Type R coils burning!

[iagrdshaka 5,000+ posts]

toaster, how did you achieve mid 150s with 2 punch stage 1 tens with 50 watts LEGAL????????

http://forums.caraudio.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1315632&postcount=16

 

[Spkrman]

the gain is to set the hu preout matched to the input of the amp. has nothing to do with the front stage....
if you set your gain properly, and you cant hear your highs, you need more power on your highs.

if your gain is set right, your hu will just start to clip at the same time as your amplifier.

also, if you have a coil on your sub going out, it WILL exhibit this type of behavior. you could be slinging it out of the gap and shorting it, also.

a loose wire will do it, too.

The goal of the gain is to properly match everything in the system. I find it better to turn the gains up a little more than matched perfectly to when the HU clips... so you have some headroom for recordings that are quiet.

If you have your gain set "properly" and you can't hear your highs... you need to turn the sub down. Throwing more power at the front speaks isn't always an option or necessary.

Preferably you have a subwoofer level on the deck, or a remote gain (note, not remote bass boost... what a waste)... so you can adjust the sub accordingly at will, with enough restraint to not just crank everything all the way up and clip the hell out of things.

Personally, I roll around with a setup capable of 150+ all day, does that mean I se t the gain on the amp so that the head unit and sub amp are perfectly matched? No... if I did I'd never be able to hear the front speaks. With my particular setup, I normally have the sub level on -15, level 0 is approx where it peaks out with the head unit. "full volume" at this setting is approx 130-134, which is plenty just for cruisin around.

Why not throw a bunch of power at the front speaks to keep up? Because at this point, they already get louder than I would ever want to listen to on a daily basis... No reason to invest in a ridiculously loud front stage if I'll never listen to it. Another reason would be... with the sub level on 0, my cruisin around volume would be around 7-10... and I like to have more increments in my volume, so each step isn't so big.

 

[toaster 10+ year member]

haha well, it was a linear power amp RATED for 50 watts mono. it was the first competition amps lp ever made, a high voltage job designed for 50 watts into 4 ohms mono, but with 16 decibels of dynamic headroom.

also, back then, everyone was doing ALOT of subs in small sealed enclosures for spl, with average power. there wasnt many people who could afford alot of powerm, because there were only ab amps. d class was still aways off, so power was EXPENSIVE.

when usac came up with outlaw spl, then port wars, we decided to build an enclosure for 1 ten inch driver with monsterous port area, to use in outlaw and port wars. what we ended up with was a 2 cubic foot box with 75 in of port area for 1 ten. we tried it out on the meter and besides doing well in the port, it was loud as HELL.

so we did a dual 10 box with the same specs, tuned it to the resonant freak of my lil escorts hatchback, and metered it. we were getting 150s consistently. i posted up my findings on termpro, and manville smith, a friend of mine (now), who is the technologies director for jl audio, threw a fit, called me crazy, all kinds of people telling me i was lying, threatening to ban me, it was wild.

so they have a show called thunder in the ozarks in little rock, ar, and i agree to meet all these guys from the termpro forums there, since i was judging sq at the show anyway. we spend the day talking and i let acefosg8, who later became a bigwig with rockford (and helluva good guy), run my escort through the lanes. this was so there would be no question as to the verification of the setup. the result was a 153.7, iirc. we later put it on the b&k meter and popped a 150.1.

its all in the box design. that being said, there is no "voodoo" to it. just maximize your port area, and throw what the manufacturer recommends out the window.

all this was done in 97-98, so the original posts at termpro are gone. but there are many references to it, these are a few. its really good reading.

http://audioforum.termpro.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=2;t=003737

http://audioforum.termpro.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=2;t=001135
http://audioforum.termpro.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=2;t=004225

anyway, enuff bragging... my heads already too big...

you have to read some of those posts completely to understand where im coming from. what i reall wish i had was the original vt thread from back in 97. it was several hundred pages long, iirc.

 

[toaster 10+ year member]

The goal of the gain is to properly match everything in the system. I find it better to turn the gains up a little more than matched perfectly to when the HU clips... so you have some headroom for recordings that are quiet.
If you have your gain set "properly" and you can't hear your highs... you need to turn the sub down. Throwing more power at the front speaks isn't always an option or necessary.

Preferably you have a subwoofer level on the deck, or a remote gain (note, not remote bass boost... what a waste)... so you can adjust the sub accordingly at will, with enough restraint to not just crank everything all the way up and clip the hell out of things.

