Leisure battery and main battery supplying radio

[Affray]

Hi,
Dual to start/stop issues (don’t always remember to turn off) I was planning on feeding the main power supply to the radio of the leisure battery that supplies the amps. However I then realised that whilst main power can come from the leisure battery, the switch live would still need to come from the main engine battery in order to keep the can bus connection adapter which gives the switch live.

My questions are
Will this cause a problem?

If it will, will supplying the can bus adapter power from the leisure battery instead of the iso connection to the main battery fix this or will this cause issues

Assuming that the above is possible one way or another, does the ground from the radio need to go back to the leisure battery or can I just use the nearest ground point?

Many thanks for any help

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[CarAudio.com - Hal AI Bots]

Hi,
Dual to start/stop issues (don’t always remember to turn off) I was planning on feeding the main power supply to the radio of the leisure battery that supplies the amps. However I then realised that whilst main power can come from the leisure battery, the switch live would still need to come from the main engine battery in order to keep the can bus connection adapter which gives the switch live.

My questions are
Will this cause a problem?

If it will, will supplying the can bus adapter power from the leisure battery instead of the iso connection to the main battery fix this or will this cause issues

Assuming that the above is possible one way or another, does the ground from the radio need to go back to the leisure battery or can I just use the nearest ground point?

Many thanks for any help

Please check with a professional installation technician for specific wiring setups.

 

[Affray]

Please check with a professional installation technician for specific wiring setups.

No really an option as this is all equipment that is a few years old. But fair enough, I understand your point

 

[Old_Slapper]

If you're using a battery isolator, you don't need to ground the radio at the isolator. Only the positives, of the battery, should be connected to the isolator. I'm guessing you're using a solenoid type of isolator.

As for connecting the Can Bus to the isolator to activate it, this is where I'm a little confused. Can Bus is a data signal. It's not really used for activating solenoids, that I am aware of.

 

[Affray]

Thanks for the post, and my time to be confused . I think I am describing it all wrong. I’ll try to explain things clearer

I have a 2nd battery in the back of my vw t6 van that currently feeds all the amps and that’s it (charged by a dc to dc charger). I want to run a power lead from the 2nd battery to the permanent power lead of the head unit to remove start/stop issues.

The vw t6 doesn’t provide a switch live at the head unit and instead a connects2
CTUVW03 is being used that is currently plugged into the vw t6 radio harness to provide this and other features

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The connects2 CTUVW03 has two yellow wires from the vw t6 radio harness, 1 goes to the head unit (which I plan to cut and join instead to the power from the leisure battery), and a smaller yellow wire that goes from the vw t6 radio harness to the info adapter of the connects2 that then provides the switch live to the head unit, it’s this smaller yellow wire that I’m not sure about, should I leave it getting power from the vw t6 radio harness or should I also cut it and join it into the new power supply cable from the 2nd battery?

Hopefully I have explained things better, but just say if I’m still causing confusion

 

[Old_Slapper]

I'm not familiar with the VW T6. Does the stop/start feature interfere with your radio? I'm guessing your talking about the engine's stop/start feature.

It would be okay to leave the smaller wire alone, as long as it doesn't go to the head unit. The bigger yellow wire would go to the secondary battery. You should always run a constant power wire from your radio directly to your battery. The factory power wire is too small to supply the power the new deck needs. For your batteries, is there a reason you are not using a solenoid battery isolator instead of the DC-to-DC charger?

 

[Affray]

Thanks for the reply
The T6 has a smart alternator, whilst a solenoid isolator will work, it’s not recommended.

Yes it’s the engine start/stop feature that is causing the problem, when the engine stops everything is fine, but when the engine restarts, the amps turn off for around 30 seconds, been in touch with Sony who said that the radio isn’t start/stop compatible and can cause it to stop output a signal feed to the amplifiers when the voltage drops during startup

 

[1aespinoza Premium Member]

wires from the vw t6 radio harness, 1 goes to the head unit (which I plan to cut and join instead to the power from the leisure battery), and a smaller yellow wire that goes from the vw t6 radio harness to the info adapter of the connects2 that then provides the switch live to the head unit, it’s this smaller yellow wire that I’m not sure about, should I leave it getting power from the vw t6 radio harness or should I also cut it and join it into the new power supply cable from the 2nd battery

Do you recall if the OEM radio would turn off during the engine's start-stop cycles?

