my brand new subs smell

[Based]

I got 4 oa 15s Friday and put em in I'm only giving them 250 watts per sub when they are rated for 600. I was banging on them Saturday and yes I was clipping them a LITTLE bit because I really didn't know I was at the time. I might have 10 minutes of soft clipping on them...

So yesterday morning I noticed a smell it smells like rubber or something idk. The subs aren't hot as far as I can tell (everything is hot right now...). Today I got in my truck after not playing them for about 24 hours and the smell is still there and on my trip to the store I had my headunit at 50% with my amp's remote gain knob on half and it's still there....

Is this just new sub smell or did I *** up????

Click to read more...

 

[whitedragon551 5,000+ posts]

How do you know it was a soft clip if you didnt know you were clipping in the first place? Really only way to tell is with an OScope.

That smell is you clipping them. What is bass boost on the HU set to? What is the gain on the amp set to? And get rid of the bass knob.

 

[csu87 10+ year member]

sometimes new subs/coils have a smell to them as they begin breaking in.

but most likely, if its a solid smell that lingers, you are clipping them.

 

[Dmac1991]

250 watts clipped to all hell will not make the subs stinky. The OA's can take about 1.2k thermally before you have to start taking it easy, so soft clip/hard clip, that's not the problem. You'd kill the amp before the subs.

What you're smelling is the excess glue burning off.

 

[whitedragon551 5,000+ posts]

250 watts clipped to all hell will not make the subs stinky. The OA's can take about 1.2k thermally before you have to start taking it easy, so soft clip/hard clip, that's not the problem. You'd kill the amp before the subs.
What you're smelling is the excess glue burning off.

It absolutely will. If the subs are being clipped at 250wrms on a hard clip and there isnt any excursion going on there is no cooling going on as the coil isnt moving in/out of the gap. Hence the terrible smell.

 

[Popwarhomie 5,000+ posts]

How do you know it was a soft clip if you didnt know you were clipping in the first place?

Exactly.

 

[Dmac1991]

Like I said, @Based;, what you're smelling is the excess glue burning off.

Keep wanging on sir

 

[Based]

ok I will answer all questions regarding my OP.

I set my amp with both a DMM and the SMD DD-1 and I set the amp with a -7 40hz tone. After I set it I took my gain remote knob and put a 0db tone on and put a dmm to my amp and I found where the 0db spot is with my remote, it's at half. So basically put I can not clip if I keep my remote at half way no matter what song is playing. That's where I kept it all last night because I was afraid I was clipping but the smell was still there.

I know I was only barely clipping it on Saturday when I first noticed the smell because when playing them I would have the remote on minimum and then raise the level until the sound level stopped increasing and started making noise, then I backed off. So I was either right on the edge of clipping or I was still clipping a little bit.

I do not use bass boost on my amp or my HU. And the "bass knob" as you called it is just a remote gain knob that goes from 0 to whatever the gain you have the amp set to.

I just now drove around for about an hour listening to them and actually the smell went away WHILE I WAS WANGING ON THEM. So I am very pleased. I really do think they are just breaking in right now because they are getting louder and less smelly and lower. They are not hot other than it just being hot outside, like, they're room temp I guess you could say because it's probably around 90 degrees in my truck and they aren't hotter than other things in the truck.

Thank you for all your responses I really am glad this is such a helpful community.

Oh btw dmac, my box is from DCAR Customs too //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif. And same tuning!

 

[Dmac1991]

ok I will answer all questions regarding my OP.
I set my amp with both a DMM and the SMD DD-1 and I set the amp with a -7 40hz tone. After I set it I took my gain remote knob and put a 0db tone on and put a dmm to my amp and I found where the 0db spot is with my remote, it's at half. So basically put I can not clip if I keep my remote at half way no matter what song is playing. That's where I kept it all last night because I was afraid I was clipping but the smell was still there.

I know I was only barely clipping it on Saturday when I first noticed the smell because when playing them I would have the remote on minimum and then raise the level until the sound level stopped increasing and started making noise, then I backed off. So I was either right on the edge of clipping or I was still clipping a little bit.

I do not use bass boost on my amp or my HU. And the "bass knob" as you called it is just a remote gain knob that goes from 0 to whatever the gain you have the amp set to.

I just now drove around for about an hour listening to them and actually the smell went away WHILE I WAS WANGING ON THEM. So I am very pleased. I really do think they are just breaking in right now because they are getting louder and less smelly and lower. They are not hot other than it just being hot outside, like, they're room temp I guess you could say because it's probably around 90 degrees in my truck and they aren't hotter than other things in the truck.

Thank you for all your responses I really am glad this is such a helpful community.

Oh btw dmac, my box is from DCAR Customs too //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif. And same tuning!

yeah buddy. Homie does an excellent job

 

[Based]

Yeah I really was in awe at the beauty of the box he did for me. Good fellow.

 

[AnthonyO 10+ year member]

Yeah, OA subs have some stinky *** excess glue. I beat the **** out of my 15 and had it smell a couple times on hard bass demo's. When I took it out of the box before I sold it, the coil still looked brand new. I would not let that smell on OA's scare me at all. Those subs are ****** and will take a beating.

 

[Based]

I took a sub out to fix something on the box and I felt the coil and it wasn't even warm. The magnet was pretty hot though but isn't that normal?

 

[Dmac1991]

I took a sub out to fix something on the box and I felt the coil and it wasn't even warm. The magnet was pretty hot though but isn't that normal?

cooling doing what it's supposed to