Thread: Battery advice

Originally Posted by chamilton89

Well this is an interesting thread. I understand you are upgrading your stereo just like many other people on GPF. Without trying to be mean, unless your battery is already on the way out, or you are just looking to spend hours with the car off and the stereo blasting away, then a new battery is really unnecessary. You are going to get no better performance from a new battery than you are on your current one. I think there is a ton of confusion when it comes to car electronics and "upgrading" the battery. A bigger/better battery will not make it any easier to power your system, regardless of the size, intact it will actually make it more difficult to power your system as your alternator will have to constantly charge a larger battery. That being said, if you plan on having a show car or parking it for long periods of time and running the stereo, by all means, a larger battery will accomplish this goal while still being able to start your car when your done. I really hope I havnt come off as a dick, just trying to make sure people doesn't waste there money because they don't have all the information. Hope I have helped and I will keep an eye on this thread to see if you have anymore questions!

You're not being a dick at all lol. I just figured a battery upgrade would be the right choice. Right now i have a Duralast red top battery, but its just a pair of post terminals so i have my car audio wires coming from the positive part on top of the fuse box. Im not sure if thats safe or not but i havent had any problems so far : /

Originally Posted by chamilton89

Well Its not the best way of doing it. I would look into a battery terminal that supports not only your cars electrical system on the positive terminal but also accepts whatever gauge wiring you use for your audio system (8guage, 4guage, ext) Thats the best way of doing it in my opinion, or a terminal extension for a side mount battery that features a simple bolt to screw on ring terminals (this is what I'm rocking) looks great, works great, simple to use. Made by stinger if your interested, maybe 25 bucks. And I understand that battery upgrade thing, makes sense right, more subwoofer= more battery right? Your car will be just find with your red top, thats a great battery. I have a yellow top dual cycle, so I get both cold cranking amps and some aspects of a deep cycle battery (able to be discharged without killing the battery). Anyways, the only real way to upgrade your electrical system to support systems really greater than ~1K watts is an alternator upgrade and battery grounding wire upgrade. The alternator is very expensive (200+) and the batteries grounding is well unnecessary if you stay under the ~1K watt threshold. So if your under that, upgrade your battery post/terminal to accept your positive wire to your amplifier and enjoy!

The terminal extension sounds interesting. Can you take a pic of it so i can get an idea??