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Showing content with the highest reputation on 10/27/15 in all areas

  1. Today's amplifier specimen for "Amp Test Tuesday" is one of my classic "George Foreman Grill" Rockford Fosgate 1500.1bd's. This is an amplifier that was a dream come true when i first got it. I paid $990 dollars for it. Soon after, i realized i really needed 2 of them. So i got a deal and ended up with a second one. I used do compete and as i started picking up wins, i started finding the need for more power. I somehow got 4BD1500's and then later i ended up with 8. The Tahoe has seen a LOT of systems Now a lot of people question how much power i really have, or how much power ANYONE has, especially when they claim to have 20,000+ watts. When i was running 8 BD1500's, i used to tell people i had 16,000 watts and feel confident i wasn't stretching the truth. I was actually running close to 18,000 if you count mids/highs. So this test, in essence, will tell me once and for all if i really had that much power....or if i really had amps capable of putting out that much power if i could feed them. Now did i have enough alternator power to feed them? I will never know. That was my old system. But for the sake of this test, if it's possible to hold 14.5-14.8v, would it be possible. I believe i used to drop down to low 14's and high 13's during the hot summer days. So if i was SOME watts short, that is why. But this test is just to see in my best scenerio, did i have 16,000, if the alts were there. I was also running at .7 ohms, with the D106 removed If you have this old school amp, please do not do this. RF will NOT fix it if you do and it's a mess if it goe's. Trust me So i tested this amp at it's RATED 2ohms I also tested this amp at a risky 1ohm, since the protection diode has been removed for years I used to run these amps at .7 ohms, but i did not test them on the AD-1 below 1ohm for the sake of not fu#kin' them up. SORRY. You guys know i love to give stuff away. Sometimes i make it hard, sometimes i make it easy. Today's contest, SOMEONE will win no matter what. How do you think this amp did? Tested with (10) XS Power D1400 14v Batteries. XS Power PSC-60 Charger used in between runs to top the batteries, but not as a supply. Powered off during testing. Tested: 2ohm: Certified (stops test at 1% Distortion) X,XXX Watts RMS Non Cert (stops test at clipping) X,XXX Watts RMS Dynamic RMS (stops test at clipping) X,XXX Watts RMS 1ohm: Certified (stops test at 1% Distortion) X,XXX Watts RMS Non Cert (stops test at clipping) X,XXX Watts RMS Dynamic RMS (stops test at clipping) X,XXX Watts RMS Add every single number above together to come up with one huge number. The person closest to the number WITHOUT BUSTING, will get an SMD VM-1 Volt Meter! Yes, this means no matter what, SOMEONE will win! Now if someone nails the EXACT number, i will add $150 store credit at http://www.wcCarAudio.com for any SMD or Rockford Fosgate product. That is enough to get some really nice gear. This is DIRECTLY out of my pocket, not endorsed by RF at all. I am sure they like i am doing this LOL but this is all on me. In other words, it's all on me. Wait, i already said that. KEEP THIS IN MIND. I AM WRITING IN CAPS SO YOU WILL PAY ATTENTION. IF SOMEONE GETS THE EXACT NUMBER, HE WINS BOTH THE VM-1 AND THE $150 STORE CREDIT! BY DEFAULT HE HAS THE CLOSEST NUMBER BY BEING EXACT. THANKS! I WILL POST THE RESULT VIDEO AT ABOUT 3-5PM PACIFIC STANDARD TIME TOMORROW. So GOOD LUCK! and on to the amp guts. Post your guess!
