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Will Earth hour do damage to power supply system?

Fitting a positive earth car stereo in to a negative earth car. avoiding possible conflicts b4 hand.?

  • I own a 1955 Rover p4.75 car. Just like alot of old cars of the day. It has a negative earth electrical system. Just recently I bought a knew car stereo which is designed for modern cars running on positive earth. I also bought a 12v power converter which connects to the 12v car battery and connects directly to the stereo allowing me to use stuff like modern day cell phones and positive earth car stereos n such like in an neg earth system. Not being fully aware myself on how the earthing system works in car stereos and with the converter fitted could issues arise when the metal shell/case of the stereo is inserted into the cars dash inside its slot when bare metal of the case meets with the metal inside the stereo slot allowing two conflicting earthing systems to combine allowing damage to the stereo and wiring system of my car. I want to be sure on what im doing before fitting the stereo to this negative earth system. So In Short. Is the earth taken through the shell of the stereo or is it taken by a different route? Any help most welcome, Regards Brent. For your info. I have the converter as seen here on the bottom right hand side of this page below. http://www.mgaguru.com/mgtech/electric/et207.htm

  • Answer:

    Stereos earth through both - they have an area wire (as well as two positives, a permanent and a switched) but they also can earth from the casing. Best of luck, but it's not something I'd attempt!

Brent at Yahoo! Answers Visit the source

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I think you've switched positive and negative. Most modern cars are negative ground. This means that the negative terminal of the battery is connected to the frame of the car. At least that's how we do it in the USA. Ground (or earth) is the zero voltage reference. You can have a positive or negative voltage in reference to ground. On most cars, we only use positive voltages. If you had a converter, then you can add a positive voltage supply in addition to the negative voltage from the battery. If you measured between the battery negative and your converter positive supply, you would get 24V difference. It gets really confusing when people reference it as a positive or negative ground. This is actually a misnomer. Ground is defined as 0V. So it really is a positive or negative voltage electrical system. So all you need to do is hook up the correct power converter to the power wire on the radio. The radio illumination wire probably needs a positive voltage also. The website you linked to has a good explanation. The chassis of the radio is connected to ground (0V). If you don't use a converter and try to insulate the chassis, you will have trouble with the antenna, and possibly have a short circuit on the antenna shield.

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