Red this on the JL audio facebook page lately........

[zeropoint0.5]

Just a couple tips for all the JL AUDIO fans out there that plan to run a higher power subwoofer set up in their vehicles ( HD1200/1 or SLASH 1000/1 for example ) .. Make sure to upgrade you factory GROUND and POWER wires under your hood to at least 4 GAUGE wire [ The Big 3 ] ... Next add a secondary wire of at least 4 GAUGE that runs from the subwoofer amplifier's ground point near the amplifier to the NEGATIVE battery post up front .. This will augment the chassis ground for less resistance .. Your vehicle will thank you !!


So JL audio states

"Next add a secondary wire of at least 4 GAUGE that runs from the subwoofer amplifier's ground point near the amplifier to the NEGATIVE battery post up front .. This will augment the chassis ground for less resistance .. Your vehicle will thank you !!"


I personally didn't heard of this before. Please feel free to give comments on this statement by JL audio......

[ttocs]

what you are kind of describing is normally reffered to as the big 3 upgrade.
Upgrade your ground wire from the battery to chassis, and from the chassis to the motor or the alt is where I like to go. after that you need to upgrade the power wire from the alt to the battery but be sure to fuse it or you risk your alt blowing if it shorts out.

now you do not need to run a ground from the amp to the battery after you upgrade the ground from the battery to chassis. If you were though I am not sure why you would not just run the ground straight to the amp rather then near the amps ground? Now with that being said I am running power and ground from front to rear on my car but mainly in the name of overkill as well as because I run a dual battery system mounted in the trunk now. I just did some cleaning up of the page that shows it all about half way down.

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2395420/1 ... 2d/page-10

[zeropoint0.5]

what you are kind of describing is normally reffered to as the big 3 upgrade.
Upgrade your ground wire from the battery to chassis, and from the chassis to the motor or the alt is where I like to go. after that you need to upgrade the power wire from the alt to the battery but be sure to fuse it or you risk your alt blowing if it shorts out.

now you do not need to run a ground from the amp to the battery after you upgrade the ground from the battery to chassis. If you were though I am not sure why you would not just run the ground straight to the amp rather then near the amps ground? Now with that being said I am running power and ground from front to rear on my car but mainly in the name of overkill as well as because I run a dual battery system mounted in the trunk now. I just did some cleaning up of the page that shows it all about half way down.

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2395420/1 ... 2d/page-10

well, first of all i just copied the text that was written on their page.... if you have a facebook account you can like the jl audio fanpage and read everything.

they just said that modern cars the chassis is just the equivalent of a 4 gauge wire. In my former car i had a yellow top in the front and another one in the back, had a 2 gauge OFC power wire from the front to the back, and had 2 gauge ground wire from alternator to battery to chassis. But no extra ground wire
from the front to the back.

I never heard this was really nescessairy. If it really does i will do it in my current car i'm planning to to.......

[ttocs]

I was just saying what the big 3 is and what it includes, not trying to cut ya down or attack you. Sure an extra ground from front to rear will not hurt anything but no it is not necessary. Like I said I am doing it just in the name of overkill honestly and really just to ensure that all of my audio componants have the same ground to avoid noise problems. I am using a DD10 to power my deck and some other accesories that will run off of a regular switched wire so that I can be sure that they are all grounded at the same point, that wire I ran from front to back.

[zeropoint0.5]

well,

for me it was indeed the first time i heard about "an extra ground wire from front to back " . i don't think neighter that is nescessairy.

But as i reread what they state, it is especially important for the sub amplifier, they say......

indeed you can always connect an extra ground wire from the chassis point in the trunk to the point in the front.

we'll see.


and now it is time for a night out and looking for some girls with big "torroids"

hehehe.... good evening.... to be continued......

[ttocs]

you could always add one and would love to hear an A-B comparison of them to hear the difference

[Stereo Junkie]

The main reason that most people don't do this is because of ground loop noise. A lot of the time grounding in multiple places creates a ground loop that causes significant audio noise. Just think the head unit is ground to the same vehicle.

An ideal situation would be grounding all points in the exact same location, but that is unrealistic as the manufacture of any vehicle grounds to all kinds of places for different items.

Not to say it will not work in some cases, but odds are not in your favor if more and more ground connections are made.

Food for thought.

[ttocs]

That is why I am wiring mine the way I am. The DD10 is on the same ground/power as the amp so all the audio componants will share the same ground. I will also run a DD5 to cover the remote turn ons so that they all get power form the same source.

One of the higher end shops I worked at in scottsdale would run a 3 primary wires from the deck to either the amps power or dist block if we used one so that the decks power/ground were the same. Of course we ran them down the opposite side of the car as the rca's and it was overkill but when they were charging the prices they were it was expected...

