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wire stereo off acc instead of ignition


dustinwiemann

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So i just got a 2011 v ride and the stereo does not have a designated on off switch. It comes on and goes off with the ignition. Not to big of a deal but I wish i had a switch so if i were parked i don't have to have the key on to listen to tunes. anybody know how to fix this. I know i can just wire the stereo remote line direct to the acc switch but where is it? what color is it?

Thanks

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The head-unit has a small red remote turn-on wire that receives 12V when the switch is in the ON and ACC position. Relocating that wire to a simple toggle wired to B+ is all thats needed. The red wire will be on the head-unit side of the harness, and may be a different color on the boat side. If you isolate the correct wire at the key switch, its a simple mod.

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The color on the boat side at the switch will be white/blue or white/purple. One of these is switched power and one is constant. Does this boat have keyless ignition?? If not, just turn your key to the left and the stereo will play, no need to chase wires. Let us know if you have a keyless system and I'll chase down the diagram.

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I actualy want to do the same thing in my 2007 bu. I hate how the stereo turns off every time i turn the boat off when we are switching riders.

One of my concerns though is wiring to any positive buss. I fear this might introduce uncessary noise to my system. Should I run a wire from my Amps buss?

The color on the boat side at the switch will be white/blue or white/purple. One of these is switched power and one is constant. Does this boat have keyless ignition?? If not, just turn your key to the left and the stereo will play, no need to chase wires. Let us know if you have a keyless system and I'll chase down the diagram.

You say switched power and costant power. I am assuming that the constant power is for the stereo memory and the switched power is what acutally powers the deck?

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I actualy want to do the same thing in my 2007 bu. I hate how the stereo turns off every time i turn the boat off when we are switching riders.

One of my concerns though is wiring to any positive buss. I fear this might introduce uncessary noise to my system. Should I run a wire from my Amps buss?

You say switched power and costant power. I am assuming that the constant power is for the stereo memory and the switched power is what acutally powers the deck?

The head-units red remote turn-on is only a low current 12V signal to the head-unit to turn it on. The wires we need to be concerned with in terms of noise, are the yellow B+ (sometimes called MEM) and the black ground wire. The yellow wire is actually the circuit the head-unit current is drawn from. As long as those share the same source as the amp, you will not have noise introduced via the turn-on circuit

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thanks for your help. it has a key. i agree with jonnyrad i also want the stereo to stay on while i switch riders and not go off just because i shut the boat off. maybe ill give it a try and see if i get used to it. I liked how my old malibu had a designated switch. also the stereo is on the passenger side so I am hoping the acc wire is easy to find near the key on the driver side.

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Dustin I was going to make the post about a month ago lol. Thanks for starting the topic.

Thanks MLA that makes a lot more sense. This sounds like a much easier change than i thought. Stoked to get this done.

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Just to be clear, the remote-on wire is just that....it simply signals the head unit to turn on. You need the main power supply to the head unit to be on as well for it to operate.

This means that if the ignition switch is in the off position, you'll need the remote-on wire connected to an appropriate toggle switch with a power supply that is on independent of the ignition switch position. Additionally, you'll need the power to be on to the head unit's main power supply line, so again, you need to check that is a constant on regardless of ignition switch position.

Personally, I find the best way to wire this up is to have both the remote-on wire and the main power wire feeding from the common/Acc post on the battery switch, with the remote-on wire running through a dash-mounted toggle switch. This way you can have the stereo working a) independent of the ignition switch, b) running off either battery you select at the battery switch, and c) turned off completely when the battery switch is in the "Off" position (so your battery isn't drained while boat isn't being used). That's just my KISS approach.

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post-17891-0-46782600-1354835707_thumb.j

This is my understanding of what you are saying. I could check pretty easy if the headunit's main power is independant of the ignition by simply intercepting the remote and powering it.

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Mike (MLA) explained it correctly :) only thing I may add is that since the radio is on the passenger side, that the buss under the dash will have the same "ignition" or red wire but in the colors grandude mentioned, going to it and possibly be marked IGN. So you prolly don't have to run a wire over to the driver side ( I assume you wanted the switch there) to a switch, you may be able to just pull it off the buss. Good luck! :)

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post-17891-0-46782600-1354835707_thumb.j

This is my understanding of what you are saying. I could check pretty easy if the headunit's main power is independant of the ignition by simply intercepting the remote and powering it.

Jonny,

Thats drawing is a bit confusing so im not sure its a true representation of what your 07 will be. There are 3 main wire colors we need to concentrate on. These colors will be on the head-unit side of the boat's harness connector, so they could be different on the boat side. This is where an ohm meter can help find that same wire over on the help for example.

Black: this is the head-units ground wire and should be connected to the boats ground plane. If the head-unit works, then you are good. If you where doing a complete stereo/amp install, I would go into more detail about this wire, but lets just leave it as is for now as it has no bearing on the topic of this thread.

Yellow: This is the head-units constant B+ wire that actually powers the head-unit. Since it stays hot, it is also the memory keep-alive. Back in the day, these used to be a small 18ga or 22ga wire and was only used as memory. Head-units often had a larger red wire that was switched and provided the current for the head-unit to operate on. Odds are, this yellow wire is already wired to B+ (maybe through the battery switch if the boat has a dual battery setup with switch) or terminated right to the battery. A volt meter will confirm that this wire is constant. I doubt its wired through the key switch. We can talk more on it later, but for now, lets just leave it where it is if it is indeed constant B+.