Personally, I roll around with a setup capable of 150+ all day, does that mean I se t the gain on the amp so that the head unit and sub amp are perfectly matched? No... if I did I'd never be able to hear the front speaks. With my particular setup, I normally have the sub level on -15, level 0 is approx where it peaks out with the head unit. "full volume" at this setting is approx 130-134, which is plenty just for cruisin around.

Why not throw a bunch of power at the front speaks to keep up? Because at this point, they already get louder than I would ever want to listen to on a daily basis... No reason to invest in a ridiculously loud front stage if I'll never listen to it. Another reason would be... with the sub level on 0, my cruisin around volume would be around 7-10... and I like to have more increments in my volume, so each step isn't so big.

i disagree. the gain is to match your hu output voltage to your amps input sensitivity. its not to "blend" in anything, tho alot of people use it as a volume control that way.

and if you roll around with a 150 plus setup all day, you should invest in better front stage to keep up with it, instead of focusing on the bass part.

ive had stroker systems that would do 160s all day, but the highs could keep up. youd be amazed at how much power boston pros can absorb...

youre missing the key, i think:

where is your hearing more sensitive? in the midrange freaks, somewhere around 2800hz. 115dbs @ 2000hz or higher is almost untolerable, to me anyway. the reason the sub end can be hammering @ 150 and the highs screaming @ 115dbs is sensitivity of your eardrum to the higher freaks.

back to the point:

if ive got 25 watts on my highs, and 2000 on my subs, do you think im going to "turn down the volume" of my subs to "blend" in with the highs? NO. that woould be the same as buying a 2kw amp and running it @ 16 ohms mono: you turn it into a 500 watt amp, which is a waste.

and you can tweak the pot a little more after you set your gain, to allow for headroom, although with todays amps, if you set them at what they are rated to produce, they will have a decibel or 2 for headroom, due to their underrating.

 

[Spkrman]

I like to have the boom when need be... but when I need to crank up the boom, I don't need to hear the front speaks loud and clear.

Like I said, there is no reason for me to have front speaks that keep up... waste of time and $. It gets loud enough now, if I do anything it will be swapping out the stock 4x6's and getting something other than the flea market tweets //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif... so long as it gets as loud as it is now its just fine with me.

If you feel that I need to grab and amp and high power speaks up front, buy it all for me and install it //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

 

[toaster 10+ year member]

haha very funny you really dont know what youre missing, tho.

 

[Spkrman]

haha very funny you really dont know what youre missing, tho.

Not to say I am AGAINST a loud front stage, just not something I feel is worth doing at this point.

 

[DBfan187 5,000+ posts]

3:1 gain ratio gives you the best of both worlds. It gives you that extra power for those "quiet" tracks, but stays above the noise floor.

 

[eisenhower 10+ year member]

Maybe he ought to listen to alpine's power ratings rather a stranger's on the internet?

 

[toaster 10+ year member]

3:1 gain ratio gives you the best of both worlds. It gives you that extra power for those "quiet" tracks, but stays above the noise floor.

thats the one thing that was escaping me- noise floor. thats another reason why high voltage, low impedance outputs on a hu are a good thing. allows the gains to be turned down and s/n ratio maximized.

thanks for bringing that up, it was totally escaping me

 

[Mr. Opportunist 10+ year member]

heh i smell coils every day if people want me to show off. The box in now isnt made to handle power which is the reason. I am also running them off a powerbass xa-3000d at .5ohm. so i think it is a clipping issue not a power issue

 

[BassBEAST88 10+ year member]

Ok just forget it, i am going to just sell everything i am fuking tired of this bullshit... Thanks all who tried to help no oroscope or w/e could help me thanks.

 

[DBfan187 5,000+ posts]

so i think it is a clipping issue not a power issue

what do you think clipping is?

Clipping can actually put out more power than your amp is rated for.

Maybe surrpassing your speakers thermal limit? I think so.

 

[eisenhower 10+ year member]

Ok just forget it, i am going to just sell everything i am fuking tired of this bullshit... Thanks all who tried to help no oroscope or w/e could help me thanks.

Good, you don't deserve to own car audio equipment if you can't take 5 minutes to read up on stuff. Go to circuit city or something and have them check it out at least. I hate rich kids...

 

[toaster 10+ year member]

dont give up, go buy a 15 dollar multimeter, and do what i asked you to.