[longboard]

i always run a seperate earth to the audio rom the battery it makes sense when pulling high current
, the less joints between any wire is better just think of your car body as a wire you have a connection between the battery and the chassis the chassis then has hundreds of joints between welds spot welds etc before it reaches the case of the alternator as well as the terminal you fit to pick up the audio earth

gorund loop is also another good reason we can then ground all the audio at one single point and hopefully never have a ground loop issue

for the time and effort it takes to run one run of cable it takes very little effort to run a second at the same time

[audiophyle_247]

People often neglect ground connections, and seem to forget that the power and ground are of equal importance. People spend big bucks on huge power wire, and Ive seen countless installs with such wire & amp grounds connected to seat bolts & shit, where there is very little direct metal connection. (paint isnt even scraped away) Ive also seen people run big wire & have great ground connections in the rear, but still rely on the car's oem 8ga ground cable! THAT is the ultimate bottleneck, because your entire car's electrical system is reliant on that wire.

However while ground connections are very important for many reasons, running a dedicated ground cable is a waste of coin and effort. I think JL's main point is to bring attention to the importance of ground connections, they are also there to make money and if people suddenly realize they need twice the amount of large gauge wire..... well you should be able to see where that leads. Ive read countless threads on this topic, and the chassis of any unibody vehicle will FAR exceed anything a dedicated ground cable will offer. The key is attention to connections, and actually make a SOLID connection to the vehicle. The ground connection between the battery & chassis is very important, as is the connection from the amp to the chassis, master both of those connections and you will be golden. There is also so much more contact between chassis panels than just the spot welds. Cars are all built & welded together as raw metal, and the metal along those welded seams are also in direct contact, then painted to seal it from corrosion & rust. No different than how a bolt or screw holds your power wire down, except those usually arent protected from the elements with a paint coat. I dont recall the specifics, but somewhere I read about how even with less than ideal conductivity across seams, the quantity alone of material acting as a conductor exceeds even the largest of power wire available. LIke comparing a 4/0 aluminum wire to an 8ga copper wire, where the aluminum may be less than ideal for performance its difference in size easily blows the copper performance away.

I typically run a large ground from the batt to the engine block & another ground to a thick chunk of chassis and call it good. OEM ground locations are "adequate" at most, but they are not the best and rarely if ever good enough for any moderately improved sound system.
Ive run some very powerful systems like this and none with any ill effects. There will not be any audible difference from running a dedicated ground wire, and anything you "think" you notice is most likely all in your head. (assuming of course your batt-->chassis & chassis-->Amp grounds are good to begin with) A topic people much smarter than I have debunked, and I happily comply and keep my money.

[zeropoint0.5]

Good morning everybody.....

So what jl audio states on their facebook fanpage , is the following.....

""the reason for the augmented GROUND is that most vehicle frames have been tested to only provide the equivalent of a 4 GAUGE wire as a true GROUND .. By adding the additional wire that goes from the spot near the amps to the NEGATIVE battery post actually decreases the resistance even further to equate to a larger GROUND wire .. It really does help ..""


http://www.facebook.com/#!/jlaudio

here you can read it all......

[ttocs]

a car chassis with the equivilant of a 4 awg wire? Not sure I agree and would love to know what cars specifically they have found this on. Of course it will not hurt anything but yer wallet to run the extra cable and it might actually help but I would be amazed if anyone here could do an a-b comparison and tell the difference in sound. I think its just JL trying to make another couple bucks personally and again I am running dual 0 awg power and ground...

[dvnt88]

a car chassis with the equivilant of a 4 awg wire? Not sure I agree and would love to know what cars specifically they have found this on. Of course it will not hurt anything but yer wallet to run the extra cable and it might actually help but I would be amazed if anyone here could do an a-b comparison and tell the difference in sound. I think its just JL trying to make another couple bucks personally and again I am running dual 0 awg power and ground...

Exectly ...I've done the big 3 with 0g wire under the hood to an Optima yellow top and from the Optima to the Kinetik 1800 in the rear. I also have 0g running from the Kinetik to a Streetwires pwr/gnd block and have never had a grounding issue as I'm runnin a JL 300/4v2 and 500/1v2 with 4g pwr and gnd wires to the block. the 300/4 is powering 2 sets of elite comps and the 500/1 is powering 2 JL 8w7's and is the best sounding system I've heard to date with one exception of a local members s-10 that's just craaaaazy loud and clear (Go Dave ).

[audiophyle_247]

This exact claim covered about 5 years ago, seems JL is a little behind the times. Lol

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/tec ... ideal.html

Couple very smart people on there who oppose this notion, and a few who think it can actually increase risks (unless ground wire is fused).

This old topic being covered by a large (& often overpriced/hyped) brand kinda reminds me of the debates around Monster Cable, which I'm sure people still stand behind the 150-200% price difference because it's that much better.

[ttocs]

fused ground wire?

[kg1961]

fused ground wire?

sure why not and the remote wire and sub wire..lol





im just kidding never heard of fusing the ground wire?

[ttocs]

there is a time and a place for it and I have done it but I am not sure how it would help to protect thing here.

[Eric D]

Don't forget fusing the RCAs...

[audiophyle_247]

Fusing a ground makes sense, but I don't see it actually doing anything in reality.

