Fried Speaker?

[ZoomZoom1997 10+ year member]

Installed head unit, speakers & amplifier today... All brand new except for speakers...

Started everything up for the first time, sounded awesome at first... Then it started clipping/crackling, turned it off very quickly...

Checked all the connections... Noticed my ground came loose at the battery... Turned on the system again, same clipping/crackling... Turned it off quickly...

Test the system again, now the speaker is MUCH, MUCH weaker than what it just was; barely audible at MAX volume. Hoping I didn't damage anything... I haven't touched the gain setting at all...

I should mention that I only had 1 speaker (not a pair) hooked up.

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[photocrazy8 10+ year member]

you could have blown it. what amp was pushing this one speaker? what type of speaker? the loose connection could have caused a short sending a weird signal to the speaker. does it smell?

 

[ZoomZoom1997 10+ year member]

Profile 60w (rms) x 4 amplifier... Infinity Kappa 6.5"/75w rms speakers...

Going to test the speaker off the deck instead of the amplifier to test if its the speaker...

 

[ZoomZoom1997 10+ year member]

No smell...

 

[ZoomZoom1997 10+ year member]

Tried the same speaker off the deck (Eclipse 8445), seemed like the same amount of power which is hardly audible unless its cranked...

Tried another speaker (Infinity Reference) I have lying around for just a couple seconds, same thing (very little volume) both through the deck & amp...

I'd like to think that rules out the speaker being blown but could mean the issue is with the head unit... Its possible my head unit has some sort of option or adjustment as to why its playing so weakly...

Then again, when I first fired the system up it played well till the crackling/clipping.

 

[maylar 10+ year member]

Test the speakers' voice coils with an ohmmeter, then with a known good source. I use a boombox stereo and a cable salvaged from a set of broken headphones. Most radio / tape player thingies have a headphone jack that you can connect a speaker to.

I'd suspect the wiring or the speaker(s) before I'd look into HU settings.. they don't change suddenly and get scratchy.

 

[joetama 5,000+ posts]

He could have damaged part of the powersupply in the amp or even the output stage of them amp... I would try a different amp in there before you say it's your head unit....

 

[ZoomZoom1997 10+ year member]

I'm an idiot... My RCA cables were wired incorrectly... I only have 3 good RCA cables (1 is broken, using a 4 channel amp) and must've been using the odd cable, instead of the pair...

Now a good amount of power is coming through the speaker though its not as clean or as loud as they were with an older Profile amp...

Maybe too early to say that is true but that is what I noticed after only listening to it for like 15 seconds. Was in a hurry as my car had an appointment for tires.