Blown solo x; underpowered?

[99mitseclipse 10+ year member]

Yeah I have a friend with these. Would want something with a bit more power handling but I'm not sure of much more out there.

 

[9BlackN*Black6 10+ year member]

I love my 12, best sub Ive ever owned...Hits better than any 2 12's Ive ever had, only thing you gotta watch is coil rubbing on assembly.

Im just trying to fix all the stuff fallin apart in my car, the rearview mirror wont stay on the window for more than 3 mins, 12 disc changer cant handle the vibration...

Im dont even have my gain all the way up, Im guessin im only pushing around 1k to it...

 

[joep1231026 10+ year member]

could the box be too big? 12 solo X manual recommends 3-6 cubes for ported....?

 

[DBfan187 5,000+ posts]

good question to ask him....... 5 months ago!!!

 

[audioholic 5,000+ posts]

Too large of a box would have caused mechanical failure, but my impression at the time this thread was current was that the sub failed thermally.

 

[CRXBMPN 5,000+ posts]

i had two Orion 2500d's, two Solo X 12's, and I knew when to turn it up and when to lay off it... I am guessing you didnt know when to lay off it and let things chill out...

did the coil come unwound in the gap?

 

[CRXBMPN 5,000+ posts]

ok i didnt see the date haha... my bad //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

still a relevant post since people still seem to think that underpowering a sub blows it

 

[Haunz 10+ year member]

Do you realize that a heavily clipped amplifier can output twice its rated power, or more?

I don't really agree with this statment, at least if we are looking at an amp working near it's nominal rated load... The power supply in a typical amp has the current capacity to give on the order of 30% more power then it's rated for.. at this point you run into a clipping mode where no additional power can be made by driving the amp harder, and THD skyrockets...

With music you can continue to compress the signal and you may be able to reach a point where you are getting 2x the average power then the amp was delivering clean... but I think we can all argree that it would sound pretty bad...

 

[FurbiesAndBeans 10+ year member]

There are a couple possibilities:
-Your gains werent set correctly and therefore clipped the signal and fried the sub.

-If your gains WERE set correctly, and you were beating on it for a while and your voltage started dropping very low, that will cause your amp to clip.

-The 3,xxxrms was just too much for the sub to handle for this amount of time, blowing the sub.

-The song you were playing had a note that was right at your box tuning. At your box tuning, the port becomes most efficient and the cone excursion drops severly. Because of this lack of excursion, the coil cannot disappate heat, and overheats, blowing the sub.

Im guessing it was little of EACH of the first 3. I would make sure your gains are set properly, make your your electrical system is on par, and then just go easy on the sub. 3,000+ true watts is a LOT for any speaker to take for more than a minute or so on any bass heavy music. A coil is a coil, and can only disappate so much heat before it fails.

//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/fyi.gif.9f1f679348da7204ce960cfc74bca8e0.gif

I thought that when playing tuned frequency, the load is actually a lot higher than normal thus essentially sending less power to the subwoofer.

 

[audioholic 5,000+ posts]

I don't really agree with this statment, at least if we are looking at an amp working near it's nominal rated load... The power supply in a typical amp has the current capacity to give on the order of 30% more power then it's rated for.. at this point you run into a clipping mode where no additional power can be made by driving the amp harder, and THD skyrockets...
With music you can continue to compress the signal and you may be able to reach a point where you are getting 2x the average power then the amp was delivering clean... but I think we can all argree that it would sound pretty bad...

In your first paragraph you disagree with my statement, and in the second one you reiterate what I said, that you were disagreeing with. Just looking at amplifier output in sinewave form, as the signal clips and the waveform flattens, you can easily accumulate double the area under the wave (2x the power) while not increasing amplitude, thus a flat or squared wave, with double the power delivered to the speaker. This is a well documented phenomenon.

 

[Haunz 10+ year member]

Just looking at amplifier output in sinewave form, as the signal clips and the waveform flattens, you can easily accumulate double the area under the wave (2x the power) while not increasing amplitude, thus a flat or squared wave, with double the power delivered to the speaker.

Most people listen to music, and I guess you might double average output with clipping and compression... this is what I suppose I might agree with, although I think most people would be hard pressed to achieve this level of distortion...

The bit with the square wave and 2x total output is what I disagree with.. a typical amp running near it's nominal rated load simply cannot supply the current to double the output power.. If you are running a 1ohm stable amp at 4ohms and feed it square wave I would agree it's capable of doubling output... but if you are running it at 1ohm the power supply just dosen't have the juice...

At this point you move from a voltage clip into a current clip... THD goes through the roof with no gain in output...

 

[IMOVeCHICKENS! 10+ year member]

YEA you clipped the ish outa it i done the same but shit happens recone it brah

 

[michaellane 5,000+ posts]

i think voltage drop was a major factor

 

[dbeez 5,000+ posts]

you guys do realize this thread is like 6 mos. old right..