I guess it's recone time.. What would cause this?

[MattinMO]

I would assume this wasn't necessarily clip city on 1 particular day I think this is something that accumulated over time until catastrophic failure

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

This is why i tell people why the fk do you run it at higher ohm loads LOL clipping at higher ohm loads is just as bad as any other clipping. You will clip more at higher ohm loads because your output is complete sh*t.  wired to 4 ohm nominal will see like 8 ish ohms power after rise.

You said you never heard clipping. YOU CANT HEAR CLIPPING on subs most of the times. by the time you do hear it, its already a heavy square wave thats extremely clipped. Those coils are supposed to be black and shiny, yours is really dull and has burn marks on the coil and the spider. Which is a sign of clipping.

 

[Popwarhomie 5,000+ posts]

I don't understand why people do that either.   Wire to 1 ohm. Turn gain down.

 

[THATpurpleKUSH 5,000+ posts]

Clipping is not always audible. 

I think shredder nailed it, overexcursion lead to torn leads which then burned up from too much heat. 

 

[NSTALN 10+ year member]

How many times does the 'Sundown Audio' logo appear on this sub? Inside and out?

...at least you'll never forget who made it.

 

[CplCuddles]

That coil looks like charcoal! The coils should be shinny black not dull burnt black. Clippppppp city 

Uh, no sir. It's supposed to be black on this sub.

I would assume this wasn't necessarily clip city on 1 particular day I think this is something that accumulated over time until catastrophic failure

My thought as well, I had it for about 2.5 years.

This is why i tell people why the fk do you run it at higher ohm loads LOL clipping at higher ohm loads is just as bad as any other clipping. You will clip more at higher ohm loads because your output is complete sh*t.  wired to 4 ohm nominal will see like 8 ish ohms power after rise.

You said you never heard clipping. YOU CANT HEAR CLIPPING on subs most of the times. by the time you do hear it, its already a heavy square wave thats extremely clipped. Those coils are supposed to be black and shiny, yours is really dull and has burn marks on the coil and the spider. Which is a sign of clipping.

I run at 4ohm because of wattage.  I know that it won't exceed what I can safely put out while at 4ohm. Has nothing to do with not clipping. I simply dont have the electrical to support an oopsie. I know you can't hear it, hence why I use an o scope.  It looks shiny to me, might be just the pics. 

I don't understand why people do that either.   Wire to 1 ohm. Turn gain down.

Wire at 1ohm turn down gain or wire at 4ohm normal gain set; same difference. Do you disagree?

 

[PPVtahoe11]

Uh, no sir. It's supposed to be black on this sub.

My thought as well, I had it for about 2.5 years.

I run at 4ohm because of wattage.  I know that it won't exceed what I can safely put out while at 4ohm. Has nothing to do with not clipping. I simply dont have the electrical to support an oopsie. I know you can't hear it, hence why I use an o scope.  It looks shiny to me, might be just the pics. 

Wire at 1ohm turn down gain or wire at 4ohm normal gain set; same difference. Do you disagree?

U don’t understand at all. Clip for sure because the way ur talking. We know the coil should be black. Just not flat charcoal black. And no wire to 1ohm gain lower and wire to 4ohm are totally different things. Not even close to same clean power at all 

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

Uh, no sir. It's supposed to be black on this sub.

My thought as well, I had it for about 2.5 years.

I run at 4ohm because of wattage.  I know that it won't exceed what I can safely put out while at 4ohm. Has nothing to do with not clipping. I simply dont have the electrical to support an oopsie. I know you can't hear it, hence why I use an o scope.  It looks shiny to me, might be just the pics. 

Wire at 1ohm turn down gain or wire at 4ohm normal gain set; same difference. Do you disagree?

You know how I know you are clipping? you are playing 20ish hz material which is usually rebassed music and that sh*t is -5 to -1 db recording levels and you set the gains with a -10 db recording level. Just because you used an oscope doesnt mean its clean or its a correct gain setting.  Its only correct for playing that test tone, not correct for playing music. Music is dynamic not a test tone, Its not the same when its 1 ohm or 4 ohm. 4 ohms you have box rise up to 8 ohms or higher thats the power you see out of your amp, i'm guessing you've never clamp tested the setup ever. You then run into the issue of not having clean dynamic headroom aka when some music has higher bass strength in  the recording levels than others. WHen you wire to 1 ohm, you have all the headroom in the world for this. You also just set the gains via voltage drop so there's no excuse if you dont have the electrical.  I have two 15ks off one single battery right now at 1 ohm each because my other batteries died in an accident. Its running completely fine because i found the proper level, none of the subs nor amps nor electrical system is stressed.  When you wired to 4 ohms you were literally maxing out the amp 100-120%  vs running 1 ohm the amp would be barely lifting a finger. which lasts longer? which gives a cleaner overall signal?  

I dont know how to make this any clearer to you.

