Autruche

ROFL. Informative thread though. I think there should be a thread on how to strap various amps. I Know AMI CUSTOMS did a thread on how to strap AQs.

Try downloading VLC media player, and play the original file in that. You can slow and speed up the video play rate using it. http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ I did with the youtube vid, but there's probably a good loss of frame rate from the youtube file. Looked fine to me, but you'd probably be able to tell better than me.

For box calculators, most people use Torres' calculator, which you can download in the sticky in the subs/boxes section here on the forum. Otherwise I like WinISD Beta, you can find it by googling it. For the modeling program it's google sketchup, just search sketchup in google and you'll find it.

First box I've designed in a while but, here's what I came up with. External Dimensions: 48x16x26 inches Net Volume: 6.5 Cubic feet Port Tuning: ~33Hz Port Dimension: 40x3, 30 inches long

What is your distance from floor to window line?

Usually, if I have a headache or a migraine then good clean bass at a moderate volume will actually make me feel better, but if it's got no bass or sounds distorted, the music just hurts. Maybe it's just bass withdrawals... I hear you on that one, my doctor says I have something called 'cluster migraines' meaning that if I get a migraine, then I know a dozen more are on their way over the next week. When I get them I can barely even think enough to add two numbers, and the pain is unbearable.

If you have 2 4 ohm dvc subs, wiring both of them together they can only go to 1 ohm, 4 ohms, or 16 ohms, or individually 2 oh 8 ohms. Do you have them both hooked up to one channel? as in both hooked up to channel 1 and 2 bridged or 3 and 4 bridged. or each to their own channel? as in one sub hooked up to channels 1 and 2 bridged and the other hooked up to 3 and 4 bridged.

Eh, that's pretty normal. I take a ride just to shift gears sometimes.

If you want an alternator, you should also try emailing mechman about a unit, or try seeing if you can get an alternator though tejcurrent, ohio generators is a great company too.

Oh noes, the excrement is going to hit the ventilation. I want to see you bump Decaf's version of White Girl.

Don't try to go budget on your alternators, man. The reason DC and Mechman are on the pricey side is because they build reliable products and back them with great customer service, tech support, and good warranties. I know that you can scoop up a 220 amp unit from Mechman (which does great output at idle) for around $300 or so.

You should be fine with just a second battery, or maybe just a really good front battery. I personally draw the line for alternator upgrades at 3Krms or when you want to run more than 2 batteries. Just what I've gained from experience.

Ill give you a quick run though on how to wire the harness up. Put the bulbs in the headlights, and plug them into the ballasts. You wire the end of the relay harness with the fuse up to the battery, and then the two ends up to the ballasts. There is a plug by the one that goes to each ballast, that gets plugged into the wire that is coming out of the bulb, that one controls the motor that moves the bulb so you have highs and lows. For the plug that goes to the factory light plug, you need a dmm or a test light. You need to find the ground wire for the stock plug that goes into the headlights. After you find the common ground, you need to find the low beams positive wire. to find it, turn on your headlights, and check for it just like you did for the ground wire. once you found the low beams positive, then you know the other one should be for the high beams, so you should know were all 3 go. Plug all three wires into the factory plug before putting them in the plug that came with the kit to make sure you have it wired up correctly. test the highs and lows to make sure it is all working right. If its wired up right go ahead and insert the pins into the plug that came with the harness in the right spots, and plug it in and you should be done. H stands for High beam positive G is for ground L is for low beam positive H/L control is the relay harness. Hope that helps.

I don't know if that one comes with a relay harness though. I'd recommend this one because it has a harness with it. Just message them what bulb type and color temperature when you order. like say "I would like 9004 6000K bulbs for my purchase please."

When it comes to HIDs, a single bulb setup with high and lows (like 9004 or 9007) are called bixenon. Look carefully at the bulb movement mechanism. in bixenon HID kits, the bulb moves and that creates the difference for highs and lows. In the good kind the angle of the bulbs will adjust, in the cheap kind the bulb moves in and out. The kind where the bulbs move in and out are complete shit and you'll barely notice a difference between high beams and low beams. For regular kits, like 9005/9006 and others for headlights that have 2 bulbs each than I'd recommend either DDM of Xentec. For bixenon kits, I would only recommend Xentec. You can find them on ebay. As for brightness, 6000K looks nice, but doesn't look stock. 4300-5000K is really bright and still looks stock.

My first amp was a walmart VR3 "300" watt amp that did like 100 rms. I had it pushing a 12 inch sub that I have yet to figure out the brand of. The sub had fried leads but I had managed to solder new leads on it. Cost me $60 for everything.

People run multiple batteries because large sound systems require a large amount of current, and you can't rely on your alternator to directly supply your amps, you need to have batteries. An amp draws it's power from batteries, and the alternator simply keeps the batteries charged. If you don't have that reserve power on tap, you won't be able to maintain full tilt for long. Think of it as a gas tank and a gas pump for a race car - you need the gas in your tank for when you drive the car on the track, and you need to take it to the pump when your tank is low. If you have a small tank you are going to have to hit the pits for fuel more often, if you have a larger tank you can run full throttle for longer, and a larger alternator is like a gas pump that can pump faster, meaning you will fill your tank back up faster. At the power you're running you shouldn't have any trouble, but if you do try doing the big three, if that doesn't work, then try getting a better battery, not just one from off the shelf at walmart, there is no need for running 2 batteries yet.

run one + and one - straight from up front. Frames are not as good of a ground as a direct run to the front battery or alternator.

Well, I've done it once before and it worked out pretty good. Not the easiest way to go about it, but it is simple and effective. If you have no experience fiberglassing, then I'd try doing what I said first. You should get a good result.

Here's a way that I'd do it. Mount the speaker in the door panel in place of the factory grille. Make and stack a series of rings to go from the cutout on the plastic panel to the stock mounting location (the metal of the door.) screw the rings to the door, and glue them together to get them out far enough to align with the door panel. Your speakers will look like they are just mounted on the door panel but they will actually use the door as the enclosure just like you want.

Yes. It's pretty simple when you break it all down. If you wire it all like that it should come out perfect.

Use bolts as terminals on the box, then on the inside you can put all 5+ wires to one bolt, and all 5- to another bolt. Then on the outside you can have just one (or two if you want) wire come off each bolt and go to your amp.

Wire each sub's coils in series (each sub to 4 ohms), then wire the subs together in parallel. it should come out to .8 ohms. After wiring and everything it should sit at about 1 ohm nominal. Those amps have 2 + and 2 - outputs to make wiring them up look less cluttered, it's still just 1 channel. Like so:

What amp do you have?

My friend's Explorer is a '96 2 door. We did sub up port back and it gets loud, especially for a single sub setup.