dragonplayboy
Junior Member
hey everyone, if someone can help me figure this out, i'll be forever in your debt, and i'll appreciate it more than ever.
ok, just a quick background, i've loved car audio since i was 15 (i'm now 22) and it has been pretty much my sole hobby for 6 years now. i've done over 50 installs (all successful) and i'd like to believe i know what i'm doing, but today made me put my head in my hands for the first time ever.
the scenario - my friend has a 1992 toyota camry v6 and today i was to put in a cadence 6.5" component set and a US Acoustics 2050 amplifier (50watts x 2)
his HU is a kenwood one, i'm not sure of model number but is about a year and a half to two years old, which has always worked flawlessly and was well installed by sound advice. so i popped the deck out, and plugged the rca into the back of it and used the lead that was convienantly in the middle of the rca (go fosgate! //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif ) and ran the wires to the trunk area, and then ran the speaker wires (14 gague insulated monster cable speaker wire) to the doors from the trunk (for the components). after a couple of fun ol' hours in the florida sun i had the components installed and the doors back together, and let me tell you the grommets in the doors of those camrys are serious bastards to work with.
ok, then i ran the power wire (4 gague fosgate power wire) from the positive terminal of the battery thru the firewall (oh so carefully) under the carpet and into the trunk, then connected it to a fosgate 4ga in, 2 8ga out fuse block so we could add another amp and some subs later. i put a 60 amp fuse in the holder under the hood, and a 20 amp in one block of the distrobution block. then ran 8ga wire out to the amp, screwed into the bottom of the trunk for a ground (used a flathead to scrape some paint off first) and ran 8ga wire from that too, wired everything up, put the fuse in the front, turned the cd player on, and expected to be all excited about the new speakers, when all i saw was the "protection" red LED on the amp flash on for about half a second.
pissed as i could ever be, i started checking everything, and eventually decided that i had a bad ground. so i selected an even better (although harder to work with) spot in the trunk, sanded it down to bare metal, drilled a self tapping screw in it, busted out the multimeter, and made sure that i had 12 volts off/14 volts running for the amp. confident that this would fix it, we put the fuse back in and fired it up, same thing with the LED. this is at like 8pm tonight. i go up and check the fuse under the hood, it's perfect, i check the fuse in the distro block, it's groovy, i use the voltimeter to check the power wire every step of the way to make sure it has good power, it's perfect, i double check the amp turn on lead is wired right, and that the rca's are good, try again, same LED. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/censored.gif.f9ad8e7c6db58c5530c5a0a20a3b5baf.gif//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/verymad.gif.3f39c5c2fd57527b671fad3efdfac756.gif//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/mad.gif.c18f003ab0ef8a0d9c27ca78d77a6392.gif
oh just fyi, the fuse rating in the amp is 15 amp in case that might be key. then i unscrewed the amp and took it up to the engine bay, and took a short speaker wire, touched it to the battery terminals and to the terminals on the amp (positive to the remote 12volts and to positive, negative to negative) and again the **** red led.
oh, right before i did this i went and got my phoenix gold 475 titanium amp and tried to hook it up with the wires i ran for the us acoustics amp, and the protection light on the PG amp came on, which pissed me off too. anyway then i took the pg amp (which worked perfectly before) and hooked it up directly the same way to the battery, and it did the protection LED thing too, then i took both amps over and tried to hook them up directly to my car's battery and they both did the same thing with the red protection led's, then i called my girlfriend to come over with her car that i put a very similar us acoustics amp in that has been working perfectly for like 4 years now, i unscrewed the connections from her amp, and plugged in the new us acoustics amp and then it blew out the fuse on the 2050!
then i screwed her amp back in, and as soon as i did so it sparked really big and blew the fuse under the hood. then i made sure that i hadn't touched any wires (which i didn't, and i never had in any of the three cars) and got a new fuse out and put it in her fuse holder by the battery, and the second i did, the fuse blew out again!
so now i think i have three botched amps, one pissed off friend and a sad girlfriend.
SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
thank you guys soooooo much.
ok, just a quick background, i've loved car audio since i was 15 (i'm now 22) and it has been pretty much my sole hobby for 6 years now. i've done over 50 installs (all successful) and i'd like to believe i know what i'm doing, but today made me put my head in my hands for the first time ever.
the scenario - my friend has a 1992 toyota camry v6 and today i was to put in a cadence 6.5" component set and a US Acoustics 2050 amplifier (50watts x 2)
his HU is a kenwood one, i'm not sure of model number but is about a year and a half to two years old, which has always worked flawlessly and was well installed by sound advice. so i popped the deck out, and plugged the rca into the back of it and used the lead that was convienantly in the middle of the rca (go fosgate! //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif ) and ran the wires to the trunk area, and then ran the speaker wires (14 gague insulated monster cable speaker wire) to the doors from the trunk (for the components). after a couple of fun ol' hours in the florida sun i had the components installed and the doors back together, and let me tell you the grommets in the doors of those camrys are serious bastards to work with.
ok, then i ran the power wire (4 gague fosgate power wire) from the positive terminal of the battery thru the firewall (oh so carefully) under the carpet and into the trunk, then connected it to a fosgate 4ga in, 2 8ga out fuse block so we could add another amp and some subs later. i put a 60 amp fuse in the holder under the hood, and a 20 amp in one block of the distrobution block. then ran 8ga wire out to the amp, screwed into the bottom of the trunk for a ground (used a flathead to scrape some paint off first) and ran 8ga wire from that too, wired everything up, put the fuse in the front, turned the cd player on, and expected to be all excited about the new speakers, when all i saw was the "protection" red LED on the amp flash on for about half a second.
pissed as i could ever be, i started checking everything, and eventually decided that i had a bad ground. so i selected an even better (although harder to work with) spot in the trunk, sanded it down to bare metal, drilled a self tapping screw in it, busted out the multimeter, and made sure that i had 12 volts off/14 volts running for the amp. confident that this would fix it, we put the fuse back in and fired it up, same thing with the LED. this is at like 8pm tonight. i go up and check the fuse under the hood, it's perfect, i check the fuse in the distro block, it's groovy, i use the voltimeter to check the power wire every step of the way to make sure it has good power, it's perfect, i double check the amp turn on lead is wired right, and that the rca's are good, try again, same LED. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/censored.gif.f9ad8e7c6db58c5530c5a0a20a3b5baf.gif//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/verymad.gif.3f39c5c2fd57527b671fad3efdfac756.gif//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/mad.gif.c18f003ab0ef8a0d9c27ca78d77a6392.gif
oh just fyi, the fuse rating in the amp is 15 amp in case that might be key. then i unscrewed the amp and took it up to the engine bay, and took a short speaker wire, touched it to the battery terminals and to the terminals on the amp (positive to the remote 12volts and to positive, negative to negative) and again the **** red led.
oh, right before i did this i went and got my phoenix gold 475 titanium amp and tried to hook it up with the wires i ran for the us acoustics amp, and the protection light on the PG amp came on, which pissed me off too. anyway then i took the pg amp (which worked perfectly before) and hooked it up directly the same way to the battery, and it did the protection LED thing too, then i took both amps over and tried to hook them up directly to my car's battery and they both did the same thing with the red protection led's, then i called my girlfriend to come over with her car that i put a very similar us acoustics amp in that has been working perfectly for like 4 years now, i unscrewed the connections from her amp, and plugged in the new us acoustics amp and then it blew out the fuse on the 2050!
then i screwed her amp back in, and as soon as i did so it sparked really big and blew the fuse under the hood. then i made sure that i hadn't touched any wires (which i didn't, and i never had in any of the three cars) and got a new fuse out and put it in her fuse holder by the battery, and the second i did, the fuse blew out again!
so now i think i have three botched amps, one pissed off friend and a sad girlfriend.
SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
thank you guys soooooo much.