4ohm so (2200W approx), -10db with a DD-1 & DSONanov3 o-scope.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

As for overexcursion, its absolutely fking rare because when you actually hit mechanical Xmax which is absolutely fking rare as you see in the sundown X free air video, jacob put A LOT more fking power than you ever did to the sub FREE AIR and it took a lot to bottom out even at the lowest registries on his sweep test. Yours is in a box which will take absolutely ridiculous amounts of power to even come close to bottoming out which your 4 ohms wiring is not capable of. This was a long term damaged tinsel and coil due to clipping. The coil was just strong enough to not croak at the power you were giving it.  If the sub was unloading or bottoming out, its very noticeable and audible and you'd definitely hear it even if its locked away in the trunk of a car. 

 

[Boomin_tahoe 5,000+ posts]

Uh, no sir. It's supposed to be black on this sub.

My thought as well, I had it for about 2.5 years.

I run at 4ohm because of wattage.  I know that it won't exceed what I can safely put out while at 4ohm. Has nothing to do with not clipping. I simply dont have the electrical to support an oopsie. I know you can't hear it, hence why I use an o scope.  It looks shiny to me, might be just the pics. 

Wire at 1ohm turn down gain or wire at 4ohm normal gain set; same difference. Do you disagree?

Wrong

 

[CplCuddles]

You know how I know you are clipping? you are playing 20ish hz material which is usually rebassed music and that sh*t is -5 to -1 db recording levels and you set the gains with a -10 db recording level. Just because you used an oscope doesnt mean its clean or its a correct gain setting.  Its only correct for playing that test tone, not correct for playing music. Music is dynamic not a test tone, Its not the same when its 1 ohm or 4 ohm. 4 ohms you have box rise up to 8 ohms or higher thats the power you see out of your amp, i'm guessing you've never clamp tested the setup ever. You then run into the issue of not having clean dynamic headroom aka when some music has higher bass strength in  the recording levels than others. WHen you wire to 1 ohm, you have all the headroom in the world for this. You also just set the gains via voltage drop so there's no excuse if you dont have the electrical.  I have two 15ks off one single battery right now at 1 ohm each because my other batteries died in an accident. Its running completely fine because i found the proper level, none of the subs nor amps nor electrical system is stressed.  When you wired to 4 ohms you were literally maxing out the amp 100-120%  vs running 1 ohm the amp would be barely lifting a finger. which lasts longer? which gives a cleaner overall signal?  

I dont know how to make this any clearer to you.

That makes sense, I knew I COULD do it that way, but thought I shouldn't given I do not have the proper electrical. So if I understand this correctly, at 4ohm it pushes the amp hard but with less power and at 1ohm it wouldn't push the amp as hard?

Also, something that has never been clarified to me is, if I tune with a -10db and a song has -5db bass notes, am I definitely clipping? Do you clip as soon as you hit 0db? Its like when is too much? I've always heard when you can smell the coil or when the sub gets hot, never smelt my coil and the sub never got past luke warm..

U don’t understand at all. Clip for sure because the way ur talking. We know the coil should be black. Just not flat charcoal black. And no wire to 1ohm gain lower and wire to 4ohm are totally different things. Not even close to same clean power at all 

I dont understand lol, I am making a concious effort to learn this stuff, typically I'm learning from mistakes. So if you set 2 of the same amps, one at 1ohm and the other 4ohm, set the gains to say -5db on the 4ohm, then voltage matched the 1ohm. The 4ohm would be dirtier power? If so, why? This is where my knowledge falls kinda flat, I don't know the intricacies of how ohms law works in real world application. 

As for overexcursion, its absolutely fking rare because when you actually hit mechanical Xmax which is absolutely fking rare as you see in the sundown X free air video, jacob put A LOT more fking power than you ever did to the sub FREE AIR and it took a lot to bottom out even at the lowest registries on his sweep test. Yours is in a box which will take absolutely ridiculous amounts of power to even come close to bottoming out which your 4 ohms wiring is not capable of. This was a long term damaged tinsel and coil due to clipping. The coil was just strong enough to not croak at the power you were giving it.  If the sub was unloading or bottoming out, its very noticeable and audible and you'd definitely hear it even if its locked away in the trunk of a car. 

I've never seen a tinsel blow because of clipping, why would that happen? Also, what about the spider? It ripped in like 4 or 5 places.

@PPVtahoe11, @Jeffdachef

If I'm coming off as being a smart@$$ or a d!ck, I promise I'm not intending to come off that way. I legitimately want to learn from you guys that actually know wtf you are doing. The people I work with including my boss know so little in comparison to even me when it starts to get in depth. I want to learn my dudes. 

 

[Boomin_tahoe 5,000+ posts]

That makes sense, I knew I COULD do it that way, but thought I shouldn't given I do not have the proper electrical. So if I understand this correctly, at 4ohm it pushes the amp hard but with less power and at 1ohm it wouldn't push the amp as hard?

