Golf Cart Stereo

Hello i have recently purchased a 48V (6x8V) golf cart. i have set up a 12V deep cell battery for accessories. i have purchased a SONY deck and Speaker package http://www.sony.com.au/xplod/catalog/product.jsp?categoryId=22000

My question is... what other objects other then wire will i need to purchase to get a clear and pumping system. things like fuse sytems, noise reducers? and other things like aerials etc.

has anyone else attempted a 12V stereo system independant from from any other system.

As long as you can keep that 12v battery safely charged at 12 volts all should be fine.

As far as any noise filters you must wait until after the installation. If there is any noise we must first determine what "type" of noise it is, then determine where its coming from (whats causing it) and advise from there. Make solid power/ground connections and thats a good start. You are not running amplifiers so at this point the only concern with fusing is the accesory wire..and the constant (memory) wire. For safty I would place the fuse as close to where you are connecting the wire to it's power source as possible, this leaves less wire to burn up before reacing the fuse if this was to happen. Secure all wires away from heat and moving parts and take your time..neatness counts IMO.

As far as having good sound the most IMPORTANT thing will be speaker placment/enclosure (baffling). I know from experience that a cheap speaker placed properly will sound 10x better then the most expensive speaker in the world poorly place or baffled...basically without baffling of some type you will have very poor if any bass response..without proper placement, the upper frequencies are directional which means if all the sound is coming from behind you...are into your feet etc..it won't really give you anything but sound..and you seem to want a pumping system.

In a nutshell, make sure the speakers are in some type of enclosure..or mounted in a way that best seperates the front of the speaker from the rear..the better you do this the better the bass response and reproduction will sound. And try to have as much sound as possible in the front, firing towards the occupants and I guarantee you will enjoy it so much more.

For an "aerial" aka "antenna" nothing IMO works better then a good ol' metal mast. However, if you want AM the base of the antenna needs to be grounded..and the cart is most likely all fiberglass. You can run a ground wire from the base of the antenna to a solid ground and it should help. If AM is a non issue just mount the mast so it points straight up and FM will be fine. There are other types of antennas out there as well that don't require a ground plane such as "voltage fed" that can be hidden or be shorter as well and work if you wish to go that route.

Best of luck.

i cant ground anythin to the cart chassis since it is the ground for the 48V system, so i will have to run it as a closed loop system off the negative terminal from the battery to each accessory.

as for baffling, i wihs to mount the speakers in a custom head board facing down to the occupants, is this ok. and refering to the baffling issue do i have to put some wadding behind the speaker or seal the rear of the speaker

Closed loop will work fine. If AM reception is still a concern you can take a small strip of sheet metel, or even foil (about 3'' x 3'' should suffice) and run a ground wire from that to the battery negative. Then mount the antenna so the base is touching the metal, the metel itself can be under the body so you don't have to see it. This will at least give a small ground plane.

The speakers should sound fine in that location, I know on the original hummers the speakers were up top from the factory and sounded fine. If you can seal the rear in a decent size enclosure (you want some airspace for better bass response) it should sound better then wadding but regardless anything will work better the the speakers simply mounted on a board with nothing behind it, that would sound more like a PA then a quality stereo.