ground the wire?

[smoke121212]

wats up guys, i bought this adapter from radio shack (its not on the website so i cant show it to you)its a 3 slot plug for chargers and radar detecters, astuff like that. it says i can hardwire it into the vehicle. it says to ground it onto any metal surface. does that mean just drill into any metal party of the body(under the carpet)? any i have no idea were the electicity is gonna come from?
help me out please.

ill try to post some pics later.

[Blackcrow64]

Your battery runs a positive and negative. The positive terminal wires in throughout the car to certain devices and such. The ground terminal goes from the terminal to the cars frame. This in turn makes the entire car a ground source. Grab your +(positive) from any power wire in the car and then run your -(negative) to any bolt on the car. If there is paint under the surface of the bolt you choose, then you will need to scratch off the paint there first. It must be a bare metal surface to be a good negative connection...

[smoke121212]

i really dont understand this, im liable to really fuck something up if i try. im not good with electronics (you should have seen me trying to install my speakers, what a mission). ill just have my neighbor do it. thanks anyway, i just wasted a thread for nothing.

[Blackcrow64]

Its not hard to understand dude...

http://science.howstuffworks.com/electricity3.htm

Read this, it might help ya understand a bit more...

[smoke121212]

ok that helped a lot more thanks a lot.

[david-b]

Just find any metal surface on the car, say like in the dash, and just mount on there. On the center console there is all metal bracing on there. Just find someplace where theres a screw and just tap it there. Easy

[TalonEclipseMixGsx]

Finding the ground is the easy part, the power source is harder. Do you have a volt meter, connect it to what ur hookin up and then touch it to metal stuff until u hear it beep. That is ur ground. If you dont have a volt meter, touch ur power wire to metal until u see a spark, that would be a good ground. Thats the ghetto way of doing it but it works. Dont hold it there though.

[Blackcrow64]

Originally Posted by TalonEclipseMixGsx

If you dont have a volt meter, touch ur power wire to metal until u see a spark, that would be a good ground. Thats the ghetto way of doing it but it works. Dont hold it there though.

I would definetly not recommend doing it that way...

[gthompson97]

Originally Posted by Blackcrow64

I would definetly not recommend doing it that way...

He said he has a hard enough time with electronics the way it is....that would probably just confuse the HELL out of him.

[TalonEclipseMixGsx]

Well i won't say i do that on a regular basis, once or twice when i didnt have a voltmeter or test light. Those are the tools that i normally use to find a good ground. Hook the test light to a power source and start touching metal until it lights up, theres ur ground. I got mine for like 5 or 10 bucks at autozone.

[gthompson97]

Well now you're talking about two different things, a voltmeter (multimeter) and a test light. I would suggest using the test light over the voltmeter just because it's very very simple to use and it's very effective, now if you wanted to find the absolute best ground, then a multimeter would be the ticket, but in this case it really doesn't matter, a ground is a ground.