Car Audio Peeps from Seattle

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Hey guys and gals,

I live in the Seattle area and am finished with my install and all, but there still seems to be something a miss on my substage. The front stage seems perfect, no issues.

Long *** story short, something is wrong where the amp is not sending enough power to the subwoofer. It is a TC OEM 10 inch.. RMS 800 watts in a .6cf box net sealed.

The amp is a MMats D1500.2... so there is no issue with the potential wattage of the amp. Thing is, I have to turn the gains way up on the HU and amp to get any output of the sub. Before I had two 12's in my car and it was the same, but I sold them as I did not like having 2 12's in my coupe before I could solve the problem. This makes it seem like it is an amp/wiring issue.

I checked grounds and all, good resistance (aka low) and it is wired in 2 ohms to the amp (which is its optimal load, etc) But when it comes to anything beyond that I am a newb.

I was just wondering if any people in the Seattle, WA area would like to help me with this problem to see if we can narrow it down, because I have no idea what it is. This amp is bench tested to do just under 1500 watts rms.. and I've seen this sub move like nuts off 900 watts rms, and it isn't doing it in my ride.

I also used this same amp in my truck and it was awesome, so it makes me think it is wiring/install.

Anyways, if I could meet up with another local audio buddy to help me figure out what could be going on, and has a DMM to use and all, that would be awesome. I'd buy you a 12 pack or something for the help.. or if you are under 21 I'll figure out something else //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

Let me know guys! Thanks!

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[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Any more people out there for some help and good times? Haha.

 

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Well here is one question I guess to jump start this: Is this a good ground? It reads good. I tried only one other place as the ground needed to be in this general area and this one worked best:

I'm not sure where else to put it if I could though.

 

[Supergumby5000 5,000+ posts]

whats up fellow washingtonian.

First off, that ground could be improved. Sand a bigger area, on both sides of the metal. Also, use a bigger bolt w/ washers. You want that to be one hell of a solid connection. And, you can always get a can of blue spraypaint and just paint right over the top of that to make it blue again.

your positive you have the sub wired up correctly? All the gains and whatnot are set correctly on both your headunit and amplifier? It never hurts to double check everything.

 

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Yeah more like quadruple checked everything. It is indeed wired to a 2 ohm load.

It's always nice to meet a fellow CA enthusiast. You mind meeting up sometime and helping me out? Where are you located and all? I'd love to hear your system too, haha.

Chris

 

[Supergumby5000 5,000+ posts]

Im over at WSU right now, i'll be back on the westside presidents day weekend.

oh, and my systems gonna be torn out in the next week or so. gotta make room for the 18's, which will most likely be put in pres's weekend lol

 

[Supergumby5000 5,000+ posts]

anyways, sand more area for that ground and use a much bigger bolt with washers. make sure your RCA's arent pinched or torn anywhere, check the voltages on the speaker outputs on the amp with a DMM to make sure your subs are getting the power you think they are.

 

[outspoken 10+ year member]

x2 on the sand it some more, make sure where the ground makes contact there is NO paint...

p.s. i like washington state, it rains alot and i like rain //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/fyi.gif.9f1f679348da7204ce960cfc74bca8e0.gif

 

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Thanks for the replies guys.

Update: Just before work I installed the new sub and all. Now with the sub amp turned on, the component amp (JBL) cuts in and out... it doesnt matter what volume it is at. So there has to be a voltage issue (in the install... as the alt and battery are fine)

It's weird that the comp amp turns on and off intermediately when I turned on the sub amp... but this is what I take out of it. If I re ground the ground and check all RCA/s etc.. what else?

 

[terra 5,000+ posts]

im in seattle....

 

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

Haha yeah Terra I know, I didn't know if you were down to help me out or not. I'm meeting another member tomorrow around 3pm-ish at Northgate mall probably... you around that area and wanna join?

 

[terra 5,000+ posts]

meh around 3ish ill be building...new t line enclosure for the c3 15"

if u cant get it figured out ill bring my crack team of ace installers lol

id sand that ground, check the voltage, and see exactly what voltage ur amp is putting out to the sub...

 

[Vipervenom18 10+ year member]

UPDATE:

e36m3_98 came out to help me out and we worked on my ride for a bit. (I also cannot wait until he is done with his own install, I can't wait to hear it.)

Long story short, there was a gain issue, and we played with it and some other things and all is well now. I still plan on re doing my ground, even thought it does not seem to be giving problems at all. It will mainly be out of peace of mind.

Now there is one more issue that came up on the drive home after fixing it all: (This did not occur when we were messing around with the install)

I start the car up after re installing the head unit. Sups play, but no components. I'm like "WOW!"

So I turn off the car, take HU out, check all connections. All good. I check all connections on amps. All good.

I turn it on again, everything is perfect. About 3 minutes into a song (on volume 10 out of 62) the comp amp cuts out again. 1 minute later it turns back on. Turns off again about a few seconds after and then turns back on 15 seconds after. I get irritated and turn off the HU until I get home.

I play music about half way with the hatch open so I can see if the amp goes into protect or thermal etc etc.

I play music while watching the amp. It finally shuts off again 2 minutes into a song. It just gets no signal. That is the thermal light does not come on. The protect light does not come on. Nor does the power. Wen the amp turned back on by itself 30-40 seconds afterwards the power light turned on (not protect etc etc) as if it were fine.

Summed up:

-Comp amp turns on and off (not protect/thermal etc) intermediately (totally random.)

-Occurs at any volume level for any length of time.

-Sub amp has no issues. It stays on when the comp amp turns off.

The only thing that this sounds like is a remote wire problem. However even if the HU is on and i take off the remote wire wouldnt it still be on since the power wire is copnected to it? (doesnt the remote wire only shit it off when the HU turns off?)

I am tired and won't work on the car until tomorrow before work or Saturday. I jut wrote what is going on now to get some brain storm going so I can check some things you guys may tell me to do.

So far I'm just going to re check the remote even though it looked good on both ends.

What else should I check/does this sound like?

Thanks. If I can fix this it seems like it should be up and running 100 percent. The components and amp plays fine when it does in fact turn back on. We did not run into this problem when we had the speakers playing for good lengths of time which is weird.

 

[e36m3_98 10+ year member]

hey whats up, that was fun trying to figure out the problem and it ended up being the a gain issue lol. Anyways sounds like its a remote turn on problem.

"However even if the HU is on and i take off the remote wire wouldnt it still be on since the power wire is copnected to it? (doesnt the remote wire only shit it off when the HU turns off?)"

if you disconnect the turn on wire and leave the hu on, the amp will shut down. the turn on lead acts as a on/off switch for the amp. there is like barely any current running through it, as long as the amp sees a potential difference in voltage it will turn on 12v and off 0v. Just do this, when the amps turn off and the Hu is still powered up, take a mm to it and measure the voltage on the remote wire lead. Also try running one amp at a time. Thats kind of weird that its doing this, is anything pinched and shorting out?. There is a usually no problem running 2 amps off the HU turn on lead. If anything you can get a relay.

 

[Supergumby5000 5,000+ posts]

im guessing the cutting out is either due to a bad remote lead somewhere, or your RCA's. If your RCA has a harsh bend in it, is pinched,torn, etc, it could send a messed up signal to the amp.