When to get a new battery

[joe603]

My car is only 2 years old, but I just installed a stereo with about 1500 watts of power. Lights dim on heavy bass notes, but nothing too crazy. Optima used to be the best...just wondering what is the new king of stereo batteries?

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[MiamiGT350]

What battery do you have now? Assuming you have the 590 CCA (96R), you may want to try an H5 AGM which should fit and give you closer to 650 CCA.

Lithium batteries apparently don't play well with the Ford BCM, fyi.

Also ensure you have sufficient gauge wiring for the power draw, and the "big three" upgrade. Sometimes these issues are as simple as a good ground.

Good luck!

 

[K4fxd]

If I did my math right that is a 125 amp draw, I'd get a capacitor.

 

[joe603]

I'm running ofc 4ga...right at the max. 1/0 would be overkill probably. 4ga to sub amp and 8ga to mid/high.

OEM battery/alt.

 

[MiamiGT350]

I run a capacitor and 1500 watts through a Rockford TF1500. Here is the one I have: T-Spec V8-3DDC Digital Capacitor 3.0 Farad Distribution Top https://a.co/d/eg4nS1Z

My wiring is 1/0 to the trunk and 4 gauge to each amp, which I agree is overkill.

 

[joe603]

Just ordered a 2F Cap...hopefully that will help.

 

[m3incorp]

What amps are you running? I am going to guess the Class A/B amps and not a Class D. I have no dimming and running the JL Audio Vx1000/5i and Vx1000/1i for a total of 2000 watts. Evold is running the same plus the Vx600/2i, if I remember right. I did run 1/0 gauge for power and ground to the distribution blocks near the amps and then 4 gauge to the amps. There are some good AGM batteries including the Optima, Odyssey, XS Power, and I am running an Interstate AGM Group 47 (H5) that is doing well so far. I have to admit, I don't play my system for more than a few minutes with the engine off.

 

[joe603]

I have an older Memphis MXC 1.1100 for the subs and a Focal FDP4600 for mids/highs. Both are Class D amps.

 

[joe603]

I cut my positive OEM terminal and used one that accepts 2x 4ga wires. Little did I realize that the OEM lead is actually 1x 4ga and 1x 8ga wire...so I just crammed as best I could. Hopefully this will help with power delivery as I was using a lead from the fuse box which has some bolts that connect to the alternator/starter. I don't recommend doing this as the positive lead is just long enough to reach and I had to get creative to make it work.

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