(Idea) Capacitors In High Amperage Setups

[skittlesRgood]

ok, you're sounding like a dick now. some person will obviously disagree with you on any idea you might have. just listen to what they have to say. ask questions and find out why they disagree. then you can compare the negative with the positive and come up with a more informed decision. you can not rite off an opinion just because its against yours. you dont have to do what they say, but if you dont ask questions, you might miss some wisdom that would have helped you. and if they are hostile, ignoring them is easy to do. and you would learn more by asking questions on the positive advice instead.

[Maxim]

The Rockford Fosgate T15KW used an amazingly large array of capacitors to store and release energy for its power delivery. The design allowed for periods of OVER 100% efficiency where the amp could put out more wattage through the speaker terminals than it was taking in through the car's charging system. Amazing piece of engineering from Tony D and the Rockford team.

Now, the biggest drawback of a design like that is the massive space required for capacitors. The amp itself was capable of pushing 225,000 joules of energy at once (a lot). But the case for such an amp wound up being 37.5" wide x 22" tall x 10" deep. A monster of an amp. Caps are good when used properly. They just take up an amazing amount of space for what you're looking for and in order to be useful have to be used in conjunction with a traditional alternator + battery charging system. At the end of the day when most guys have crammed in their amps, box, and multiple subs there's little to no room for caps and nowhere near enough for an array of caps of the magnitude you're imagining.

[SoCaLBaMF]

Caps are used in burp applications in usaci and other orgs because you are generally allowed to have unlimited amount. Look at Alan hall for example does 158+ in trunk class, he has two D5s and can hold 15.5 volts for around 30 seconds on a 12 volt system. But he has a bank of maxwell caps, 2700 farads each around 30 or more of them. Burp application is the only positive application I could see a person using them given the restrictions and class limitation for trunk. In some other mod classes I could see a benefit as well.

Same with a guy I know that does 55s out of the trunk with (2) Treo 12s.. has a bank of (20) 2v caps all wired up and plays for 30 seconds only dropping .2 volts.

[ALPINE408]

ok, you're sounding like a dick now. some person will obviously disagree with you on any idea you might have. just listen to what they have to say. ask questions and find out why they disagree. then you can compare the negative with the positive and come up with a more informed decision. you can not rite off an opinion just because its against yours. you dont have to do what they say, but if you dont ask questions, you might miss some wisdom that would have helped you. and if they are hostile, ignoring them is easy to do. and you would learn more by asking questions on the positive advice instead.

that sounds negative so leave this thread NOW!!!!

we can end this thread now cause if you dont agree you are not right

[dereileak]

ok, you're sounding like a dick now. some person will obviously disagree with you on any idea you might have. just listen to what they have to say. ask questions and find out why they disagree. then you can compare the negative with the positive and come up with a more informed decision. you can not rite off an opinion just because its against yours. you dont have to do what they say, but if you dont ask questions, you might miss some wisdom that would have helped you. and if they are hostile, ignoring them is easy to do. and you would learn more by asking questions on the positive advice instead.

that sounds negative so leave this thread NOW!!!!

we can end this thread now cause if you dont agree you are not right

I see his point, I will relax a bit on my post

I like the ideas coming from this, that picture of that rockfordamp is amazing, I guess we can kind of conclude they are good if used right, and can push serious power, but for shorter times, but looking at some of the setups that have used caps, they mainly look like they are for burping/spl, which is useful, and in situations like that rockford amp, that is just crazy bad ass

[MECHMAN]

The thing I heard good about using a capacitor is that they filter out bad signals, according to guy I asked, using a special military camera prototype on an H2 hummer at Lockheed Martin, he said he got batteries, 0 guage wire, and a 270 amp alternator from an audio company, so he wasn't using a capacitor to help with keeping stable voltage.

Large capacitors are used in Extremely high end Home audio solid state amplifiers to reduce distortion from what I read also.

