[Flashman]

Hi Everyone,

I am a lurker turned newbie (just registered today) in Greenville, SC (home to Michelin North America, where I work, the only BMW factory in North America and Shoeless Joe Jackson ).  I have just ordered a Sig 30 and will be sending Vinnie my Olive Musica for a mod.  Of course, as with many of you with items on order, I am in an extreme anticipatory mood.

The question I have today is anyone's experience with an external battery.  At times, such as when my wife and I have parties, we like to play our music for up to eight hours.  I know in correspondence with Vinnie that the modded Musica will last about six hours on the internal batteries.  I am going to order an external battery and am just curious as to whether anyone has done this and what their experience is like.  What battery did you order, what make (does it matter?) and are you pleased with the decision?  I would like to run the Musica for at least eight hours.

I plan to hook up the Sig 30/Olive Musica combo to my (original) Klipsh Forte speakers.  Nice, efficient, horn-loaded (tweets and mid-range) speaker from 1987.  Should sound sweet!

Oh, I also plan on selling my Cayin TA30 integrated tube amp, modified by BizzyBee.  Any idea where I could sell, as I have not sold audio equipment online before.

Many thanks, Flashman

[ZLS]

aa    I have the Olive Musica with an external battery and I highly recommend it.  You will have no problem running 8+ hours on it.  In fact, I also have an external HD that Vinnie modified to run off the same battery.  I had Vinnie make up the battery by attaching the necessary cables, but you can probably do it yourself.  I have it sitting behind my system on the floor. 
    I hope this has been helpful.

[Paul_Bui]

Nice picture!

Vinnie made me a black box that lets me use an Optima Redtop car battery on my RWA modded Squeezebox2.  Whenever not in use, I just flip a switch, and the battery will be in re-charge mode.  If I am not mistaken, Vinnie is using one Optima Bluetop battery to power his modded Olive.

I got the idea of using Optima Redtop from Charles Altmann, who manufactured and sold me his BYOB DAC, among other audio gear.

[Toka]

Oh, I also plan on selling my Cayin TA30 integrated tube amp, modified by BizzyBee.  Any idea where I could sell, as I have not sold audio equipment online before.

Many thanks, Flashman

Probably the best place would be www.audiogon.com...or the classifieds on this site. But A'gon gets the most traffic for this sort of thing.

[Vinnie R.]

Hi Flashman,

Welcome to Audiocircle and the RWA forum!

At times, such as when my wife and I have parties, we like to play our music for up to eight hours.

If this is the case, and you don't believe you'll be playing longer than 8 hours, this battery will do the trick:
http://www.batterymart.com/p-12v-18ah-sealed-lead-acid-battery-1.html

What battery did you order, what make (does it matter?) and are you pleased with the decision?

  It is important that you use a sealed lead-acid battery, not a convetional car battery (lead acid, which is not sealed).  It is also VERY IMPORTANT that you do not short out the + and - battery terminals.

The larger the Amp-Hour rating (Ah), the longer you can play between full charges.

The Sig 30 can play up to 24 hours from its built-in batteries, so if you wanted to be able to go 24 hours with the modded Olive, this will do the trick:
http://www.batterymart.com/p-12v-55ah-sealed-lead-acid-battery.html

The Optima Blue Top batteries are very nice, but expensive.  One advantage of them it that they can be deep cycled and recovered... just in case you play for longer than the recommended play time.  I believe they also last longer (probably twice as long as ones linked to above).

I use an Optima Blue Top (55Ah) and never play it longer than 12 hours or so, but it is nice to know that it could go 24 hours w/o a problem.  Also, it is nice to have in case my car battery dies one cold morning when I least expect it! 

As always, please let me know if you have any other questions.

Best regards,

Vinnie

[srayle]

Hi Vinnie,

Is it possible to power a conventionally modded RWA Olive Musica with these longer-lasting batteries,
or do you have to mod them specifically for this ability when you do the mod? In other words,
would a regular RWA Olive need to go back to be retro-fitted for this?

Thanks,

Steve

[Vinnie R.]

Hi Vinnie,

Is it possible to power a conventionally modded RWA Olive Musica with these longer-lasting batteries,
or do you have to mod them specifically for this ability when you do the mod? In other words,
would a regular RWA Olive need to go back to be retro-fitted for this?

Thanks,

Steve

Hi Steve,

I'll need to mod the Olive specifically to accept the external battery.  This also involves removing the internal battery (you either go with the internal battery or the external battery, but not both).

Best regards,

Vinnie