Speaker Trouble

[cam_cool9]

Hey, I have a weird problem going on right now. I just installed a complete system with 3 amps. 1 running my 2 12' subs, 1 running my rears and 1 running my fronts. When i put a cd into my alpine CDA-9885 headunit, only the rear spearers work, and when its on radio only the fronts work with a faint signal coming from the back. Its not fader and i dont no what it can be. Can anyone help?

[kuecker_dj09]

check the speaker connections on the amp and the remote wires to make sure the amp is turning on

[cardude007617]

maybe loose RCAs somewhere or the signal is weak on the source.
in plain english-check ALL your wires and their connections, tighten anything up that looks loose. im not sure what else it could be. have a freind look at it too, sometimes a different pair of eyes will catch something u missed. my last idea is maybe a bad head unit, but that would be the last idea

[kuecker_dj09]

hes got the same HU as me so im not sure....

assuming you have bypassed the monsoon amp. well nevermind he did cuz he is running amps to his speakers

[cam_cool9]

yes, i bypassed the monsoon. I have been looking over the wires for the past few days and cant find anything wrong. I will get a friend over to take a look at it but I just have no idea what it could be. Also I have 2 12' Fosgate Punch P3's being ran by a Phoenix Gold OCTANE-R 15.0:1 amp and im just not getting any punch out of it. It should be hitting much harder than it is. I also have a 1 farfad cap on it. Any suggestions?

[cardude007617]

the cap could be draining. or you have it wired to 8ohm or some **** like that.

[gobraves00]

sounds like you trying to turn to many accessories on with your remote wire. you might wanna hook a relay in line with it.

[cam_cool9]

I have a relay installed. I have tried running it without the cap and there was no difference. I have it wired in parallel-series as 2 4ohm DVC subs should be.

[cardude007617]

well, there are many ways to wire subs up, not 1 right way. maybe your subs are not that loud/good

[GRZHOPR]

Sounds like an internal problem in the deck, or a speaker out of phase.
But, more than likely its in the deck.

Just to make sure, try unhooking one speaker at a time to see if the problems change. If there's no change, it's your deck. If things do change, then its a blowing speaker or a speaker out of phase.

The thing that really leads to it being deck related is that the symptoms change from CD to radio.

[cam_cool9]

well how do you recommend i wire my subs up?

[cardude007617]

i dont know, what kind of amp you got? and what kind of subs you got? that would help greatly

[cam_cool9]

Amp - Phoenix Gold OCTANE-R 15.0:1 Class D

Subs - 2 Rockford Fosgate 12' Punch Level 3's

[cardude007617]

dual 2 ohm or dual 4 ohm?

[cam_cool9]

4 ohm

[jperryss]

Sounds like you've got the subs wired up properly.

I don't have an answer to your problem. Seeing how it's acting differently depending on which source you're playing, that makes me think you've got something miswired with the amp turn-on (sometimes there are separate amp turn-on and power antenna wires, and the antenna one will only turn on when the radio is set for TUNER). But that alone wouldn't cause the problems you're having, assuming you've got just that one big amplifier running all of the speakers in your car.

Do you have three separate sets of RCAs going from the headunit to the amp, or are you using splitters?

If this was my car and I was trying to figure this out, I'd probably try to isolate everything bit-by-bit. First off, I'd bypass the cap. That probably isn't causing your problem, but you might as well leave it out of the equation for now. And there's no sense in trying to dial in your amp gains now, just set them at 1/3-1/2 way. And make sure your fader is dead center.

I'd probably start by disconnecting the REAR and SUB RCA inputs at the amp, leaving only the FRONTs plugged in. Now see if the front speakers work normally, balance full left and full right, listen for anything funny, like the music being quieter at center than it is at either full left or full right. Try CD and radio, make sure the fronts are working normally. Obviously only the fronts should be playing. If your rears or subs are also playing, then check the switches on the amp to make sure it's not set for SUM or COMBINE or something similar (this will take the signal from one set of RCAs and split it to all five amp channels). If the fronts are NOT going, but the rears or sub are, then you've got your RCAs connected wrong. Verify them at the radio where they're labelled, and make sure they match at the amp.

If everything's OK so far, go back to the amp and reconnect just the REAR RCA inputs, and disconnect the FRONTs. Now do the same thing you did before. Make sure ONLY the rears are playing, balance full left and full right, try CD and radio to make sure both are working, etc.

If everything checks out here, go back to the amp and reconnect the FRONT RCAs (leave the SUB RCAs disconnected). Try balancing/fading to all four corners of the car and see if everything's normal. Then switch sources and try it again.

Let us know how you make out.

[cardude007617]

dumbed down version=check everything, even the simplest stuff to make sure its right

[cam_cool9]

Alright, I think i have found the problem. I had the fronts hooked up through the factory wiries because of the crossover factor, thus when i had it on disc the speakers wanted to run thought the monsoon cutting the power from my amp. Thanks for the help everyone.

But I am still wondering what i should do about my subs?

[jperryss]

Originally Posted by cam_cool9

But I am still wondering what i should do about my subs?

First of all, I just realized you're running like 3 amps (I thought that PG amp was the 5-channel, but I was wrong).

What's the RMS rating on those subs? Because of the sub VC configuration you have (two D4s) the best you can really get out of that PG amp is 4-ohms, which puts you at about 250w per sub. Depending on what they can take and what kind of enclosure you're using, they may need more power.

Where are the gains at? Here's a copy-paste from one of my other posts on here, you can use this to set the gains.

Here's a fairly easy way to set the amp gains properly:
-Find some 0db test tones that are in the range that the subwoofers can play. The higher the better (since clipping gets easier to hear as the frequency goes up) but will probably need to be 200hz or below for the subs to play properly. If you can't find them with a Google search, I can make some and email them to you tonight. You'll NEED to shut off any crossover for the sub, so the tone frequency doesn't get filtered out. Make sure the LPF on the headunit is OFF, and the x-over on the amp needs to be set to FULL (just for now, you'll change it back once you're finished adjusting the gains).
-Burn them to CD (as audio, not as MP3s). Throw the disc in your car's CD player.
-Turn the gain all the way down on the amp. Set your bass controls to flat (not +8 where they are now ).
-Play the tone and slowly turn the volume up on the headunit until you hear the tone start distorting (it's clipping). Then back the volume down just a bit. At that spot on the volume knob you're getting the maximum 'clean' volume from your headunit.
-Leave the volume knob at that spot and head over to the amp. The gain should still be all the way down. Slowly turn the gain knob up until you hear the tone clipping again, the back it off just a bit. (NOTE: You could maybe get away with not backing it down, since regular music will rarely hit this volume level).

You know have properly set amp gains.

If they still don't sound loud enough to you, consider going with a bigger amp.

[cam_cool9]

they are 500W RMS and 1000W Peak