AP 1800 Louder then saz 3000d..Why?

[vaiboy 10+ year member]

It does come into play, when you set the gains using a dmm you are setting the amplifier to put out a certain amount of volts of alternating current, you find the amount of volts, by looking at the amps rated power output at a certain impedance level. However once you start playing your sine wave to set the gain with the dmm you immediately have impedance rise. For example lets say you are setting the gain on an amp that puts out 1000 watts at 1 ohm that is hooked up to two dual 4 ohm subwoofers. Lets say the woofers are wired down to 1 ohm on the amp. 1x 1000 =1000 and the square root of 1000 is 31.6. So you should look for 31.6 volts of alternating current on your dmm for the amp to be putting out 1000 watts at 1 ohm like it is rated to do so. Once you start playing your sine wave your amplifier is going to be seeing above 1 ohm due to impedance rise, if you then turn the gain and set it so its putting out 31.6 volts of alternating current your amp is going to be far into clipping. Also you run into the problem of amps not doing what they are rated to do, and not knowing the supply voltage to the amplifier.
The only sure way to set your gain is with an o scope

You are making one glaring mistake, you don't set the gains using a DMM with the speakers connected. Impedance is not a static variable it can increase or decrease, depending on the frequency that is being reproduced. Using the DMM method you are setting the amp to produce a target AC Voltage for the nominal impedance of the driver but with no load on the amp. By setting the gain with no load you have a built in safety margin for times when the impedance decreases. It's a safe method as long as the amplifier will do rated, but you will have a little less output.

 

[hegar817 10+ year member]

I have an saz3000d that I just picked up last week as well and I gotta say it has BALLZ. Learned how to clamp it with youtube videos and it came out to be around 2445 watts at 2.1ohms rising from 1ohm. Not bad since the specs say 1600watts at a 2ohm load. I did try wiring mine to .25ohms and rise was to .56 but it would cut off when I would turn it up too much. Dont know but that ish was nasty loud so I just decided to wire at 1ohm since it was decent enough to drive my 8 sa12s. Im sure I will be getting another saz3000d to strap them.