Car/Marine Audio Install: Best place to start learning how?

I've always had an interest in car audio install and of course, now that I have a boat, Marine audio installation, but haven't ever learned even the basics. I wouldn't even know where to begin. If I was younger and didn't have a steady career, I'd go apply at Best Buy and learn through them, but since I'm a busy guy with my career and everything, does anyone have any resources where one can learn the basics and become an expert? I'm talking BASICS..... I don't know the slightest thing about soldering, electronics, grounding, etc.

I'm thinking maybe a community college course on electrician type stuff would be a good start... Any recommendations?

Start here - http://www.the12volt.com/

I like to look at stuff on http://forum.sounddomain.com too.

This is a good place to start. I know many of the guys that started this school. Great bunch.

http://www.mobiledynamics.com

-Brian
Exile Audio

also, youtube is alot of help. Installing stereos is pretty basic stuff especially when replacing equipment with the same sizes. For marine, you have to be careful and think of areas that may get wet or areas that are damp. I.e. don't install amps on the floor, under seats etc unless they are enclosed in a water proof housing. Its pretty much red goes to red, black goes to black kind of work.

You don't need to go to any electrician school to learn this stuff. It's all 12 volt equipment so you don't have to worry about burning things up etc. Just look through video reviews, how-to's, etc on equipment and youll get the hang of it. You may want to youtube things like, how to install an amp, things like that.

Originally Posted by kx250frider617

also, youtube is alot of help. Installing stereos is pretty basic stuff especially when replacing equipment with the same sizes. For marine, you have to be careful and think of areas that may get wet or areas that are damp. I.e. don't install amps on the floor, under seats etc unless they are enclosed in a water proof housing. Its pretty much red goes to red, black goes to black kind of work.

You don't need to go to any electrician school to learn this stuff. It's all 12 volt equipment so you don't have to worry about burning things up etc. Just look through video reviews, how-to's, etc on equipment and youll get the hang of it. You may want to youtube things like, how to install an amp, things like that.

No offence, but your advice couldn't be further from the truth. There is SOOO much more to mobile 12-volt then connecting red to red and black to black. Try that in a European car or commercial truck where black is not the color used for ground. Also in boats, yellow is often used for the ground color, yet on a typical head-unit, yellow is the B+/MEM.

To the OP. I am not saying you cant do your own install, but its not as easy and straight forward. Theres a lot to mobile 12V, then theres the audio side of it. Then, boats are an entirely different animal then a car.

More of what im trying to say is, lets say you want to replace the headunit to your car. you go out and buy the headunit, dash kit, wire harness. You have to solder the wire harness to the harness of the new radio. The wires are literally the same color and you match them up. It would be very hard to mess that one up. Power and grounds for amp are a given, then there's the remote wire. RCA are even easier, red to red, black to black. The basic set up of a stereo system is a no- brainer.

Now it may get confusing when it comes to wiring speakers in parallel or series to get 1, 2, 4, 8 ohm load or whatever the ohms come out to. 3 speakers fall in the decimal points. But they have calculators on 12volt.com for that.

As far as finding power, ignition wire, grounds etc. a simple test light will tell you exactly what wires they are.

Im no expert on audio but I have done enough stereos of my own, full component speakers, fiberglass enclosures, etc to tell you that audio shops completely ream people on prices to do jobs that some one can easily do themselves. A simple head unit costs $50 of labor at a shop. The job takes 10 min if I did it.

The hardest part to any install is finding out how interior parts come apart and running wires through factory boots.

For basic stereos, head unit, speaker amps sub amps, etc. The OP should have NO problem learning. Now, if you get into sound processing side of things then it gets complicated.

Im a DIY kind of person and it sucks seeing people get ripped off for stereo installs just because they don't do any research.

Here are some projects I have done myself all from doing research on forums, youtube etc, trail and error, and not being afraid to dig into things. Now they aren't show quality but they are decent audio installs.

The OP i interested of learning this stuff and I don't want to discourage him from doing a project himself. A lil research will go along way and you'll realize its alot easier than you think.

I think you have the right idea, a community college basic electrical or electronics course would be a great way to start. Sure its simple enough to know connect positive to positive and negative to negative etc. But the theory and reason behind all that will make more sense the more you understand about resistance in wire, resistors themselves(ie speakers)and much more. I've always toyed with stereos but it wasn't until I started doing electrical in my house, then taking things a step further to becoming an electrician, then taking a full blown electrical college program that I understood the principles behind everything I had been doing. Also being in a band when I was younger, recording music, understanding frequencies ect. came into play on the musical side of stereo's and learning from my brother's who were far better musicians helped too. One of my brothers became a sound engineer/producer/badass helped understand so much more than most stereo shops or people could know.. There's really 3 sides to mobile audio- 1. The physical connections and wiring of components and 2. The installation and fabrication 3. The musical side, Which is understanding frequencies, distortion, physical properties of different drivers and so so much more. I'm decent at these but on my current stereo I still had it tuned by a shop after i finished the install and attempted my own tune. The reason being is that for me it is a hobby and something I like, but not something that I do everyday and my profession. My tune was pretty close to the final version and I even tweaked a few things after they were done, but having that piece of mind and second opinion helped ease my mind. I think WW is a great place to learn more as well. Theres guys like Grant West, Tim from Wetsounds and lots of other guys that offer up some great advise and tips on here too.

I'm with Jordan. While I'm sure it would be ideal to get an electrical/electronics course under your belt, I think most would be fine with a little online research and some forum advice while they're underway with whatever project you've got going. I didn't know a thing about car/boat audio, and installed my sub/amp/tower speakers. It took a while, and I ran into some issues, but I got the job done, and learned a lot along the way. So yeah, for me the best way to learn was to dive right in.