20007+ GM Truck Electical Upgrade Thread. I stop when dimming stops.

[vandiar2 10+ year member]

I'm actually not positive on the specs of my alt. I would imagine it's probably like a 160 something around there. It's just the stock alt for the 5.3L Engine in the new Chevy trucks.

did you run a dedicated ground to the front battery or did you ground off on your chassis where your amps are? I just ordered some knu wire to run a dedicated ground. I hope that it will stabilize my voltage

 

[loopkiller 10+ year member]

It wasn't the case. Just the sticker that bubbled up. Kinda like it was letting gasses out of the top of the battery. It was brand new purchased from Sonic Electronics. I only had it 1 day before I put it in. I'm going back there today for a replacement (They are right down the street).

Good thing you are close to them. Shipping back a dead battery would ****. Especially one that big. The only thing I can think of is that it had a shorted cell and that is why you have continuity and gassing. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/confused.gif.e820e0216602db4765798ac39d28caa9.gif

Let us know how the replacement goes. Also, you might want to make sure they are giving you a fresh unit. There should be a stick somewhere that gives you the date or something.

 

[vandiar2 10+ year member]

Oh dude that *****. What the hell. you did a great job too. send that bish back.

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

Oh dude that *****. What the hell. you did a great job too. send that bish back.

Second battery did the same thing to me except there is no continuity between terminals. But it is still like gases are escaping from the top of the battery and something is frying in there. I e-mailed Kinetik and tried calling but looks like I missed them by about 10 minutes from closing time. We'll see what they have to say. Hopefully they work Saturday but I really doubt it.

It's almost like it's getting overcharged but when I start the car it's at 14.9 volts after driving it goes down to around 14.4 volts. I even removed my larger grounds that bypass the that loop that monitors ground current and the voltage and problem remained the same. I'm kind of stumped because I've never had a problem like this. Almost makes me wonder that because the battery is such lower resistance and what not the newer style regulator on my truck is giving it too much juice. It's only a 145 amp alternator though so IDK.

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

did you run a dedicated ground to the front battery or did you ground off on your chassis where your amps are? I just ordered some knu wire to run a dedicated ground. I hope that it will stabilize my voltage

I'm just grounding to the chassis for now. I may run a dedicated ground in the future but have not yet. I'm just going one little baby step at a time. I really need to figure out what the hell is going on with this battery situation though before I move on.

Good thing you are close to them. Shipping back a dead battery would ****. Especially one that big. The only thing I can think of is that it had a shorted cell and that is why you have continuity and gassing. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/confused.gif.e820e0216602db4765798ac39d28caa9.gif
Let us know how the replacement goes. Also, you might want to make sure they are giving you a fresh unit. There should be a stick somewhere that gives you the date or something.

Hell yeah. Sucker weighs 54 pounds!!!! //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/eek.gif.771b7a90cf45cabdc554ff1121c21c4a.gif

Gekk

 

[audiolife 5,000+ posts]

my 1400 has over 40k miles 4 years of age and the lowest my alt goes now is 14.75 volts hot when cold it is very close to 15v. Normally I only run on amp but I have had 2 on it that totalled over 2k watts rated power (probably close to 1500 actual in use). Never had an issue. The engine block to the chassis ground is the alt ground.

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

my 1400 has over 40k miles 4 years of age and the lowest my alt goes now is 14.75 volts hot when cold it is very close to 15v. Normally I only run on amp but I have had 2 on it that totaled over 2k watts rated power (probably close to 1500 actual in use). Never had an issue. The engine block to the chassis ground is the alt ground.

Yeah. I'm real confused bud. Guess I have to wait untill Monday to find out. I took it out for now to keep from any further cooking of the cells in it.

 

[audiolife 5,000+ posts]

doesnt make much sense one of my best friends runs an 1800 on a system actually larger than yours with a larger alt (200 amp) adjustable voltage glued to 14.7v in a silverado (about 2 years old). One of the guys I went to school with has a kid that has a 1800 as well powering ~1000 watts of sony amps (1200 and a 600) and has enough neon on his el camino to reblind stevie wonder and neither of them have had issues either. The el camino has headers on it which brings quite a bit more heat to the battery location. Also if I were a betting man the air bubbles in your sticker were due to heat and the sticker adhesive more so than the battery venting. More than likely nothing wrong with it.

