YACT

[dabuddha]

I've been told two different things so I'm not sure which ones correct.

I'm replacing the head unit in my 98 grand marquis and some people have told me that I have to disconnect the battery and wait about 10 minutes before removing the old one. They say it's so the airbags don't go off.

Others have told me that it's not an issue and that I can remove the stereo w/o any problems.

Whose correct?

 

[wbresson]

Does it really matter ? If you side on the safe side at the worst you are going to be waiting 10 extra minutes woopdy do

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Always remove the negative battery cable when installing/removing electronic devices. I've never heard anything about waiting 10 minutes though.

 

[Heisenberg]

I would like to shake the hand of the Ford engineer who tied the stereo into the air bag system.

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: wbresson
Does it really matter ? If you side on the safe side at the worst you are going to be waiting 10 extra minutes woopdy do

It's more that I'm curious.

 

[Demon-Xanth]

I think it's more of a situation of if you clip onto, or disconnect a cable. An ohmmeter has enough voltage to set off some airbag sensors, and cause the bags to pop.

 

[imported_LoKe]

Remove the negative wire, otherwise you could fry something/someone.

 

[dabuddha]

So I can leave the positive hooked up?

 

[NutBucket]

Doesn't matter since you'll be messing a harness anyway. Wire it up then plug it in. No brainer.

 

[nakedfrog]

You should definitely disconnect the battery.
Unless you're curious to see if they're right. I'm curious myself.

 

[imported_LoKe]

Just the negative, the positive can stay on.

But, you can take them both off if you want, negative first please.

 

[JustinGoodie]

if all you're doing is installing a head unit, like aforementioned, most of the work you do can/should be done outside of the car... take the harness that came with the HU and the harness adapter for your make/model of car (you should've gotten one when you got the deck) and match up the wires and crimp them together. then all you have to do is connect the piece of wiring you just made between the factory wiring harness and the plug on the back of your HU.

in short... no disconnection of the battery is absolutely necessary, i do all kinds of stereo work with the battery connected; it just depends on the where you're working to decide whether or not to disconnect the battery. also, the wires behind the HU shouldn't even be live as long as the car is off and the keys aren't in the ignition.

 

[scorpmatt]

the only time i had to disconnect my battery for installing my stereo was when I had to re-wire the constant power line. other wise disconnecting the harness will be safe enough, unless you have extra time on your hands

 

[goodoptics]

Originally posted by: dabuddha
I've been told two different things so I'm not sure which ones correct.

I'm replacing the head unit in my 98 grand marquis and some people have told me that I have to disconnect the battery and wait about 10 minutes before removing the old one. They say it's so the airbags don't go off.

Others have told me that it's not an issue and that I can remove the stereo w/o any problems.

Whose correct?

Always disconnect the battery ground cable. I don't believe that the stereo is tied to the air bag system.
Even if it is tied to the air bag system, you will only need to wait 1 minute (iirc) for backup supply energy to be depleted to avoid accidental deployment.

 

[jamesbond007]

My buddies and I remove the battery connection w/o waiting before we start working right away on a car install.

 

[Raduque]

I haven't removed the battery wire in any car I've done an install in (now going on 6 cars... a 68 Oldsmobile, an 88 Accord, an 01 F150, a 97 GMC van and an 02 Eclipse). But I've only done a HU in every car except the accord, and I didn't pull the battery cable off to run the amp power wire.

 

[olds]

I never dc the battery