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Permalink Reply by Chuck a Muck on March 9, 2009 at 6:38am

Alex of West Town bikes is the go to guy for your sound bike questions.

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Permalink Reply by Gecko on March 9, 2009 at 7:13am

If you're already planning on using a trailer, why not just go with a 12V car battery? Yes, they're heavier and bigger, but you can hook up a car stereo to them and use any car speakers, even big ones. I would recommend a smaller wattage stereo (50 watts per channel is plenty) and 5 1/4" or 6X9" speakers, either 4 of each or mixed pairs. This will give you a longer run time without sacrificing too much sound quality. Also, make sure the stereo has a front audio input or you have an fm tuner to get the mp3 player audio on the stereo.

When looking for a battery, try to get one with the highest amp rating you can afford (measured in mAh or milli-amp-hours). The higher the mAh, the longer run time at a given volume. Be ready to recharge after every excursion though (a battery charger is a good thing to have, but around 50 bucks a pop). Also, make sure you put a fuse on the positive lead between the battery and the stereo, otherwise if you make a wiring mistake, *poof* goes the new (possibly expensive) stereo. Even better would be to have a breaker, that way if something goes wrong, it pops, but if nothing goes wrong, you basically just have an on/off switch.

Also, if you plan it right, you can probably fit the whole thing (speakers/stereo/battery) inside a wood or acrylic case. If you seal/pad the case, it can increase the reverb for the bass, improving the sound quality. You could probably hook up a car charger plug in the case to plug the mp3 player into as well. Plus having it all in one unit makes it relatively easy to move/strap in, etc. And if your stereo has a remote, you can control the volume/etc from the seat of your bike!

Hope I've helped!

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Permalink Reply by mindfrieze on March 9, 2009 at 11:53am

El Gecko said:

If you're already planning on using a trailer, why not just go with a 12V car battery?

How about types of batteries? Would you recommend just a typical Die-Hard or some sort of deep-cycle battery like the Optima yellow-top?

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Permalink Reply by Gecko on March 9, 2009 at 12:20pm

Deep cycle is the way to go for this particular application. Deep cycle batteries are designed to be discharged completely over and over, and do not provide the extreme cold cranking amps like those needed to start a gasoline engine. Thus a deep cycle battery will last longer and provide a more level current stream. A normal car battery will work, but after a shorter time, it will drain much faster.

mindfrieze said:

El Gecko said:

If you're already planning on using a trailer, why not just go with a 12V car battery?

How about types of batteries? Would you recommend just a typical Die-Hard or some sort of deep-cycle battery like the Optima yellow-top?

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Permalink Reply by buddaa38 on March 9, 2009 at 6:53pm

Yeah by Friday.

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Permalink Reply by Gecko on March 10, 2009 at 2:46am

By Friday? Wow, that kind of throws all my suggestions out the window. Have you looked at small ipod-specific stereos that can run on batteries? They put out pretty good sound for their size and can be strapped easily to a rear rack. My roommate has one like this and it gets pretty loud. This one runs on rechargeable batteries and is probably more what you're looking for.

buddaa38 said:

Yeah by Friday.

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Permalink Reply by Bikefreeek on March 10, 2009 at 3:46am

If you want to do it easy with a system that fits on a bike rack go for one of these

For a personal sound system they sound great, put out a fair amount of volume and run upto 8 hours off of regular batteries. My brother got one and it sounds great!

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