    2 points
  2. So first of all, let me say that this is a subjective review, backed by some testings. Don't expect something ultra scientific - just my opinion on this beast. The subwoofer belongs to a friend of mine. It is a Sundown Zv4 rev.2 15" with NSv2 D2 coil. Here it is next to his Ground Zero Plutonium 15" and next to my humble 12". His car is an Audi A6 C4 Avant. He has an OEM 120A alt (which will be changed when possible), one 70ah AGM battery at the front and three 105ah AGM batteries at the back. He has a GZPA 1.10k HC amp, which claims to produce a bit over 10k at 1 ohm. The subwoofer box was built by me - 4,6 cu.ft. (130 litres) tuned at 32hz with an interchangeable 8" aero. Double layer mdf everywhere and triple layer baffle. And in the car: Now for some impressions. Pictures and videos do this thing no justice! If you haven't seen or touched a sub that big, it literally shocks you. I am very impressed with everything about this thing - the new cooling on the motor, the new surround, the leads.... Let me say that this is the first sundown new platform sub that I have touched with my hands. I can only imagine how big the NSv3 and the Team are... I won't post pictures of different parts of the sub - you have probably seen them already. The cooling is a bit noisy (which I think is a good thing because of the higher velocity of the air that cools the coil - Jacob could chime in on that) but the suspension itself is VERY quiet up to very high excursion. I don't think the leads will have any problems with the power you'd like to throw at it. Mechanically this thing is top notch - the linear excursion is high enough to ensure high spl levels without much distortion and the hard bottom limits of the motor/coil are pretty hard to reach. You will more likely stress the soft parts before the coil gets close to the bottom - we will get to that part later. Thermally - WOW! For a "2000" rms sub this thing cools like a champ! Good job on that! I know that this particular one is with a bit longer coil (from NSv2) but you get the idea. When we first loaded the sub, we expected that it won't require much power and we will have to bring down the gains from the previous setup (GZPW 15SPL tuned at 47hz, wired at 0,5 ohm). Boy, was I mistaken! We only had to adjust the filters a bit. If the power we gave it was clean - no signs of any smell or overheating. It only smelled when the power was clipped. Keep in mind that the sub was rather new on that moment, so It wasn't broken in completely. From then to now there is a night and day difference. With this 10k amp, wired at 1 ohm and with this box, we didn't experience any mechanical trouble near or above tuning. The amp would start clipping before we could stress the suspention enough to turn it down. We left the LPF at 40hz with 12db slope. Of course, we had to use subsonic, but nothing drastic. When the cone exceeds its linear travel, the suspension starts stressing and there is BL distortion, so it gets a bit loud mechanically, but we're talking over 3" p-p. Mechanical limit of the motor is over 4" as you all know - we didn't dare reach it. It's not healthy for the driver either Surprisingly, even with a 32hz tuning and a bigger than suggested box, it played the higher frequencies quite well - was very surprised on that! I wanted to tune this thing at 28-29, but there wasn't enough space for that - we used a straight aeroport and we had to keep an adequate distance between the walls and the mouths of the port. Next box will definitely be slightly bigger on volume and lower on tuning! On its first competition it did 151,7db at 36hz on the dash - driver's door open and with people pushing the doors. It also did 135,6db at 25hz, 149db at 33hz and 149,7db at 40hz. It wasn't broken in completely, but I can't say how much that will affect the scores. We measured the power going to the sub on different frequencies using the clamping method, which is NOT the most adequate way to do this, but it gets the work done. There was NO clipping during these tests, therefore the sub stayed cool the whole time and there wasn't any sign of smell, even when measuring at tuning. I'll just put the numbers we got at tuning (32hz) and at best score (36hz). These tests were NOT done when we measured the system on the competition - when we measure we introduce a bit of clipping to get the score higher. System voltage stayed between 12.3-12.8 during the tests. At 36hz 116.1V x 24.7A = 2867 watts, rising to 4,7 ohms At 32hz 109.9V x 44.0A = 4835 watts, rising to 2,5 ohms I repeat, these tests were done with no clipping and without fully charged batteries. The test tones were played for a couple of seconds to ensure that the sub doesn't have any problems with longer playing on that power. The power needed to achieve the scores I mentioned earlier would have been a bit higher. So yeah, I can pretty much say that on 2000 watts, be it clamped or with a 2-3k amp, this subwoofer will have ABSOLUTELY NO problems (if it is clean, of course). If you keep the power clean and adjust the subsonic properly, you could feed this thing A LOT of power. And that's daily - on burp it could and would handle much more. I don't even understand how people can listen to this with a 3-4k amp for example - it just begs for more (clean) power! If I could wire this thing at 0,5 ohm on this 10k amp (after getting proper alternator) - I'd deffinitely do it. It's better to keep a powerful amp down, rather than clipping a smaller one. Of course, with higher power comes greater responsibility, so I'd have to adjust the gains and filters accordingly, but overal I don't think I'll have a problem and it will perform better than now. Do I recommend on going over the rated power? Absolutely no! At least for those who don't know what they are doing. You will void your warranty and may damage the subwoofer. Thank you for your time, hope you enjoyed my review! Here's a little "shirt" trick for finale. Wait a bit for the good part.
    1 point
  3. Judging by the fashion in the crowd, Id bet she doesn't look near that good anymore.
    1 point
  4. I picked Stan up yesterday in the Lexus and spent a few hours with him. Discussed his new shit (for his bike system) after a tour of the shop and a kickass bass demo i drove him back in the Tahoe. We slapped all the way home haha! I know he is pretty easy to please but that don't make it any less fun! Watch the video see what i decided....was the only thing that really made sense.
    1 point
  5. Seeing his skills compared to yours i say you should do it. Maybe bring him into the shop and have him help you work on it so he can learn how the pros do it.
    1 point
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