im gettin the alpine cda-9813 h/u, and was wondering if anyone knew how to wire the thing up properly. I think it needs a direct fused connection to the battery. Do you have to replace the existing one with a bigger wire and bypass the fuse box or what?

 

Alpine tells you to run a wire directly from the battery like you would do with an amp. I have an alpine deck and I used stock wires. Every thing works just fine (knock on wood).

 

Are you installing an amp if so get a T adapter and cut your power wire to the amp put the T in and run a 8 guage wire to the deck. You also need a 8 gauge ground.

 

Umm ok. I used 4 gauge wires to install my amps. And I power the deck from stock harness,


thanx for the advise though

 

my friend uses his 9815 off the stock wiring and its just fine. you dont need to hook it to the battery.

 

are you guys sure bout not needing to hook it to the battery, cuz I've heard both sides. It would be much less of a pain in the *** if I didn't have to hook it to the battery, but if it needs it, it needs done.

 

if you dont believe us, hook it up without it and try it out.

 

I just installed a 9813 in my 2K2. At first, I was thinking about running an 8GA cable to the battery with a fuse. Then, I took a close look at the OEM harness and realized that the OEM power wire was the same guage as the power wire for the 9813. The fuse on the circuit is 15amp and the fuse on the HU is 20 amp. I figure that the 15 amp fuse will blow if too much current is being drawn. I did use a harness adapter to wire up the HU, but for the power line, I wanted something with a thicker line than the harness adapter had. I ended up using T-Taps into the main OEM harness for the +12V and a crimp connector on the radio +12V line. This bypassed the high gauge, thin power wire in the aftermarket adapter. This seems to work well with no problems yet.

 

I am running 4 gauge too. I used 8 gauge to the deck cause that's what Alpine said to use. Sure you can run it off your little stock wire buy my guess is that since your using that small wire your deck is running real hot. Why buy the headunit and not hook it up per instructions.

 

does using that wire to the battery waste the battery faster?

 

No. My only problem is since it's hooked up to the amp power wire is if you blow the fuse at the battery your radio will go off too. But I have never blown a fuse or the fuses on any of the cars I worked on in the two years that I worked at a stereo shop.

 

The main thing to consider is whether you will be using the internal amps. If you are, then run a good wire straight to the battery. If you will only be using the RCA outputs then hooking to the factory wire harness power should be plenty.

Ted

 

Please explain why using the OEM 12 gauge wire versus an 8 gauge wire to the battery would cause the HU to run hotter?

 

More current strain. If you wan tI can look threw my Mobile Electronics Cerification program Manual and find it for you.

 

The increased heat is a result of the lower voltage / higher current. And as it gets hotter the resistance of the wire increases making the problem worse. A larger wire has less resistance and will not have as much voltage drop between the battery and the HU. It's a high power headunit and therefore needs more power to perform as designed. Not running through the fuse box also eliminates a possible noise source.

HotAzzMax - The larger wire to the battery will draw less current, not more.