Edit: Example of said high end amplifier

That H2 is running a Mechman Alternator.

[dereileak]

The thing I heard good about using a capacitor is that they filter out bad signals, according to guy I asked, using a special military camera prototype on an H2 hummer at Lockheed Martin, he said he got batteries, 0 guage wire, and a 270 amp alternator from an audio company, so he wasn't using a capacitor to help with keeping stable voltage.

Large capacitors are used in Extremely high end Home audio solid state amplifiers to reduce distortion from what I read also.

Edit: Example of said high end amplifier

That H2 is running a Mechman Alternator.

ha ha, love my mechman alt, just wish I could get it to charge above 14.1, and 13.8 where it stays, its internally regulated and load dependent

[SilverSPL]

keep the fight going dereileak, I got your back. I am a firm believer in capacitors and I put my money where my mouth is. Where its at is ultracapacitors! not like those 1 farad huge space wasting capacitors. but a newer technology design in capacitors they refer to as ultracapacitors. I purchased 2 430 farad 16v max capacitors. Just installed them this weekend with great initial results. Will have to start a new thread once I do allot of testing with them. But i'll say this, I now have no voltage fluctuation when my 4000 watt mojo amp needs power. I use to run 5 kinetik 2400 batteries and now run one 2400 and 2 of these caps with better results.

I'll also have to get a build log going on here.

[snafu]

A few points:

1. The capacitors used in the T15kw are super capacitors / ultra capacitors - whatever you'd like to call them. Each of those caps are 400 farad in size. They were the best of the best when this amp went into production. [i helped assemble every one.]

2. The big caps you guys are looking at in home amps have a somewhat different purpose - their purpose is to stabilize the +/- high voltage rails. Most traditional amplifiers utilize them. Half of them are wired between the + rail and ground, the other half between the - rail and ground. Compare what you see in that Mark Levinson amp pictured to the cap "level" of the T15kw - these caps were used in the very same way!

3. 12 volt batteries rest at 12.6 - 12.8 VDC, alternators can output over 13.4 VDC.

4. The higher voltage is always preferred.

5. Capacitors are always more effective on the secondary side of the power supply (the high voltage side) than the primary side (the B+ / B- side).

Research before you flame the OP would be my recommendation. For example, one could refer to the cap thread (sticky) in the RF forum. Capacitor technology will continue to improve as "green" is important. New technologies in capacitors will always make them more appealing to the educated car audio crowd. It's crap like the 5 Farad chrome cap in the velvet lined wooden box for $79 that has all but killed the capacitor business in car audio. Those things are nothing but glorified volt meters.

[SilverSPL]

A few points:

1. The capacitors used in the T15kw are super capacitors / ultra capacitors - whatever you'd like to call them. Each of those caps are 400 farad in size. They were the best of the best when this amp went into production. [i helped assemble every one.]

2. The big caps you guys are looking at in home amps have a somewhat different purpose - their purpose is to stabilize the +/- high voltage rails. Most traditional amplifiers utilize them. Half of them are wired between the + rail and ground, the other half between the - rail and ground. Compare what you see in that Mark Levinson amp pictured to the cap "level" of the T15kw - these caps were used in the very same way!

3. 12 volt batteries rest at 12.6 - 12.8 VDC, alternators can output over 13.4 VDC.

4. The higher voltage is always preferred.

5. Capacitors are always more effective on the secondary side of the power supply (the high voltage side) than the primary side (the B+ / B- side).

Research before you flame the OP would be my recommendation. For example, one could refer to the cap thread (sticky) in the RF forum. Capacitor technology will continue to improve as "green" is important. New technologies in capacitors will always make them more appealing to the educated car audio crowd. It's crap like the 5 Farad chrome cap in the velvet lined wooden box for $79 that has all but killed the capacitor business in car audio. Those things are nothing but glorified volt meters.

agreed and stand corrected on the t15kw