 

[Affray]

Do you recall if the OEM radio would turn off during the engine's start-stop cycles?

No problems with that, but there were no amps and the radios you get in commercial vans are as cheap and basic as possible. Heck electric windows only became standard about 10 years back

 

[1aespinoza Premium Member]

If it will, will supplying the can bus adapter power from the leisure battery instead of the iso connection to the main battery fix this or will this cause issues

No problems with that

In that case, the adapter harness may be wired wrong or not compatible with your specific vehicle model. As stated by Old_Slapper, the radio's yellow wire must be constant 12v so splicing direct to the leisure + is ok. The adapter harness yellow is behaving like the red key turn on. But even that is not viable for the red turn-on.
Do you know if the thin yellow is 12v?

 

[Old_Slapper]

I believe the accessory wire (the red wire) is the culprit. Like a regular car, when the car cranks, the radio shuts off. It's not due to low voltage, but due to the power being cut off. See if you can hook the accessory wire to an ignition wire (a wire that keeps power when the engine is being started). There are also other items you can get, such as a small capacitor, that will keep your radio powered on while cranking but shut off shortly after the car is shut off.

 

[Affray]

In that case, the adapter harness may be wired wrong or not compatible with your specific vehicle model. As stated by Old_Slapper, the radio's yellow wire must be constant 12v so splicing direct to the leisure + is ok. The adapter harness yellow is behaving like the red key turn on. But even that is not viable for the red turn-on.
Do you know if the thin yellow is 12v?

On the connects2 adapter you have 2 yellow wires, a thicker one that supplies the constant 12v to the radio (one I plan to join to the leisure battery +) and a thinner yellow wire that provides constant power to the adapter interface, from the connects2 interface, there is a red wire which provides the switch live to the radio.

Doubled check with connects2 that it is the right unit and that it is wired correctly

 

[Affray]

I believe the accessory wire (the red wire) is the culprit. Like a regular car, when the car cranks, the radio shuts off. It's not due to low voltage, but due to the power being cut off. See if you can hook the accessory wire to an ignition wire (a wire that keeps power when the engine is being started). There are also other items you can get, such as a small capacitor, that will keep your radio powered on while cranking but shut off shortly after the car is shut off.

The radio stays on throughout the start/stop process, and continues playing music files etc, at first I thought it was a problem with the amps, but Sony confirmed that as the switch live to the amps from the head unit takes it’s power from the permanent live yellow wire, a drop to 7/8 volts during the restarting of the engine can cause the radio to temporarily stop outputting any voltage on the amps switch wire until the radio sorts itself out again.

It doesn’t always happen with the Sony (depends how long the engine stop period is), and Sony acknowledged this, they explained that it can happen, not that it will always happen.

As it’s a van, running the new power supply is pretty easy, so I’m going to give it a try today

 

[1aespinoza Premium Member]

On the connects2 adapter you have 2 yellow wires, a thicker one that supplies the constant 12v to the radio (one I plan to join to the leisure battery +) and a thinner yellow wire that provides constant power to the adapter interface, from the connects2 interface, there is a red wire which provides the switch live to the radio.

Doubled check with connects2 that it is the right unit and that it is wired correctly

In that case then running both yellows to the leisure battery will work. Maybe doing the same with red along with a switch would keep a constant 12v.

 

[Affray]

In that case then running both yellows to the leisure battery will work. Maybe doing the same with red along with a switch would keep a constant 12v.

Thanks, that’s not a bad idea.

I did run a power supply and ground (to keep the head unit and amp grounds in the same place) yesterday from the head unit to the leisure battery, with the new power supply feeding the head unit constant yellow wire, but left the little yellow wire that feeds the info adapter, still feed via the van’s engine battery and everything works without issue with no more start/stop problems.

As the ground back to the battery isn’t really needed (as I did try a new straight to the chassy) then put a switch on the new ground cable and using it as a switch live, isn’t that much work, and would have the advantage of no one being able to turn the radio on when I wasn’t around and driving the system to loudly. I’m starting to really like the idea