I have a kenwood kac x521 amp at what temperature does it overheat

[Ricky616 10+ year member]

i have a kac x521 amp i was wondering at what temperature would this amp over heat.//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif its running bridged powering a 12in.kicker solo L7 dual 4 ohms

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[lifted95blaze 10+ year member]

when you cant keep your hand on the surface of it..........its overheated

 

[Ricky616 10+ year member]

lol ok so the temperature is good then it only reached 149 degress farenheit i have it bridged at 2ohms

 

[lifted95blaze 10+ year member]

if your ohms are right, which they should be if u got your sub hooked up right, then it'll be fine, ohms are what gets amps the hottest when there wrong.

 

[Ricky616 10+ year member]

well its at 2ohms bridged and it says only stable at 4ohms but it doesnt get hott except that it draws more current which i would have to add a extra battery so lights wont dim as much

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

i have a kac x521 amp i was wondering at what temperature would this amp over heat.//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif its running bridged powering a 12in.kicker solo L7 dual 4 ohms

The rather strange advice found preceding this post notwithstanding ~

The thermal protection in the late-model eXcelon amplifiers shuts down the unit when internal temperatures reach above 179 degrees F.

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

if your ohms are right, which they should be if u got your sub hooked up right, then it'll be fine, ohms are what gets amps the hottest when the[y']re wrong.

Oh, to heck with it....I can't let this pass.....

Yes, dropping too low of an impedence load on an amp can cause it to heat up but it is by far not the only or most common reason it happens.

Insufficient ventilation for an amp that is prone to warmer operation than some (due to no active cooling apparatus, poor heatsink design, etc etc) can cause an amp to heat up.

Struggling for current (if the install is insufficient to supply the amp's need satisfactorily) can cause an amp to heat up.

Driving the shit out of an amp during the heat of the summer can cause it to heat up past the point where thermal overload protection will kick in.

 

[lifted95blaze 10+ year member]

true, on all the amps ive owned the only reason they really overheated or got hot was b/c of ohms not being right, there's many reasons why it will or can overheat, as listed above, i just thought ohms was the most common b/c most people that just start out with car stereo dont even know about ohms law and how it applies.....thats why i said its probably why his amp is runnin warmer than normal

 

[Ricky616 10+ year member]

yea i know that its only stable at 4ohms but the person who installed it said it was stable at 2ohms but i didnt know that it was bridged at 2ohms till my friend checked the wiring on the sub what should i do should i wire it back to 8ohms or keep it at 4ohms how much power will the amp send the sub at 8ohms how can i find that out

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

yea i know that its only stable at 4ohms but the person who installed it said it was stable at 2ohms but i didnt know that it was bridged at 2ohms till my friend checked the wiring on the sub what should i do should i wire it back to 8ohms or keep it at 4ohms how much power will the amp send the sub at 8ohms how can i find that out

If it isn't creating a problem then potentially you could change nothing and be just fine. Once the heat of the summer is upon us it may be a completely different story.

There are amps out there that will safely run below the manufacturer's impedence stability rating and you'll simply not find those specs in the manual. I do not know if the eXcelon unit you are running is one of them. Personally I wouldn't leave it connected at 2 Ohms while bridged if I were you...

Your KAC-X521 is rated for 505w RMS X 1 @ 4 Ohms mono bridged. If you were to present the amp with double the resistance (8 Ohm load) then, in theory, you'll get half of the rated output - or 252.5 watts.

I don't know which you had first (the amp or the sub) but more often than not a 2 channel amplifier is a bad match for a Dual 4 Ohm sub if the eventual plan is to run the amplifier in bridged mode. The reasoning behind that is the majority of amps are not stable lower than 4 Ohms when bridged. Not all amps, mind you, but the lion's share of them.

 

[Ricky616 10+ year member]

well i had a mtx amp but it got stolen with my other kicker subs the cvr's so i bought another 12in and used it with the kac x521 which i bought for 2 12in kenwoods tornado series so what would you recomend to run it bridged at 8ohms or to wire it at 2ohms on one channel would it put out the same power when it was at 8ohms it sounded ok loudd but not as loud as wired at 2ohms also i have the gain less than half way up i have a pioneer 6700mp im using 4gauge rf high strand wire's and a 1.5 farad cap im planning on getting a orion amp from tblazer in a couple of weeks or a month