Are my alpine type r's sh*t or broken

[bennybadman]

Hello from Aus, long time reader first time poster.

I'm in need of some help/guidance before i return my recent purchase. So i have just purchased and installed some alpine spr-60c and spr-60 into the doors of my subaru liberty (legacy depending on where you live) with some slight sound deadening. I have an alpine CDE-148EBT with a alpine powerpack KTP-445 running the system.

Reasonably clean install, nice and stealthy. Initial listening was nice but i recently cranked it up and i was shocked to hear that the tweeters were giving out (almost sounded like snapping plastic) and the woofers just can't keep up. This is with the bass turned to around -4 i don't know what it could be. i have a feeling that they are **** house. any feedback or suggestions would be great. Thanks in advanced

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[ace_800 5,000+ posts]

what is the gain set at on the powerpak?

 

[bennybadman]

i have front and rear gain set in the middle/half, turning down the gain any lower than that really affects the overall volume. almost unbearable. So many settings within the headunit my amature knowledge cant make sense of it.

 

[subzero 5,000+ posts]

that amp is 45x4 @ 4 ohms. Your speakers are about 5-100rms each. It is highly likely that you are sending clipped power to the speakers. You should get a bigger amp, for cleaner power. They do make small footprint 100x4 amps.

 

[bennybadman]

That's what i thought subzero, it is a small unit and purchased purely of ease of install (fully plug'n'paly) and its footprint. Despite the numbers I had the idea that being all alpine it would work seamlessly together. Not to mention the pushy salesman who assured me that my components and would be the best option to get the max out of my dollar without a conventional amp. i will try out a 4 ch and see how it goes. cheers

 

[subzero 5,000+ posts]

You want to have enough power to reproduce the music flawlessly. Music has allot of peaks and what is called transients. That can reach peaks that would immediately exceed the power you have on hand and cause clipping. More clean power is better. I would at least match the RMS power rating. At most is depending on the speakers quality and ability to reproduce those transient peaks. If these where those kind of capable speakers, then I would even go with an even higher powered amp. Good luck buddy.

That's what i thought subzero, it is a small unit and purchased purely of ease of install (fully plug'n'paly) and its footprint. Despite the numbers I had the idea that being all alpine it would work seamlessly together. Not to mention the pushy salesman who assured me that my components and would be the best option to get the max out of my dollar without a conventional amp. i will try out a 4 ch and see how it goes. cheers

 

[trumpet 5,000+ posts]

The quality or power rating of the amplifier is not likely the cause of the problems. More power isn't a solution. Do you have a high pass filter(HPF) turned on?

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

sounds like poor head unit settings more than anything.

 

[the727kid 10+ year member]

I've installed at least 100 power packs and many with components with a higher RMS than what it provides. This is not your issue. I would suggest checking the passive crossovers to make sure they are installed correctly. Next I would check your crossover settings on the head unit and also make sure all EQs are flat.

Any chance you could provide pictures of the speaker install?

 

[bennybadman]

I have all my settings set as default for the purpose of attempting to diagnose, and yes 727kid i can gather some photos. I did pay good attention when installing so i am confident the wiring is not the problem. I noticed there is some adjustability on the crossovers themselves but it looked like a soldering job, no visible switches or dials.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

I have all my settings set as default for the purpose of attempting to diagnose, and yes 727kid i can gather some photos. I did pay good attention when installing so i am confident the wiring is not the problem. I noticed there is some adjustability on the crossovers themselves but it looked like a soldering job, no visible switches or dials.

If you dont know how to install it yourself how would you even know if its a good wiring job or not... Especially with that crossover question its not any soldering its just a phillips head screw to adjust the tweeter attenuation level.