Need help going active with Rainbows.

[lil azn 06 10+ year member]

With my passive crossovers always cutting off at volumes it shouldnt, i believe i have no choice but to go active. Ive read up on an thread here about active vs passive and it says something that is needed.... lots of time to tune. Unfortunately, i work 10-15 hours a day and really dont have energy to do all this. Basically i need help setting it up towards where i wont blow my speakers when i first start using them. Here are my specs

JL 300/4

2 way Rainbow Pro fi Kickbass

Alpine 9855

The amp

Speakers specs (off manual)

Frequency response 80-25.000 Hz

Slope 2 x 18 db octave

Crossover Freq 2.400 Hz

The 9855 has a built in crossover as well that i really never messed with because i never really understood how it works.

My questions are

- When going passive, is it okay to use a y connector to split a 2 channel connection from the HU to 4 channels to the amp or should i do 2 runs of RCA connectors from the HU (one set of rcas as "front" and one as "rear" from HU) to the amp?

- How do i set this up towards where speakers dont blow when i first start using them?

- what settings should i set on the amp (look at pic above). Im going to already assume all of it is going to be bypassed to High or at least the tweeters will be.

- What crossover settings should i set on the HU?

All i want is a safe side to do things for now and still sound very good, after understanding this all more and having more time ill tune it to how i want it to sound.

Thanks

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[alphakenny1 10+ year member]

the 9855 has a built in 3 way xover. whenever you got time, read the manual. i'm sure its you have to get in pro/advanced mode of some sorts.

then in 3 way xover mode, you can high pass the tweets and bandpass your mids and also low pass your sub. then just turn off the xovers on your amp and you have complete control over the xover pts and slopes through your HU.

 

[FoxPro5 5,000+ posts]

With my passive crossovers always cutting off at volumes it shouldnt, i believe i have no choice but to go active.

This makes no sense. Why would the passives be cutting off at high volumes. Did you mean to say that you just hear distortion at high volumes??

When going passive, is it okay to use a y connector to split a 2 channel connection from the HU to 4 channels to the amp or should i do 2 runs of RCA connectors from the HU (one set of rcas as "front" and one as "rear" from HU) to the amp?

If you are going to run the speakers actively, then you would need a pair of RCA's for each channel - Front. Rear, Nonfader....so 3 pairs total. The Fronts go to Front on the amp (lets say you will use the Front for your tweeters) and the Rear goes to Rear (midbass). No Y splitter needed.

- What crossover settings should i set on the HU?

Use the 9855 to control everything and turn all the filters on the amp to pass (ie not on). Then set it up like this:

Front (tweeters): HP at 2.5kHz

Rear: (midbass): HP at 80Hz and LP at 2.5kHz

Nonfader (sub): LP at 80Hz

These are just general starting points. You will have to adjust the frequency and slope to whatever sounds best to you. Maybe start with 24dB/oct slopes at all the above points and then adjust accordingly. You have be carefull that you don't run a full range signal to your tweeters. They will not instantly blow or anything, but if you drive them for a while without noticing, then there will be problems. It would be best to set all the x-overs on the deck before you plug the speaker wires in- just for safe measure anyway.

My recommendation however would not to run them actively, but bridge your amp to 150w per side.

 

[lil azn 06 10+ year member]

This makes no sense. Why would the passives be cutting off at high volumes. Did you mean to say that you just hear distortion at high volumes??


If you are going to run the speakers actively, then you would need a pair of RCA's for each channel - Front. Rear, Nonfader....so 3 pairs total. The Fronts go to Front on the amp (lets say you will use the Front for your tweeters) and the Rear goes to Rear (midbass). No Y splitter needed.

Use the 9855 to control everything and turn all the filters on the amp to pass (ie not on). Then set it up like this:

Front (tweeters): HP at 2.5kHz

Rear: (midbass): HP at 80Hz and LP at 2.5kHz

Nonfader (sub): LP at 80Hz

These are just general starting points. You will have to adjust the frequency and slope to whatever sounds best to you. Maybe start with 24dB/oct slopes at all the above points and then adjust accordingly. You have be carefull that you don't run a full range signal to your tweeters. They will not instantly blow or anything, but if you drive them for a while without noticing, then there will be problems. It would be best to set all the x-overs on the deck before you plug the speaker wires in- just for safe measure anyway.

My recommendation however would not to run them actively, but bridge your amp to 150w per side.

No i meant the crossover cuts off at high volumes, as in the speakers volume just gets extremely low and sound utterly distorted. There isnt distortion at those high volumes volumes it just cuts off. The passenger side mostly the left side rarely. Im sure it has something to do with the Halo protection system in the crossover as Manny mentioned to me.

 

[FoxPro5 5,000+ posts]

Roger that. Did you at least try running that 300/4 bridged to them??

 

[lil azn 06 10+ year member]

yes but my amp kept overheating when i bridged.

 

[James Bang 5,000+ posts]

yes but my amp kept overheating when i bridged.

that's weak. JL... HA

 

[azbass 5,000+ posts]

i would not have used that amp for active. the 450/4 would have been better.. imo

 

[skierxx5556 10+ year member]

Sounds to me like its your tweeter protection thats kicking in not that the crossover is cutting out...

 

[T3mpest 10+ year member]

Your amps going to be putting out even less power now that your going active, odds are it wont' help your situation much unless you use a very high slope, but who knows how they'll end up sounding. I can't say I'd recommend going active for a volume increase. So many people on these forums seem to be falling into more advanced areas of car audio for the wrong reasons.

 

[lil azn 06 10+ year member]

Sounds to me like its your tweeter protection thats kicking in not that the crossover is cutting out...

I thought so too before, but yesterday i pulled over with it still sounding low and the mid woofer itself sounded horrible.

Its not the amp, im pretty sure of that since i decided to try some 6x9s not too long ago and had no problems.

 

[lil azn 06 10+ year member]

Your amps going to be putting out even less power now that your going active, odds are it wont' help your situation much unless you use a very high slope, but who knows how they'll end up sounding. I can't say I'd recommend going active for a volume increase. So many people on these forums seem to be falling into more advanced areas of car audio for the wrong reasons.

I dont see how it would put out less power since before i was driving it at 75x2 but now ill be driving it at 75x4. I dont want to go active for a higher volume, i just want to keep it that way ( as in high without problems). Ive been in an accord round here that has the older version of the pro fi normal line active and as far as i can hear they get much louder than mine and have no distortion at all. I believe the crossover/halo protection is holding me back, but then again i only know so much when it comes to car audio =/

 

[goodrich 10+ year member]

No i meant the crossover cuts off at high volumes, as in the speakers volume just gets extremely low and sound utterly distorted. There isnt distortion at those high volumes volumes it just cuts off. The passenger side mostly the left side rarely. Im sure it has something to do with the Halo protection system in the crossover as Manny mentioned to me.

hey...i'm having the same problem. don told me to take out the protection light bulbs in the cross-overs and it's still cutting out when it shouldn't be. it's happening on the same side as yours and rarely on the driver's side. it's pissing me off...i can't even listen to music at moderate levels. you are the only person that i know of that has had this problem. please let me know if you find out what the hell is going on.

 

[James Bang 5,000+ posts]

input voltage??? my amp has an high/low input selection, and i was getting major distortion from one of the selections.. i forgot which.

 

[3.5Max6spd 10+ year member]

how on earth you are engaging the HALO protection with 75 x 2 is beyond me unless you are clipping the piss out of the amp- I've only heard of this in setups using 4-5 times that amount of power...

Anyhow going active USE the 9855, dont bother with the JL built in xovers they cant bandpass your mid.