Random Amp Failure?

[CDetty]

1. Are you grounds good? Ground is good.

2. What is your voltage full tilt and when it fried? No voltmeter yet.

3. What is the ohm load the amp is seeing 4 ohms.

4. Have you done the big 3? Not yet.

5. How is the amp mounted Heatsink up mounted to box with spacers.

6. Were you clipping, are you sure, are you really sure? Volume was down.

7. How did you set your gains? By ear. Don't have the funds for a DD-1 yet.

8. Bass boost? Off

9. Eq settings? Flat

10. Were you clipping? Not Clipping

11. What was your voltage? Unknown

12. What alt do you have? Factory unit

As for "This time for good" The amp would go into protect when it hit low Hertz on high volume. It was wired to 4 ohms. Subwoofers were 4 ohms. It's a very basic system. I think something just shorted out. I was just curious as to what might have gone wrong. The amp was not treated badly.

[mbdblue]

1. Are you grounds good? Ground is good.

2. What is your voltage full tilt and when it fried? No voltmeter yet.

3. What is the ohm load the amp is seeing 4 ohms.

4. Have you done the big 3? Not yet.

5. How is the amp mounted Heatsink up mounted to box with spacers.

6. Were you clipping, are you sure, are you really sure? Volume was down.

7. How did you set your gains? By ear. Don't have the funds for a DD-1 yet.

8. Bass boost? Off

9. Eq settings? Flat

10. Were you clipping? Not Clipping

11. What was your voltage? Unknown

12. What alt do you have? Factory unit

As for "This time for good" The amp would go into protect when it hit low Hertz on high volume. It was wired to 4 ohms. Subwoofers were 4 ohms. It's a very basic system. I think something just shorted out. I was just curious as to what might have gone wrong. The amp was not treated badly.

you don't know where your voltage was, so you could have been dipping down lower than 12 volts. You set your gains by ear, so everything in red is unknown since you can't tell if you were clipping (you can still be clipping even if your volume isn't maxed out). and whats in blue suggests that your voltage was dipping, causing the amp to go into protect.

[Guest]

impossible to detect clipping with your ear (for subwoofers mainly) until clipping gets REALLY bad.

how do you KNOW your ground is good? where is it on your car? is the paint sanded off where the lug contacts the metal?

Edited July 20, 2012 by Kranny

[Jessica]

I saw that low hertz high volume and it goes into protect and the first thought in my mind was low voltage. Like blue said, low voltage can cause clipping and it will make an amp go into protect. If it has happen several times then the amp has probably weakened and just finally gave up. I would invest in a volt meter and really research the big 3 before purchasing a new amp. I've said it before but, electrical is a big part of car audio, and an expensive part. But it's the most important.

[CDetty]

1. Are you grounds good? Ground is good.

2. What is your voltage full tilt and when it fried? No voltmeter yet.

3. What is the ohm load the amp is seeing 4 ohms.

4. Have you done the big 3? Not yet.

5. How is the amp mounted Heatsink up mounted to box with spacers.

6. Were you clipping, are you sure, are you really sure? Volume was down.

7. How did you set your gains? By ear. Don't have the funds for a DD-1 yet.

8. Bass boost? Off

9. Eq settings? Flat

10. Were you clipping? Not Clipping

11. What was your voltage? Unknown

12. What alt do you have? Factory unit

As for "This time for good" The amp would go into protect when it hit low Hertz on high volume. It was wired to 4 ohms. Subwoofers were 4 ohms. It's a very basic system. I think something just shorted out. I was just curious as to what might have gone wrong. The amp was not treated badly.

you don't know where your voltage was, so you could have been dipping down lower than 12 volts. You set your gains by ear, so everything in red is unknown since you can't tell if you were clipping (you can still be clipping even if your volume isn't maxed out). and whats in blue suggests that your voltage was dipping, causing the amp to go into protect.

Okay. Clipping isn't something I fully understand at this moment, but I'll be reading up on it shortly.

impossible to detect clipping with your ear (for subwoofers mainly) until clipping gets REALLY bad.

how do you KNOW your ground is good? where is it on your car? is the paint sanded off where the lug contacts the metal?

The ground is direct contact to the frame. It's sanded down.

I saw that low hertz high volume and it goes into protect and the first thought in my mind was low voltage. Like blue said, low voltage can cause clipping and it will make an amp go into protect. If it has happen several times then the amp has probably weakened and just finally gave up. I would invest in a volt meter and really research the big 3 before purchasing a new amp. I've said it before but, electrical is a big part of car audio, and an expensive part. But it's the most important.

Okay. That makes sense. Should I invest in the Big Three first or a voltmeter?

[RCP Audio]

both, I would voltmeter first though, so you can see what the difference is when the big three is done any any other upgrades so it doesnt smoke another amp.