Wiring the radio to the aux battery and using it on AC also

[mightyart]

One of the fun things for me on my little Westy project here is figuring out how to make everything as small and efficient as I can.
Good exercise for the brain I guess, and I always had fun playing with 12-volt electric stuff.
So I thought to myself, I have spent a bit of time and money putting the stereo system in, kind of sucks to lug a portable radio with us just cause it runs on AC.
Hooking it to the aux battery is fine, but it seemed kind of silly to me to run it down when we camping at an electrified campsite.
So this is the solution I came up with:
I am assuming you know a bit about car wiring, or at least how your stereo system is wired in. Always take care in working with electricity of any kind! Although a 12-volt car system won’t necessarily kill a healthy human, bad wiring can cause fires, and will burn out a nice accessory if that accessory has been wired in improperly. Always disconnect the ground of the battery before you start disconnecting anything else, and only reapply power when you can verify all connections are in place.
Ok now this is how I did it.
When I first hooked up my Auxiliary battery I wasn’t sure how I was going to hook up my accessories, so I decided to power two 12v “Cigarette lighter” receptacles and just use them like you would plugs in the house.
Here is the post about how I hooked up my Auxiliary battery:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=114923&highlight=aux+battery
One thing I love about My 81 is the amount of empty space inside, this of course was filled up over the years, if you have a later model Vanagon you might have to be a bit more creative about where you place your receptacles.
To hook up the radio I went down to the AutoZone and purchased a couple of the male
“Cigarette lighter” plugs. Making sure I hooked the positive (red) wire to the positive on the plug and likewise the negative. I have a newer radio with a clock, it has a yellow wire for the “memory” This draws very low current and it stayed hooked to the battery. You may also have other wires like orange.
Consult your radios owners manual for the wiring diagram for the one you have, sometimes it’s on the radio itself.
Now here is where it gets a bit tricky. The wife and me listen to CDs mostly at medium volume; I also have a very small (40 watt) amp that powers my subwoofer. I hooked this to the plug with the radio. The tricky part is if you have a big amp or two that may draw some current, you may want each amp to have its own plug.
Making it run off house current is easy, all you need is a cheap converter, not to be confused with the much more difficult task of making house stuff run off a small 12volt battery which requires you to use an “inverter”, see “pimp my ride”
Anyways when we get to the campsite at the state park now. I set up camp by pulling off the panel, unplugging the radio from the Aux battery receptacle and plugging it into the converter and we got music!
The Next project is hooking up some hidden Aux speaker connections outside the van. This way we can string up a pair of old speakers by the campfire… kum-by-ya in stereo!
This has been your “Red Green” project of the week.

Here is the receptacle with the radio plugged in, front air deflector panel off.

With radio unplugged ready to go into DC/AC converter.
Forgive my sloppy wiring; I’m putting off the big project of taking off the dash and “cleaning” it all up.

AutoZone plug about $3.00 DC/AC, 6 amp, converter about $20.00 Target.

Who says you can’t get good deals off ebay? Just got to know what to look for!
Here is a 7amp converter I bought new for $15.00 sits right next to the other Aux battery receptacle, I run the plug under the seat belt reel into the cabinet and plug it into the “secret” plug under the sink. Works like a charm for our Vector cooler.
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My Art:
http://www.instagram.com/flynn8552/