Bass Guitar from my trunk: Wierd Questions

[fireslave 10+ year member]

I wanted to bring my bass guitar to a hippie fest in the woods, and I figured out that I can hook my bass up to play through my subs pretty easily, by using the circuit out of a mini amplifier & taking the headphone level output and routing it to my 600 watt 2 channel amp. So after dragging a heavy *** battery and sub box way back into the woods (it worked nicely, stoned hippies minds were blown), I was thinking that I should hook this shit up to my car in a convenient and impressively slick sort of way.

I wanted to add a switch in my trunk that did the following:

-turned on the 600 watt 2 channel amp in the trunk, regardless of the remote switches position (should be easy, if its already on it wont matter if there is another path to the remote, and if it's off, a single path will be created)

-turned on the bass guitar amplifier, which runs off a 9v battery or a 9vdc adapter, in this case it will be a 9vdc adapter that is only connected powered off the 12v car system when the switch is on

-disconnected the input to the 600 watt 2 channel amp coming from the head unit

and then...

-connected both channels of amp input to the headphone level output of the bass guitar amplifier (both channels would be identical signals, but my 2 subs are left and right, and I want to use both when I play bass)

This would also allow me to not have the keys in the ignition, b/c I have +12v on tap in my trunk from the battery regardless. (my amp switch in the car will obviously be downstream of some ignition related on/off, so it goes off when the head unit does...)

Could I do this with a quadruple pole double throw switch? I figured it would be:

(read this like a table... i had to use dots to space it)

.................in1..............in2................out

pole 1:.......none..........12v+..............to remote on 600watt amp

pole 2:.......none..........12v+..............to 9vdc adapter

pole 3:........left+..........left+...............to left channel on 600watt amp

.............(headunit)......(bass amp)

pole 3:.......right+.........right+.............to right channel on 600watt amp

..............(headunit)......(bass amp)

this would mean that I would have to wire all the grounds (left from headunit, right from headunit, and left & right from the bass amp b/c they are both the same) together. I'm not 100% sure this is legit to do, but I figured it should be because they are both ground, right?

Does anyone know for sure if this is ok to do? I mean, I have a cable for connecting my laptop headphone port to my TV that connects the grounds from both channels together, but thats splitting rather than combining, and i'm not sure if that I can assume that just because a cord exists that seems to connect the grounds, that I can connect the grounds without something exploding.

Otherwise, I need 2 more poles on my already gigantic switch...

Also, does a quadruple pole double throw switch even exist?

Maybe i'll have to use relays... theres a decently priced one at my local radioshack.

I have the spec sheet, and it seems like it could be activated just by sticking the red wire from my car battery to one side and the black to the other, and then routing the 2 audio channels though one of these:

http://rsk.imageg.net/graphics/uc/rsk/Support/ProductManuals/2750249_DS_EN.pdf

and the 2 previously mentioned 12v sources for the 9v adapter and the remote through an identical one, (or an identical one but with single poles)

Click to read more...

 

[fireslave 10+ year member]

hmmm....

the info and picture at the bottom of the first post in this thread:

http://www.caraudio.com/forum/showthread.php?t=198477

seem to indicate to me that hooking all those grounds together should be fine, and i could infact connect them right to my frame, or the - terminal on my battery, though there isnt any need to...

This having been said, it looks like all I need to do no is find an appropriate switch / relay...

 

[FurbiesAndBeans 10+ year member]

Umm, i would strongly advise against hooking up your bass to your bass speakers. I used to do the same, except it wasn't bass, it was my guitar to my home stereo. It sounded like ish! Possible damage to your speakers too because the signal isn't so clean.

 

[fireslave 10+ year member]

is it really a bad thing?

My bass sounds better through my subs than it does through my bass amp, actually, although my bass amp is quite a piece of shit. The signal seems to be really clean too... the only time it makes any wierd noises is when im connecting the cable, but i do that before i turn up the volume anyways...

How can I tell if the signal is clean? If it sounds clean, does that mean it is?

(my mini-amp has overdrive, which isn't so clean, but don't think it sounds good anyways)