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

doesnt make much sense one of my best friends runs an 1800 on a system actually larger than yours with a larger alt (200 amp) adjustable voltage glued to 14.7v in a silverado (about 2 years old). One of the guys I went to school with has a kid that has a 1800 as well powering ~1000 watts of sony amps (1200 and a 600) and has enough neon on his el camino to reblind stevie wonder and neither of them have had issues either. The el camino has headers on it which brings quite a bit more heat to the battery location. Also if I were a betting man the air bubbles in your sticker were due to heat and the sticker adhesive more so than the battery venting. More than likely nothing wrong with it.

I got an e-mail back from Kinetic and he mentioned that it is probably the glue/adhesive getting hot and not a problem with the battery. I sent a e-mail double checking a couple things about how I have my wiring bypassed around GM factory monitoring of current to make sure but it looks like it's probably fine. I put a small hole in the top with an exacto knife to alleviate the problem Once I get one last mail back from them it will probably go back in.

Edit: The guy from Kinetic also stated this about the continuity: "the continuity could simply be from reserve and would of gone away eventually as you stated it did…"

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

Well I put the Kinetik battery back in with the 0 gauge wiring through the factory current monitoring system. Just to make sure the charging system was operating as designed. So far I've seen voltage on idle ranging from 14.4 to 14.9 and the lowest drop in voltage I saw was to 13.5 volts on extremely hard full tilt bass hits. This is about .6 volts better than before. And now that I made a little breather hole there is no bubbling on top.

The dimming, however, actually seems even worse then before. I have a few ideas of why but am not really positive why. Could be the battery needs charging a bit more. Could be quicker release of power. In any event, looks like the next step is to wires up the stock battery on the other side of the engine bay (There are two battery mounting spots under the hood of my truck) and wire the stock battery to the vehicles electronics and keep the Kinetik solely for the stereo. I think this will alleviate my problems completely but we'll see. I'll update when I get this finished.

 

[audiolife 5,000+ posts]

Did you upgrade the alternator ground?

 

[badstang123 10+ year member]

Did you upgrade the alternator ground?

Part of this could be related to the fact that I abandoned some of the original grounds and ran (1) 0 gauge run to the block which had a few inch run to the chassis. I did this so that I could run it through that factory loop that monitors current. Until I get a answer back from GM Technical Assistance or from Kinetik I want to make sure the system is operating in stock fashion (Not overcharging the Kinetik battery). This being the case I'm probably not getting as high of output out of the alternator at all times as I was by bypassing the current monitoring system of the factory alternator setup. This could be a portion of the reason that the dimming is occurring.

Like I said I'm just being safe for now. Regardless I think I'm going to run the stock factory battery for the regular truck stuff and isolate the Kinetik to the stereo. I have two trays for batteries under the hood and a little extra wiring will be pretty easy. I just need answers like I mentioned previously so I can plan my wiring route.

Question. If you have two 0 gauge wires grounded at the same point (With ring terminals and one went to the chassis and one went to the block would that center point where the two ring terminals meet cause much resistance or would they carry the current pretty well?

 

[nimrod 10+ year member]

Question. If you have two 0 gauge wires grounded at the same point (With ring terminals and one went to the chassis and one went to the block would that center point where the two ring terminals meet cause much resistance or would they carry the current pretty well?

I think I read on here somewhere that you should not ground two wires to the same spot...BUT, in my opionion as long as your crimps on your ring terminals are solid, and your grounds are clean and tight you should not have a problem.

 

[loopkiller 10+ year member]

Part of this could be related to the fact that I abandoned some of the original grounds and ran (1) 0 gauge run to the block which had a few inch run to the chassis. I did this so that I could run it through that factory loop that monitors current. Until I get a answer back from GM Technical Assistance or from Kinetik I want to make sure the system is operating in stock fashion (Not overcharging the Kinetik battery). This being the case I'm probably not getting as high of output out of the alternator at all times as I was by bypassing the current monitoring system of the factory alternator setup. This could be a portion of the reason that the dimming is occurring.
Like I said I'm just being safe for now. Regardless I think I'm going to run the stock factory battery for the regular truck stuff and isolate the Kinetik to the stereo. I have two trays for batteries under the hood and a little extra wiring will be pretty easy. I just need answers like I mentioned previously so I can plan my wiring route.

Question. If you have two 0 gauge wires grounded at the same point (With ring terminals and one went to the chassis and one went to the block would that center point where the two ring terminals meet cause much resistance or would they carry the current pretty well?

I cannot imagine why that would ever be a problem. As long as you are using the proper sized terminals, there is no reason to think that stacking them would reduce the amount of current that could pass through them. Now if you were using an 8 awg terminal on a piece of 1/0, then I could see a potential for increased resistance.

 

[JarvisB 10+ year member]

interesting. subscribed.