13.8V AC-DC supplies are sometimes used for powering CB radios and other equipment, so they’ll work fine but aren’t necessary. Tip: 12V supplies will work fine and are also the most common kind. The right current (amps) rating: about 2 to 2.5A for most car stereos and towards 5A for some units that draw more.The good news is that it’s usually not hard to find the right kind of supply to power a car stereo at home. The good news is that 12V power supplies are available if you look in the right place – and one that’s right for hooking up a car stereo to AC power shouldn’t cost much. What can I use to power a car stereo at home? When power is removed from the radio’s accessory wire it turns off and goes into a low power mode. It’s necessary to connect this to power on a car stereo. They’re normally connected to a vehicle’s ignition switch accessory wire to turn on and off with the switch. What is the 12V accessory wire on a car stereo?Ĭar stereos have 3 power wires that have to be connected in order to work:įor 99% of car stereo, the 12V accessory wire is a red-colored signal wire that triggers the electronics to switch on. That’s because they have to work with a +12V supply which limits the power they can deliver. Fuses come in certain sizes so that’s the next closest one the manufacturer needed to use.Īlthough car stereo manufacturers may advertise them with high power ratings like “50W peak per channel”, in reality, the average car stereo can only put out about 15 to 18 watts RMS per channel. I’ve seen some units that have a 10 amp fuse, but that doesn’t mean they use quite that much current. Typical car stereos (depending on the design, features, etc) draw about 2 to 5 amps or so at full power. The good news is that unlike car amplifiers, a car stereo draws only a few amps. What you need is a power supply to safely reduce the high voltage of a home AC outlet to a lower DC voltage that a car stereo can use. It’s extremely dangerous to try and connect a DC device to AC power – in fact, it can even explode or catch on fire. Others I’ve been to are even higher at 220V AC. Home AC outlets supply around 120V (volts, or “V”) AC if you’re in the United States and some other countries. While the motor is running an alternator generates AC power that’s changed to DC in order to charge the battery. The reason car radios use DC power is that automobiles use a DC battery to start and power the engine. In fact, car radios can work down to somewhere around 11 volts DC, with 12V to 14.4V being typical when a vehicle’s engine is running. Is a car radio AC or DC?Ĭar radios use direct current (DC) voltage to power their electronics while home electronics use alternating current (AC) with a much higher voltage. However, you’ll need to know just a few things to make sure you don’t have any headaches or potentially destroy your car stereo. You cannot, however, directly connect a car stereo to an outlet. The quick answer is yes, with the right power supply, you can hook up a car stereo to a house outlet with 120V or even 220V power.
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