What causes snapped/frayed leads?

[soulstace 10+ year member]

I have one problem with my subs and it keeps happening again and again. The + and - leads to the voice coils keep snapping.

The odd thing is, they only snap on one sub and there are two in the same enclosure hooked up in series. The wires that snap are on the first sub where power comes in from the amp and splits to the other speaker. The other sub is fine.

Whats going on here?

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[soulstace 10+ year member]

I soldered the broken leads back together on the sub. What a pain in the *** that was. Especially since both leads were too short to connect back together. I had to use some 14 gauge speaker wire in its place. Hopefully that will hold up to the vibration.

This time, instead of wiring the subs together in series inside the box, I ran two terminals on the enclosure. I can connect each one to my amp's monoblock to give the same 2 ohm load. (Two dual 2-ohm subs, each in series by itself, then parallel both on the monoblock)

Now hopefully the leads won't snap any more. Especially the ones on my sub that are still good.

 

[supraman1379 10+ year member]

Over power and over excursion usualy causes this.

What kind of subs do you have?

 

[soulstace 10+ year member]

Two JL 10w3-d2

I don't think over excursion is causing it. Both subs were in the same sealed enclosure. The leads only snap where + and - comes into the first sub from the amp. Not only did they snap, they appeared to have burnt.

Overpower perhaps. Perhaps it's just too much strain on the first sub. All that power coming into it and splitting off to the other sub in parallel. Funny thats how JL says to hook em up in the pdf document I downloaded from their site.

 

[soulstace 10+ year member]

Here's where the leads would snap/burn. Notice it burns one lead from each voice coil, on the sub closest to the amp.

 

[wesl56 10+ year member]

what amp are they hooked up to?

 

[soulstace 10+ year member]

mmats d100hc. 1200W RMS @ .67 ohm

Thing is I only had them hooked up @ 2 ohm. I highly doubt the amp puts out more than rated power for these subs at that impedence.

 

[Flipx99 5,000+ posts]

I wonder if it is arcing at the connection. How close is it to the leads?

 

[soulstace 10+ year member]

It could be Flipx99.

One lead was snapped about 12mm from the terminal on the speaker. The other one was snapped about a centimeter and 1/2 away from the cone. That was the hardest one to repair because it was so short. The rest it of was in the box in what appeared to be hundreds of tiny little burnt pieces of wire.

This has happened at least three times that I can remember. And it always happens on the same two leads. Last time I repaired them by crimping on butt connectors in between where they were broke. However, this time the lead was burned off so close to the cone, and frayed so bad, that butt connector would be nearly impossible to use. Even if I did it would've probably hit on the cone and make loud clicking noises.