All you engineers I need your honest opinion. Here is the situation...

My Blaupunkt radio rear aux jack for the ipod is constantly "hot" so it charges the ipod even when the car is turned off. I want to leave the ipod off and plugged into my car overnight in my garage. The ipod should stop charging when the ipod battery is full (and it would say "charged" on the ipod screen). Would this drain the car battery?

I know there are many things in the car that use battery power when the car is off. Would an Ipod charging really hurt it? I don't know why the wire would stay hot even when the radio is off! Kind of stupid to me.

 

I have the same issue with my kenwood deck and have never unplugged my ipod and never experienced any issues. I have a 2005 with original battery as well. The only thing I do worry about is harming my ipod, I believe constantly powering rechargeable batteries that are fully charged is not good for them, maybe the ipod has a power cutoff in it for when it is fully charged???

 

This is almost a loaded question:

THe ipod even when off when connected to a charging source will begin to charge. However that being said once charged it will not continue to charge unless in use.

So either way your Ipod should not drain your battery even if you likely used it all night watching a movie and it was connected to the charger.

I think youre safe. Man that would surely be a pretty impressive Ipod if something as small as that little beast could drain your battery in 12-14 hours!

 

I will only leave it plugged in at night because it is in my garage. I will most likely take it out during the day to give the charging a break on the ipod battery. Plus it can get hot down here during the day so I don't want to leave it in the car! Thanks for your thoughts.

 

Trust me you will be fine!

BTW what is your setup for getting the I pod to run sound in your car.

I want to get somethign and have considered another head unit but...

 

Look at the size of your car battery and then look at the size of your iPOD (battery). If that little sucker can drain your car battery overnight, you need a new battery. Now, if you left it plugged in for the winter while in storage...maybe...probably.

 

I have a Blaupunkt London MP48. I used the rear ipod adaptor and bought it for 20 dollars at Crutchfield. It sent a constant flow of power to the ipod so it was charging even when the radio was off. What bothered me the most was a slight hissing noise. It was driving me crazy. I just pulled the adaptor out and will chuck it in the trash. I am going to use the front Aux jack and my lighter jack for power. I just can't deal with the hissing when the volume is in the 40+ range. It is almost like the ipod is sending the music too low. And because it is the ipod connection on the bottom, you can't increase the volume on the ipod.

 

I suspect the iPod draws so little current it could charge for a week and your car would be OK.

Look up the power output specs on the iPod charger (probably printed on the AC charger brick), I suspect it'll be rated in milliamperes, so it would take a looooong time to discharge the car battery.

 

With all the slickness of an Ipod, you better belive it they have that cutoff technology built in! I held off as long as I could when the Ipod craze was running; purchasing budget mp3 players. But now that I have an Ipod I cant even imagine anything else. The technology on these babies is soo sweeet!

 

I am trying to decide on a setup so that I can plug my Ipod in when taking a cruise. Unless your ipod is really old you should be able to drive a few hours to work and back playing your tunes without even using half the battery power so you should be fine either way.

Does your head unit match the silver in the dash? As much as I hate our cheap looking dash I dont want to call even more attention to it with a really nice head unit that stands out (if you know what I mean)

 

I believe the iPod stops charging when it's done, so for overnight I would not worry about draining the battery.

For running the iPod through the car, there are a wide variety of choices.

It's getting to be old school but you can use an FM Modulation scheme (very low-fidelity) to send a low-power FM signal to your radio and play iPod throught the head unit. I tried this and consider it a "option of last resort" if you cannot afford to replace the head unit with one that has some way to plug another device into it directly.

Next up with the option of FM Modulation or direct connection would be something like the Drive+Play from harman/kardon. They're pretty cheap on Amazon now but not a cheap product - just slightly obsolete because most head units today will take an iPod input with nothing more than a cable. But if you buy a lower priced head unit this gives you a heads-up display, charging of the iPod, a control ****, and the option of putting another device through the same connection. I had it in my car before I went to a head unit that integrates the iPod controls. I think they're about $30 nowadays.

The top tier solutions provide direct connection and control of the iPod through the head unit display and controls, with varying levels of capabilties. The very best A/V units will display album art and allow you to play iPod video when the vehicle is stationary. Most will allow you to control the iPod with most native iPod functions available directly in the head unit. This allows stowing the iPod out of sight.

It's really just about how far you want to go in terms of changes and dollars.

 

I have a Blaupunkt London MP48. The head unit is the same silver as the interior. Looks beautiful! Some people spray the black border silver to match the car but I love the black/silver look!

 

And the picture is where?...

Just razzing you but can you post a shot so that we can see.

THanks

Nate

 

I didn't take pictures yet but you can review this thread from Brucero and look at his pictures. I installed the same exact radio. It really looks great with the black border. I am very happy with the look and sound of this radio. I also love the fact it plays MP3 CD's!

https://www.crossfireforum.org/forum/...253#post346253