[ZEXCougar]

I am in the process of relocating my battery to the trunk and am running into a problem. Everything is hooked up and working, but when I turn the car on I have really loud line noise. This is obviously from a bad ground. This is how I have it hooked up right now:

I have the power wire running from the stock wire in the engine bay through the car and hooked up to the battery in the trunk.

The grounds that were previously hooked up to the battery in the engine bay are now grounded to the wheel well area through a hole I drilled in the metal. I ground the area down to bare metal of course.

The battery in grounded into a hole I drilled in the truk floor. I also ground the area down to bare metal.

My amp was previously grounded to the trunk floor, but I moved the ground wire directly to the negative terminal.

After the line noise I moved the amp wire back to where it originally was... This didn't solve anything. I also tried to run two grounds from the negative terminal... This also made no difference.

When I turn the car to the on position (not started, but the accessories work) it makes a really loud line noise. I need to get this fixed ASAP!!! When I did a search I read a post that said that the ground had to be hooked up to the original place in the engine bay... The battery relocation kit that I bought came with a ground wire that is only like 12" long though - so this can't be the case! I don't see what the difference would be! Please help!

 

[Pyro81]

Don't mind me i'm just thinking out loud here...or rather typing my thoughts...

Did you run the positive wire next to your audio lines? I remember reading something that said you shouldn't run the positive cable near any of your audio wires so you don't get line feed...or something like that. Not completely sure though, but that could be your case...or i'm completely wrong and should be ignored.

 

[ZEXCougar]

No, the rca cables are running down the other side of the car. Since my original post, I have re-grounded all of the wires that I took off of the negative terminal. No luck. I have re-routed the ground wires back to the negative terminal on the battery. No luck. I can't understand what is causing this. I didn't do anything except extend the power wire and re-ground it. Also, it only happens when I have the amp connected. Since all of my speakers are running through the amp - I think I don't hear it when the amp is disconnected because there is no power to the speakers. I could be wrong though... I looked at the ground wire connected to the amp and it seems to be secure. I though that maybe I jarred it loose while installing the battery - but it looks fine. If anyone has any ideas please let me know!!! The last thing I want to do is have to take it somewhere and have them go over the whole system. It would probably be expensive as hell! I have so many wires going everywhere!

 

[arskiracer]

I would run a ground from the battery to the original grounding location in the engine bay. That's what this guy's problem was... Pro-flow.com (all the way at the bottom of the page it has a secion on battery grounding problems)

I don't know if the screwed up wiring job with the alternator would intensify your problem or not, but maybe something you could try - it doesn't take that long and who knows, it may help extend the life of your alternator. Electrical problem

 

[arskiracer]

Oh, and I would use a thick gauge wire like a 4 awg just to be sure.

 

[ZEXCougar]

I tried to hook it back up and that didn't work either... I ran a 0 guage line from the negative terminal on the battery to the wires that were originally connected to it in the engine bay. It didn't do anything at all... I can't seem to figure out what the heck is causing this! I have tried everything I can think of and haven't even made the noise quieter! I think that tomorrow I'm going to have to take it to Circuit City or someplace like that. I am sick of working on it! I have been doing this all day - and because of this problem I didn't get to install my GMK intake like I wanted to do today!!!

 

[Lukydogg]

Circuit City will first sell you a Line Noise filter, 21.00 IIRC. Do you have another amp to try out?
Maybe something is wrong with the amp ground, or RCA's have a fault in the line.
Sometimes regrounding the amp in a different location clears up interference. Where is the amp currently grounded?

 

[ZEXCougar]

I don't think it is the amp that is causing the problem. It started right after I moved the battery to the trunk. The amp has been hooked up for a long time. If Circuit City tries to sell me a line noise filter I wont take it. Those don't work for crap. I'm just going to bring it there and have the install guys fix it for me. They're probably going to charge me like $100 to fix it, but at this point it is worth it to me. I am pretty knowlegable about electric wiring, and have had experience with car stereos for years - so I know what I'm doing... and I tried everything I could possibly think of. Nothing worked! I am just out of ideas for this one.

 

[ZEXCougar]

All fixed!!! I looked at it one last time before I was going to take it in and I finally figured out what was wrong with it! It turns out that I had a bad ground in the engine compartment. The noise is 100% gone!

 

[Lukydogg]

Good deal- You saved yourself from those other guys with no better ideas but to rewire everything and cost you some cash.

 

[ZEXCougar]

I'm sure that's exactly what they would have done too! I probably would have been charged in full for an amp install and the battery relocation. For some reason, most of the people that work in car audio install don't think that a person is capable of doing something themself. They get all touchy like "You should have brought it to us in the first place, but instead you screwed it up." Even though I probably have more experience than them anyways! I am just glad it is fixed. What the problem was is I relocated the ground wires that were connected to the negative terminal to a hole that I drilled in the wheel well. One of the connectors was corroted and I guess I didn't clean it off enough and got a bad connection. Easy fix. I'm happy too because this project gave me the excuse I have been looking for to buy my new dremel! Yes!!! A new toy to play with!