Red: This is the wire we need to concentrate on the most for the topic of this thread. On boats with a traditional key switch, this wire will more then likely be terminated to the back of the key switch at terminal labeled ACC for accessory. In most boat, this will be the only wire connected to the ACC terminal as the stereo is the only switched device we want powered up in both RUN and ACC. Everything else will either be on the IGN terminal, and hot only with the key to run, or wired to B+. I doubt the ACC terminal will be feeding a helm BUSS. Again, the volt/ohm meter will determine this.

The key switch is nothing more then a rotary switch. This red wire gets B+ when the key is both ACC and RUN positions. All we are doing it relocating this red wire from the rotary key switch to a simple ON/OFF toggle or even a sleeker latching push button switch.

If you go with a lighted switch, it will typically have 3 terminals. 1 is the ground side for the illumination and can go to the helm ground BUSS. 1 terminal will need to wired to the helm B+ BUSS. The last will be where that red wire coming off the key goes to. If you have a unused ACC switch on the helm already, then you can probably use it. It is more then likely already wired with the B+ and ground for the light, so all you need to do is locate the correct switched output terminal and connect the red that came off the key switch.

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Too much trouble to turn ignition to the left (accessory position) when changing riders? My stereo doesn't even blip off if I just turn it from run to accessory in one motion.

Edited by dalt1
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Sure if you don't have a IGN buss and its fused directly to the switch ( which most are buss fused or a mounted fuse close to the buss), pull it off the ACC side of the ign switch. But going directly to the back of the radio will be more of a hassle to run the wire over to the helm, especially when it's already ran and fused under helm... ;)

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My sub is wired to an accessory switch, and my head unit is wired to the ignition switch as this post describes. Is there any reason i couldn't move the red wire you mention to the same accessory switch as the sub is hooked up to? I dislike having to turn the stereo on and off at the unit, I dislike having to turn the key to Acc when the engine isn't running, and I dislike forgetting to turn off the sub and draining my battery and needing to jump the boat the next time I go out. I figure if i hear the stereo is still on, and can turn it all off with one switch, I'll be best off :-) Oh, if it matters, i have an '04 Response LXi.

Thanks!

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Ski38off,

Sounds like your head-units B+/MEM may also be switched by the key switch. I would recommend getting in there with a volt meter and do some checking. So to answer your question, yes, you can relocate the head-units remote turn-on wire to a switch. Now, I am curious why the sub is turned on via a switch, rather then the head-unit? If you want to retain this, then i would suggest a dedicated switch just for the head-unit as opposed to sharing one with the sub's turn-on.

I would also consider adding a house battery and switch. Hopefully, a dead cranking battery will be a thing of the past.

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  • 2 weeks later...

okay so this mod was much much MUCH easier than I thought. here are the steps

stick your head under the dash locate back side of ignition switch

find the white and blue wire (stereo remote, may be a different color on yours however it will come off the back side of the key)

disconnect it, cut off the eyelet connector and crimp on a female push on connector

plug into any open acc switch

DONE!!

Malibu already pre wired the acc switches with power, thank you Malibu!! very simple.

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  • 4 weeks later...

okay so this mod was much much MUCH easier than I thought. here are the steps

stick your head under the dash locate back side of ignition switch

find the white and blue wire (stereo remote, may be a different color on yours however it will come off the back side of the key)

disconnect it, cut off the eyelet connector and crimp on a female push on connector

plug into any open acc switch

DONE!!

Malibu already pre wired the acc switches with power, thank you Malibu!! very simple.

I have a 2009 VLX with keyed ignition and dual-battery option. I did as dustinwiemann did and relocated the w/bl (white wire with blue trace) from the "AM" (accessories main) terminal to the "BM" (Battery main) terminal on the back of ignition switch. No recrimping was required, just a phillips head screw driver to unscrew and rescrew the terminals. I CAREFULLY removed the ignition switch from the dash for ease of access. Be careful not to overtighten the plastic keyhole cover lock ring when reinstalling as it is easy to break. Now I can use the sound whenever I want regardless of the key position so long as the main isolator is on. It also means that the sound stays on between starting and stopping the motor.

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Too much trouble to turn ignition to the left (accessory position) when changing riders? My stereo doesn't even blip off if I just turn it from run to accessory in one motion.

This is what I always use. Nice small little switch, clean looking too. Direct power from battery to stereo & relay to turn everything on

switch_zps26a5267c.jpg

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This is what I always use. Nice small little switch, clean looking too. Direct power from battery to stereo & relay to turn everything on

switch_zps26a5267c.jpg

Nice, I use those alot... Did you know, you don't need a relay if your using this for a head unit, remote turn on/off?? Relays are only needed for a draw above the switch capacity ;)
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  • 5 months later...

So I finally got around to taking a look at this. I bought a switch and my plan was simple, move the remote wire to the from the ACC to the + side of the ignition, drop the switch in on the line and boom, done. I grab my cucuit tester and figured out what side of the ignition is always hot and which side went hot when the key was in acc. Turns out I have two wires crimped together on my Acc. One (i am guessing the black and purple) is the head unit remote, the other, I have no idea? My thought is move them both together to the + side of the ingition and add them both to my switch because I cant possibly think of what might else be on the ACC side of the ignition.

Thanks in advanced.

Jon

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  • 6 years later...

On our 2007 VLX, I have two wires on the “A” accessory post of the ignition switch. there are 4 posts. The A on mine is the closest to the larger red, one tick counterclockwise from the red looking at back of switch. A purple with white stripe and a white with blue strip. The white with blue strip is the radio power. I cut the ring terminals off both wire, Split the two, put purple on new ring and connected back to A on ignition switch. Then put female spade connector on the white w/blue and attached to spare ACC switch tab. Very simple move to powe the stereo with ACC switch vs ignition switch. 
 


 

 

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