Hey guys. I was wanting to mount a flastscreen TV on my trunk lid. I would be only using it for football tailgating and things, but the vertical trunk lid when it is open would make it perfect to mount on. I measured and figured I could put a 32" widescreen tv on it. Anybody know where I could run the power from? Is there a spot in the trunk when I could tap in, or should I run something directly from the battery?

Also, how long could the battery support an LCD TV?

Any help would be great!

Thanks all.

 

you should get a second battery (Optima is pretty decent for charge capacity), keep it out of the car until you're tailgating (same with the LCD)

 

oh, and you want a properly fused, high-end inverter (not one that will overheat and catch fire). That way you can also plug in some other electronics like video games, DVD player, etc.

BTW, I want to come over.

 

sure come on over! Yeah I know I would need an inverter... where should I hook it up?? Or maybe dont even hook it up and just drop the batter in my trunk when I'm going to use it.. then hook the inverter directly to that. Then when im done, take the battery out and charge it up for next time...

 

^personally, I would do this so the entire system is removable, and you're not putting heavy, expensive battery cables in your car (running them all the way to the back). This is assuming, of course, that you're talking about installing one in the trunk

 

First you have to figure out the power consumption of the TV you want to get, then calculate the size of the inverter you need based on that information. I would go with something 20% more than what the max of the tv input is. Then you can take the amp hour rating of the battery and figure out the time it would take to discharge the battery with the current draw from the inverter/tv.

 

^he might be better off with a little more than 20% higher

 

i would go with a tv that has a an external power supply. The scond thing i would do is find one that has a powersupply with a 12v output. this would eliminate the cost of the power inverter and could easily run off any 12v battery. lastly i would buy a car stereo specific battery like the SVR battery. http://www.svrbatteries.com/battery_page.php?bid=23 this can be put in the place of the oem cd changer. lets face it you probably dont own cds anymore. one thing that you can do so you dont overload your alternator is to buy a motorcycle trickle charger and plug it in whenever you go tailgating. this will charge the batt abut not compromise your factory electrical. you can also install a relayed charging system from your main battery in case this one runs out of juice while partying. hope this works for you. also run a decent 10 guage wire through the gromet by the headliner down the driver side of the car.

 

A more general option than a stereo-specific batter is a marine battery. I'd go with an optima blue top maybe. Marine batteries are for continuous high draw applications.
If you end up getting a trickle charger, Battery Tender brand is a good standard. They have a 12V, 5A waterproof model for a bit over $100.

 

Let's not overthink this. Hundreds of people bring battery operated TVs to stadiums for tailgating. so, I recommend:

1. buy battery operated TV
2. buy milk crate
3. insert milk crate (upside down) in trun
4. place tv on top of milk crate\
5. turn on
6. open beer
7. congratulate yourself for NOT wasting time, money, effort in trying to create a one-off TTV and thereby humilating your TT
8. relish in the thought that you are not the butt of most tailgater jokes
9. enjoy game.

cheers