Do I need another battery?

Printed From: the12volt.com
Forum Name: Mobile Video, GPS, and Navigation
Forum Discription: Mobile Video Head Units, DVD Players, LCD and TFT Monitors, Navigation, GPS, PS2, PS3, XBox, etc.
URL: https://www.the12volt.com/installbay/forum_posts.asp?tid=55235
Printed Date: May 18, 2024 at 9:46 AM

Topic: Do I need another battery?

Posted By: mantis971
Subject: Do I need another battery?
Date Posted: May 06, 2005 at 12:11 PM

I have a 99 dodge Durango and I want to put 3 Xboxes in so I can network them together and play against each other. I would have one hooked up to my avic-n1 and the other two hooked up to their own monitors in the back. I also want to run a KICKER KX1200.1. What I want to know is do I or should I run a second battery? If I do run a second battery I was wonder if I could put the second battery in the back and just run a 4g wire to it to charge it and run my amp and Xboxes of the second battery. any feed back world be great just let me know what you think thanks.

Replies:

Posted By: godd dan it
Date Posted: May 07, 2005 at 12:22 AM

A second battery will only allow you to run your electronics longer when the car is turned off. It doesnt give you anymore power. If thats what your looking for, then go for it. But if you want more power to run your electronics and you want to avoid electrical drainage, buy a high output alternator and install it.

Posted By: mantis971
Date Posted: May 07, 2005 at 10:22 AM

I thought it would be easier to have a second battery because I could just run one power wire through the firewall to the second battery and from their I could run a 4g wire to my amp and a 2g wire to my power inverter. The power inverter I want to run ( Xantrex's XPower 1000) requires its own 2g power cable. With the 3 Xboxes I will be using at least 450 to 500 watts and you never know what else I might want to hook up latter. Now if I run one battery I would have to run two wires through my firewall all the way to the back. If I do run two batteries what size gauge wire should I run from the main battery to the second battery and how would I go about wiring it? I want to run two batteries and have one in the back for closer wiring but I am not sure how to hook it up so it can still get charged.

Posted By: godd dan it
Date Posted: May 07, 2005 at 11:42 AM

You dont need to install another battery just to make it easier to run wires. Just run the wires from the battery through the firewall to the power inverter. Install the inverter as close to where you have to plug in your electronics. 2 gauge wires will be fine. I cant tell you exaactly how to hook it all up, but im sure someone else who has done this can tell you.

Posted By: Nocturnal
Date Posted: May 11, 2005 at 3:17 AM

To accomplish what you want, I think that you will end up doing what godd dan it stated. Because if you want the second battery to be recharged you will have to wire it in series with your other battery. This is will cause an impeadance mismatch with your altenator and or the voltage regulator which will in turn lead to failure of one or both of the components. Good luck...

Posted By: fastone
Date Posted: May 11, 2005 at 10:20 AM

Wire the second battery in parallel, NOT in series. That would give you 24 volts and you'll have a whole lotsa problems. As long as they are wired in parallel they won't hurt your alternator.

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Famous last words: Hey man, what's this wire do?

Posted By: 5150azn
Date Posted: May 11, 2005 at 10:29 AM

Man! You sure need to watch out who you get pointers from huh lol

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Tell the Snap-On guy I'm not here!

Posted By: mantis971
Date Posted: May 12, 2005 at 12:24 PM

Thanks for everyone’s input I appreciate it. I know how to hook the two batteries together if I want, but first I think I will hook everything up then if I think I need another battery after that I will put another one in. Does anyone know how may watts a Xbox uses I thought it was about 200 or 300 just want to make sure and where I could get a good HO alternator for a 99 dodge Durango. I found a couple that put out 170 amps but that is as high is the highest I found. Do you think a 170 amps will be enough? I want to run kickers KX1200.1, and A good multi-channel amp but I haven’t picked one out yet but I would like it to put around 50-75*4 and a strong enough power inverter that can run 3 Xboxes. Just let me know what you guys think thanks and recommend.