This Sucks... Kicker Fet's?

[rusty959]

So apparently my trunk lid leaks... and got a little bit of water on my kicker kx1200.1 The end of the story is probably pretty obvious by now, the amp got a little water in it, I didn't know it was there, and my amp starts smoking. I actually just got done painting it from where a friend screwed it up (new topic on that later) so it wasn't hard to take the cover back off and check for damage. Apparently all that fried was one fet. Anybody know where I could get a new one? Is it worth even trying to contact kicker? I have plenty of experience soldering on electronics boards to feel perfectly comfortable doing it, all I need is the fet.

I guess I could pull it out and check for model numbers etc?

[Guest]

i'd check for model #'s, unsolder it from the board. wont really do any harm since its already broken

[audiofanaticz]

So apparently my trunk lid leaks... and got a little bit of water on my kicker kx1200.1 The end of the story is probably pretty obvious by now, the amp got a little water in it, I didn't know it was there, and my amp starts smoking. I actually just got done painting it from where a friend screwed it up (new topic on that later) so it wasn't hard to take the cover back off and check for damage. Apparently all that fried was one fet. Anybody know where I could get a new one? Is it worth even trying to contact kicker? I have plenty of experience soldering on electronics boards to feel perfectly comfortable doing it, all I need is the fet.

I guess I could pull it out and check for model numbers etc?

Wow, that sucks man!

my one rf amp and american bass 4 channel got a few floods, in the past. but both still worked.

[Boon]

It's a Class D amp (I'm pretty sure?) so you might be in for a bit of trouble.

For a start D class amps often parallel FETs to share the current on the outputs. Because of this they need to be very very similarly matched or they won't load share properly and under high load they could fail again, so you may want to consider replacing all the FETs in that block - usually in groups of 2 or 4.

Also by powering the amp on with a dead FET it might have killed the FET driver board. Did the amp go into protect?

I would recommend sending it off to a good amp repair place just to be sure. Try DB-R maybe?

[emperorjj1]

db-r is closed for customers... only doing manufacture repairs

[rusty959]

It's a Class D amp (I'm pretty sure?) so you might be in for a bit of trouble.

For a start D class amps often parallel FETs to share the current on the outputs. Because of this they need to be very very similarly matched or they won't load share properly and under high load they could fail again, so you may want to consider replacing all the FETs in that block - usually in groups of 2 or 4.

Also by powering the amp on with a dead FET it might have killed the FET driver board. Did the amp go into protect?

I would recommend sending it off to a good amp repair place just to be sure. Try DB-R maybe?

Thanks for the help.

Yes, it is a class D amp. So all of the fets placed together would be in its block? if so there are 4 blocks of 7, which 7 is a little different from 2 or 4 which is why I ask...

Is there any way I could tell if the FET driver board is gone too? I honestly have no clue exactly what the amp did, all I know is I had just installed it, and that it was all hooked up fine and dandy, of course no water in the area, but somehow the hatch holds water, and when I closed it, it then spilled a bunch of water on the amp without me knowing it. So I go to the front to re-connect the fuse, and notice it sparked way more than it should have, so I unplugged it decently quickly, and when I got to the back again the amp was smoking a good bit.

Thing is, its not really worth a whole lot, I don't want to be spending a large amount to fix an amp that isn't even worth that much.

[emperorjj1]

how much do you think its worth. If you want i can see how much to fix it but im not sure how much it would be. probably 100 or so

[Boon]

Thanks for the help.

Yes, it is a class D amp. So all of the fets placed together would be in its block? if so there are 4 blocks of 7, which 7 is a little different from 2 or 4 which is why I ask...

Is there any way I could tell if the FET driver board is gone too? I honestly have no clue exactly what the amp did, all I know is I had just installed it, and that it was all hooked up fine and dandy, of course no water in the area, but somehow the hatch holds water, and when I closed it, it then spilled a bunch of water on the amp without me knowing it. So I go to the front to re-connect the fuse, and notice it sparked way more than it should have, so I unplugged it decently quickly, and when I got to the back again the amp was smoking a good bit.

Thing is, its not really worth a whole lot, I don't want to be spending a large amount to fix an amp that isn't even worth that much.

Hrm if it sparked a lot when you hooked up the power it's probably popped at least a couple of FETs in the power supply section.

4 blocks of 7 is probably split between the power and output sections. 2 of the blocks will be dedicated to each power and output.

I don't know if those amps use a seperate FET driver board or not - look for a small PCB sticking up from the board with a bunch of 8 or 16 pin ICs on it. Often you can check the ICs visually - often the tops will go grey and be difficult to read and occasionally you'll even burn a leg off them.

This is why you really need to take it to a pro - it could need just another set of $5 MOSFETs and be a $100 repair or it could be unsalvageable. If the driver boards are gone you're probably screwed though.

[rusty959]

I only paid $240 for it a year and a half ago.

Boon, from the way it sounds, its either just fets or im pretty much screwed? I don't remember seeing a separate driver board like you were talking about, and don't see it when I just looked it up on ROE's amp guts. I did previously give the amp another really close look to find anything else that looked fried, and didn't see anything. Im thinking im going to later today take the one heatsink off and try to get some model numbers on the fets, and probably just try to replace them and see what happens. I have absolutely no reason to take it to a pro if that is all thats wrong with it, ive modified close to 100 computer power supplies in my lifetime, and that requires more soldering skills than this looks like it will take. (among other things changing out a couple components on xmods that I would classify as difficult)

Ill get out there later today and maybe take another pic or two and post it just for the fun of it.

Thanks all for the help.

[deafyT]

If you killed a fet, it's likely something else is now damaged, too.

Be carefull just dropping a replacement fet in there. Even the same model number parts will have different values. If you have one go bad in a block of 3 or 4 fets, you should replace them ALL with equal/matching value fets. When you find your part, you'll need to order half a dozen or so to find the couple that match.