Lightning Bolt B400.4

[liliceman13300]

First I'd like to say hi to everyone on the forums, i'm sure you guys will be able to help me with my questions //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif

I found a Lightning Bolt Audio B400.4 on craigslist for $50 that is supposed to be in good shape. The problem is, its a 40 miles drive out to get it, so I'm debating if it's worth it. I've been looking for a decent amp to power my Alpine SPS-600Cs and right now i have a Walmart POS that does nothing but add static.

Is $50 for an amp I can't find much information about a good deal? It doesn't seem like an amazing amp by any means, but it seems like it will do what i want it to. I'm just wondering if its going to last and its going to sound pretty good.

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[assassyn 10+ year member]

dont do it, you can find better stuff for $50

 

[assassyn 10+ year member]

junk

 

[Rodek 10+ year member]

I owned a B300.4 a few years ago. It worked just fine and offered plenty of power and signal processing capability. I eventually changed my setup and went with a different amp. I sold the Lightning (A division of Rockford), to a friend who has been running it bridged to (2) 10's for the past couple of years. I saw where someone bench tested one a while back and at 13.5 volts, the B400.4 provided 72 x 4 or 196 x 2 bridged. IMO, for 50.00, it's a decent amp for a good deal.

 

[assassyn 10+ year member]

send me $50 and I will go buy and ship you a amp that is alot better than that. $50 is way to much money for that amp...... I sold a Bolt 400 4 chanle amp for $10 and felt bad about charging that much for it

 

[liliceman13300]

send me $50 and I will go buy and ship you a amp that is alot better than that. $50 is way to much money for that amp...... I sold a Bolt 400 4 chanle amp for $10 and felt bad about charging that much for it

So are you saying you DON'T like the amp? //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif

I actually bought it and hooked it up. The sound for running speakers is not very good at all. I played some pretty typical classical music and it sounded worse than the stock setup or Walmart amp with Alpine SPS-600C speakers! After tweaking the EQ on my D3 I got it to sound kinda decent but it seems like it wants to either only do highs or only lows. It can't do both together without lots of distortion on the other end. I'm going to try to run it on a 12" Kenwood KFC-W3012 and see how it sounds. Overall it is a very solid feeling amp, unlike the Walmart amp. I'll report back with how it sounds with the Kenwood.

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

after the first generation of lightning audio they pretty much went to shit...but when they first came out they had some really high end stuff including amps subs and componets.....

 

[assassyn 10+ year member]

You can get a good lower power amp for $50 , At the local Pawn shop they have $25- $50 amps most are RF , kenwood, sony, hifonics, alpine, I should go buy them all and sell them to you guys, but I had the same amp and I laughed at it. who ever says this is a good amp is not on top of there game........... I should get my old BOLT back ( the kid I sold it to still hass it but not hooked up) and sell it for $50 if that is a good deal

 

[Rodek 10+ year member]

You can get a good lower power amp for $50 , At the local Pawn shop they have $25- $50 amps most are RF , kenwood, sony, hifonics, alpine, I should go buy them all and sell them to you guys, but I had the same amp and I laughed at it. who ever says this is a good amp is not on top of there game........... I should get my old BOLT back ( the kid I sold it to still hass it but not hooked up) and sell it for $50 if that is a good deal

I had good luck with my Bolt and it's still being used today by a friend. I think this boils down to opinion and expectations and what other gear it's being compared to/ Car Audio has been that way since I started in it nearly 25 years ago. I f it sounds good to the listener, is reliable and affordable...then what else matters?

 

[assassyn 10+ year member]

That it sounds good

 

[Rodek 10+ year member]

That it sounds good

What sounds good to one person may not sound good to another.

 

[assassyn 10+ year member]

Liliceman13300 has a good amp that sounds really good for sale

 

[stocker08 10+ year member]

My first amp was a crappy lightning audio 2-channel. Bolt series, not sure which model number.......it was a smaller one. You should have seen the rediculous ways I linked subs up to that thing. I think I may have ran a sub on each channel, and then tossed a third in my trunk and bridged it too. LOL! The amp didn't die on me however. For $50, I would say its probably worth it. You will not find amp amp with that power for $50.

 

[Spooney 10+ year member]

I had a lightning audio b250.1 a couple of years ago(actually got it blown and repaired it) and for what it was that little amp had some balls. I think it was rated for like 250 rms into 2 ohms but it sure kicked harder than that. Had some decent quality parts inside of it. Looked very similiar internally to kicker amps. Not top of the line by any means but I have seen far worse for the money. on the other hand also though you had to spend probably ten or fifteen bucks in gas to get it so that makes it a little bit different story. is it a good deal? no but i wouldn't say you totally wasted your money.