Update on problem with wiring/amp and best buy

[leon 10+ year member]

Some early reading for those new to this thread: http://www.caraudio.com/forum/showthread.php?t=168566

Today I took my Xterra back to Best Buy.

I got my speaker wires replaced with 12 gauge (it's the biggest size they had and it's only a three feet long run so.. =/). I also found out that they thought my speakers were 4-ohms instead of 2-, so they wired it wrong. After I fixed it like this:

Wire each speaker individually to a terminal cup like so:

Then wire each terminal to the amp like so, substituting the subwoofers shown in the diagram for your two terminal cups:

After all that, my amp still went into protect mode (flashing CUR). The guy was stumped and he checked the fuses on the power wire, all four fuses on the amp, even replaced all the fuses even though they were not blown. He maintains that the ground is good, since it's on the bolt that holds the back seat down (and should be going through the chassis too). He says that all the wiring seems correct and there's no pinches or nicks in the wires. He tested them with a DMM and found that there was a satsifying amount of power, nothing out of the ordinary.

He thinks it might be the battery not giving enough power and even suggested I get a cap. I quickly shot the cap down and told him to button everything up and I'll go to AutoZone and check my battery. So I went to AutoZone and had them check my battery and it went from 11.8 to 13.5 on the test with a constant .7 to .8 amps (?? someone explain this pls).

I have another appointment with Best Buy early Tuesday morning so they can talk with Alpine. I'm gonna call Alpine on Monday and see what's up.

I still think they might have wired my speakers wrong (positive to neg instead of positive to positive??) or I might have to replace my amp, which ultimately sucks.

Advice anyone??? I'm seriously tearing my hair out. I leave on the 6th to drive across the country to work at my college for the summer. I'd like to have a FUNCTIONAL SOUND SYSTEM BEFORE THEN!

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[draarong2004 10+ year member]

sounds to me like the speakers are wired wrong, either wires are crossed, or speakers are at an ohm load too low for the amp...

 

[forbidden 10+ year member]

Disconnect all wires from the sub. Take a battery and pop each sub independent from the other. If you have two subs, all with 2 ohm coils, this is the same load as all the coils wired in series / parallel. Connect the subs one coil only at a time to the amp and test each coil. If one coil is making the amp go into protect and not the others, you have a bad sub. If the amp is going into protect on all subs and all coils (again tested one at a time) then the issue is with the amp. Have you measured the ground return resistance yet? Do you have a meter?

 

[draarong2004 10+ year member]

Disconnect all wires from the sub. Take a battery and pop each sub independent from the other. If you have two subs, all with 2 ohm coils, this is the same load as all the coils wired in series / parallel. Connect the subs one coil only at a time to the amp and test each coil. If one coil is making the amp go into protect and not the others, you have a bad sub. If the amp is going into protect on all subs and all coils (again tested one at a time) then the issue is with the amp. Have you measured the ground return resistance yet? Do you have a meter?

in most instances, its always good to have another speaker around for testings like this that you know works, because he could posssibly have 2 bad subs, and a good amp...