Also, something that has never been clarified to me is, if I tune with a -10db and a song has -5db bass notes, am I definitely clipping? Do you clip as soon as you hit 0db? Its like when is too much? I've always heard when you can smell the coil or when the sub gets hot, never smelt my coil and the sub never got past luke warm..

I dont understand lol, I am making a concious effort to learn this stuff, typically I'm learning from mistakes. So if you set 2 of the same amps, one at 1ohm and the other 4ohm, set the gains to say -5db on the 4ohm, then voltage matched the 1ohm. The 4ohm would be dirtier power? If so, why? This is where my knowledge falls kinda flat, I don't know the intricacies of how ohms law works in real world application. 

I've never seen a tinsel blow because of clipping, why would that happen? Also, what about the spider? It ripped in like 4 or 5 places.

@PPVtahoe11, @Jeffdachef

If I'm coming off as being a smart@$$ or a d!ck, I promise I'm not intending to come off that way. I legitimately want to learn from you guys that actually know wtf you are doing. The people I work with including my boss know so little in comparison to even me when it starts to get in depth. I want to learn my dudes. 

Correct. set the amp at a 1 ohm load and you won't drive it as hard. Just because you don't have the electrical to support it right now doesn't mean you can't set it for a 1 ohm load anyway....just be cautious and take it easy with it until your ready to upgrade it.

When gain setting, everything has to be at 0 or flat.

 

[Boomin_tahoe 5,000+ posts]

This is my 4 ch amp. I set the gain on it the other day with everything flat or turned down to 0 and played a 1000Hz tone. I got pretty close to the target voltage, doesn't have to be perfect but the closer the better...

Did the same thing with my mom amp yesterday...no pics tho.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

That makes sense, I knew I COULD do it that way, but thought I shouldn't given I do not have the proper electrical. So if I understand this correctly, at 4ohm it pushes the amp hard but with less power and at 1ohm it wouldn't push the amp as hard?

Also, something that has never been clarified to me is, if I tune with a -10db and a song has -5db bass notes, am I definitely clipping? Do you clip as soon as you hit 0db? Its like when is too much? I've always heard when you can smell the coil or when the sub gets hot, never smelt my coil and the sub never got past luke warm..

I dont understand lol, I am making a concious effort to learn this stuff, typically I'm learning from mistakes. So if you set 2 of the same amps, one at 1ohm and the other 4ohm, set the gains to say -5db on the 4ohm, then voltage matched the 1ohm. The 4ohm would be dirtier power? If so, why? This is where my knowledge falls kinda flat, I don't know the intricacies of how ohms law works in real world application. 

I've never seen a tinsel blow because of clipping, why would that happen? Also, what about the spider? It ripped in like 4 or 5 places.

@PPVtahoe11, @Jeffdachef

If I'm coming off as being a smart@$$ or a d!ck, I promise I'm not intending to come off that way. I legitimately want to learn from you guys that actually know wtf you are doing. The people I work with including my boss know so little in comparison to even me when it starts to get in depth. I want to learn my dudes. 

yes if you tune with a -10, and play a -5 db note in the song, you clipped lets say around 5% ish on the gain knob over your safe level. The reason why the coil didnt smell was from playing lows, the coil is moving a lot and cooling off a good bit before it gets catastrophic failure but it is still exposed to prolonged clipping and the initial built up heat and square waves over time. Sundown rates coils conservatively, you can literally throw a clean 3.5k rms after rise on those subs and there wont be any issues so even with 2k clipped its not going to die that fast depending on the level of clipping but it will wear down the sub..  As for the 1 and 4 ohm yes  Just an estimate, 1 ohm you are using 30% of the amp capacity while at 4 ohms you are at 100% redlining the amp but in your case, you are going 150% when you set your gains with the -10 db test tone and play rebassed music usually -5 to -1 db strengths.

 

[CplCuddles]

yes if you tune with a -10, and play a -5 db note in the song, you clipped lets say around 5% ish on the gain knob over your safe level. The reason why the coil didnt smell was from playing lows, the coil is moving a lot and cooling off a good bit before it gets catastrophic failure but it is still exposed to prolonged clipping and the initial built up heat and square waves over time. Sundown rates coils conservatively, you can literally throw a clean 3.5k rms after rise on those subs and there wont be any issues so even with 2k clipped its not going to die that fast depending on the level of clipping but it will wear down the sub..  As for the 1 and 4 ohm yes  Just an estimate, 1 ohm you are using 30% of the amp capacity while at 4 ohms you are at 100% redlining the amp but in your case, you are going 150% when you set your gains with the -10 db test tone and play rebassed music usually -5 to -1 db strengths.

That makes sense. What is the point of running at 4ohm at all? Also, so any amount of clip hurts the sub? I thought that a soft clip was typically how people set their gains.