The idea is, say your amps have a dedicated ground to battery and that ground does not touch the chassis anywhere. Then what happens if your oem chassis ground fails (vibrates loose or corrodes badly enough) your entire electrical system will try to find another path. That path would be through the amp ground, and it would get there through the headunit's ground connection, into it's chassis & through the RCAs to the amp.
Such a load would surely destroy the RCAs & potentially kill the deck, so a fuse could help but any fuse large enough for the amp to function with it would be too large to protect anything smaller. I think what the people in that thread are discussing in regard to fusing grounds are on small components, like radios & such, where the component itself is the smallest link in the chain, not a supersized amp ground cable.

Electricity is a lot like water, and think of a chassis ground like a strainer full of holes (various chassis connections) with a larger hole on the bottom (main ground cable) and a drain directly below (the battery ground). The water won't just drain through the largest hole, or even the hole you want, it will drain through every hole as much as it can. The only way to keep that water (or electricity) from going through the holes you don't want is by making that hole on the bottom as big as possible. (& a reason why it's 2 parts of the big 3)
That is basically what I do with my battery grounds, and I've never had issues with voltage drops large enough to warrant any attention. SPL guys may need that extra 1v at full volume, but I doubt it makes any audible difference. SPL setups also need that concrete filler in the doors & stupid thick plate glass, which I don't see anyone here doing to their daily rigs.

I also think by grounding the amp directly to the batt you increase the risk of a ground loop (like adding a large hole to the side of the strainer) unless your chassis ground at the battery is better than the amp's ground, otherwise nearby components (including the HU if it's ground connection sucks) will also use that amp's ground connection. (potentially introducing noise in the process)

[ttocs]

ah ok so if we have a number of failures that happen to happen at the same time, then its good to have your ground fused.

I have to laugh a little bit though as I remember that we had discussed the big 3 upgrade here a while back(like last year). I got shit for sayin the power wire from the alt to the battery NEEDS to be fused on both ends. If I remember correctly I was told that steve meade doesn't do it and that they didn't want to sacrifuce the minimal voltage loss that happens at a a fuse holder in order to save their alt or car from burning in. Am I still one of the few crazies saying it needs to be fused on both ends?

[Eric D]

If I install more than one amplifier, I fuse both ends.

Example:

100A breaker under the hood, and a sub amp with a 100A current requirement. No need to fuse the end by the amp. If the amp dies, the 100A fuse under the hood will go.

200A breaker under the hood, and a pair of sub amps with 100A each requirement. In this case I would put 100A on each back by the amps. If one amp died, its short could draw 200A prior to opening the breaker, and with a board design for only 100A, chances are you get a fire in the amp without separate fusing.

This is just personal preference, but I always use a much smaller fuse than the amp requires. In the above example I would have the 200A breaker under the hood, and probably a 60A fuse on each amp. If a fuse ever blew, I would go up the next size until I reach the 100A then stop.

Most amplifiers can get by with half the suggested fuse size, when running them without clipping (and music, not since waves, that is another story).

[audiophyle_247]

ah ok so if we have a number of failures that happen to happen at the same time, then its good to have your ground fused.

I have to laugh a little bit though as I remember that we had discussed the big 3 upgrade here a while back(like last year). I got shit for sayin the power wire from the alt to the battery NEEDS to be fused on both ends. If I remember correctly I was told that steve meade doesn't do it and that they didn't want to sacrifuce the minimal voltage loss that happens at a a fuse holder in order to save their alt or car from burning in. Am I still one of the few crazies saying it needs to be fused on both ends?

I don't see why not, I don't put a fuse on both ends, but when the motor is running that alt is not much different than a battery, the wire is live on both ends so makes sense to me to fuse both ends unless the alt has a built in failsafe or kill switch.

I fuse power wires on both ends like Eric when a second battery is installed, guess I'm just lazy when it comes to alt cables. Lol

[shawn k]

Fusing at the alt is not necessary as long as the design of the charging system is well thought out. Mostly meaning that the charge line to the battery is of sufficient size.

Most charge lines are relatively short runs from the alt to the battery and are capable of passing fairly high current. There is no need to fuse at the alt since the alternator itself is unable to provide more current than what the charge line is able to dissipate even in the event of a dead short. In the unlikely event that there was a dead short on the charge line, you could possibly destroy the alternator if the vehicle were to actually continue running.

Now fusing the charge line at the battery makes sense, but this is to protect the charge line from the battery unleashing huge amounts of current during a short but NOT from the alt. Most manufacturers these days have this charge line fuse and it's located very near the battery

All said and done, IMO, if you're going to fuse the charge line at all, then do it at the battery and NOT the alternator. The battery is capable of providing far more current flow than ANY alternator

[audiophyle_247]

Shawn I believe the debate is not fusing in general, but fusing at the alt in addition to at the battery.
Protection from both ends, so if alt cable comes off the battery terminal a fuse at the alt will protect it from shorting against the chassis.

[ttocs]

I am about to install my vintage phoenix gold 165A alt with balmar offboard voltage regulator. I will be using the same fuse I have had on the power wire for the other HO alt. running dual power/ground to a dual battery system and no fuse on the ground. I like to do things the wrong way I guess.