Blown channel?

[datballa 10+ year member]

Hey whats up, new to the site //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

The bronx is notorious for really low speed bumps that somestimes you don't see until it is 2 late (especially at night).. I was driving and I hit one of those.. HARD. my car flew in the air. when that happend, i the music stopped and i heard a loud BUZZZZZZZZ coming out of all speakers. it was really loud. So I shut it off. I hooked the 2 rcas to the other channels and it outputs music, so the amp works.. is this the case of a blown channel? if I open it up, what might I be looking for? And is this something I can do myself without having to pay to get this fixed? I have a Zeus 700 watt amp.. I'm not really sure of the model number.. it came with the car.

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[Pl8er 5,000+ posts]

Fuse problem? Check your speaker wires to make sure everything is still attached correctly?

It could blow from that, but I dont' see why it would (was it mounted to something)?

 

[Pl8er 5,000+ posts]

Welcome to the site too!

P.S. What kinda amp?

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

It wasn't mounted.. something I was planning on doing when I had some time //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/suicide.gif.a649d21efc0d1fd4890a6428166586c1.gif

But yeah everything is in place.. fuse.. speakers.. its just that when I connect an RCA cable to channel 1, BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

I'll go down later to really examine the amp and tell u the exact model.. All I know is that its a 700 watt Hifonics Zeus.. I think it has 5 channels, might be 4 not sure.

 

[Pl8er 5,000+ posts]

Could you have pinched one of the rca's? If you plug different RCA's in the same channel (that makes the buzz) does it still make the buzz?

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

Yeah the buzz is there if I use a different set of RCA cables.

I think signs are pointing towards blown channel //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/suicide.gif.a649d21efc0d1fd4890a6428166586c1.gif

I'm pretty good with a soldering iron.. is there a tutorial somewhere online? What would I need to repair the channel?

 

[dB-r 10+ year member]

Maybe more to it than some soldering. If the amp is not in protect you likely don't have a blown channel. You may get lucky and just broke the RCA connector loose from the PCB on the channels that the RCAs were plugged into when the car went flying.

But, if somehow your RCA cable touched a + wire on something else you likely blew out an OP-AMP or two and those can be hard to track down. Not something I would recommend without some good test equipment and some knowledge of how the amp works on the inside.

Open it up, look around the RCA connectors on the opposite side of the PCB for cracks in the solder, and inspect the RCA connector itself and see if it looks like something broke on it. Better yet, if you can solder you likely can use a DVM, put it on continuity check / diode test and check for connectivity from each part of the RCA connector to the solder connection on the main PCB.

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

Sweet, i'll look into that tonight. I'll post an update afterwards.

Oh and no it's not in protect mode =)

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

Sorry for the late update..

So I opened it up (BTW, I found out its a z700, is this a good amp? i dont know much about them..)

Didn't see ANY signs of damage. I cleaned the board with some alcohol hoping it owuld of done something, but no.. Somebody suggested I hook up an MP3 player directly to the amp and see if the problem persists, as it may have to do with the faulty internal ground of my pioneer unit.. i'll be doing this tonight.

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

Just wanted to say that I grounded the RCA terminals on the back of my pioneer head unit, and it all works now! It wasn't a blown channel afterall, just the crappy internal grounding of my pioneer radio went kaput //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/graduate.gif.d982460be9f153bb54e5d4cb744f6ae8.gif

 

[dB-r 10+ year member]

The RCA shields are not supposed to be grounded.

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

Well somebody else told me that the internal grounding of the pioneer units **** and that grounding the rca terminals would solve the issue... and it did.. so..umm..//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/confused.gif.e820e0216602db4765798ac39d28caa9.gif

 

[drifterman33 10+ year member]

i had that exact issue with my hifonics zx1000.....except it was mounted and i didnt hit a speed bump.....i ended up sending it back...but they didnt make that amp anymore so i got my money back....probably the last time i buy hifonics.....

 

[dB-r 10+ year member]

Its more likely that either inside your radio, where the RCA's connect to the PCB, there is a bad solder, or same thing with your amp, but since you looked over it good it may be in the radio. Usually the connection breaks in the amps though, not the radio. It will look like a little ring around the pin of the connection.

Although you may not always be able to see it, for instance, I just repaired a JBL GTS600 that had 2 fuse holders, and one of them had broken connection to the PCB, but the solder was fine, the leg coming from the Fuse holder had broken right off above the PCB, it was invisible to the eye, I had to use my DMM on continuity test to see that there was no electrical connection there. I repaired it with some desoldering braid.

The RCA shield is supposed to be a zero volt reference for the input signal, if grounded to chassis ground, you may have some problems down the line with noise, or distortion of the input signal.

 

[datballa 10+ year member]

I didn't ground it to the chasis, I grounded it to some metal on the back of the headunit itself. I took the amp to a shop and they bench tested it, and it was fine.. so now im 100% that the radio was the culprit and me grounding the rcas worked.