about a foot tall.  It doesn't have a 12vdc input but I'd bet I could rig one up without a lot of trouble.  (so it could play through the cigarette lighter)

My Sharp looks very much like this one and it doesn't have a CD player.  It's just a bit smaller that the Magnavox.

I've seen boom boxes with TV's in them and turntables.  These are almost forgotten since Sony's Walkman
and other devices with ear buds.

 

[eDJ_]

I was at a discount variety store today called "Ollies" (good stuff cheap).  You may have heard of them.

They had this Craig Bluetooth rechargeable speaker box that will play for 5 hours and allow you to
import sound into it from a Mp3, Smart Phone,  Radio, etc or SD Memory Card or USB device.  It was about $18 dollars
first issue. (not refurbished) 

You can read about it here at Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Craig-CR4189BT-Digital-Bluetooth-Smartphone/dp/B00COGA87I


This may be to some Van dwellers liking.

 

[Happy Camper]

While there are many options for bluetooth speakers out there that will work great for your non driving times, I would suggest looking and listening to the ion block rocker. It's quite loud, has tons of options, doesn't take up a lot of space, and lasts for half a day on a charge.

It would be easier to have a nice stereo in your van, and have the option to use the blockrocker when you're camping so you don't have to worry about your batteries.

 

[B and C]

A sub-woofer usually requires a separate amplifier to power it.  This amplifier will pull a lot of juice if played with any volume.  I had to put a large capacitor in the 12v line feeding the amplifier to keep the headlights from dimming to the beat   Any good stereo shop will know how to wire the amplifier and capacitor.  

I just got through moving my power for the dash radio to the house battery system.  Move both power wires, constant (clock station memory) and switched power.  I only moved the switched power wire to start with and found that my starting battery voltage was decreasing.  I put on an amp meter and found there was a new 0.17 amp draw from the starting battery.  I moved the constant voltage wire to the house battery and the parasitic draw went away.  Switching these back and forth between the house and starting battery will result in having to reset the clock and station memory.  I may eventually put in a DPDT switch but will leave it hardwired for now.  I also have a small portable Bluetooth speaker with an aux jack on it.