CullinanCut

So I have a 500/1 and a zapco 4 channel hooked up with a 1 farad cap, a couple of days ago the sub amp started cutting out at moderate to high volume levels. If I turned it up too loud then the sub amp would power off, turn it back down wait a second and it would turn back on. Looking at the amps when this happens it's not in protection mode or anything there is no power at all. I disconnected the positive battery terminal which was a little dirty, scrubbed it up and all seemed good for five minutes of loud playing until the sub amp cut out again. So today I come out to take a look and the sub amp won't turn on at all and now when I turn the car on I get a loud pop through my other 4 speakers. Any ideas? Thanks!

07cobalt2.2

i had my stereo instaled at a good shop but i had two 12" exiles with a exile amp and the same thing happend to me, and after a week of going back and forth to the shop with cut outs the amp finaly burnt up and filled my trunk with smoak, he said that because he took the line off of the stock pioneer sub, the new amp had a 300 watt feed to it and then amplified it more to the 12"s, over powering everything but not throughing the amp into protect mode... hope it helps! just thought i would try to save you the hassle i had! i eventualy had him take the subs out and put in a jvc touch deck for free ha

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

subs might be blown

CullinanCut

I don't think the sub is blown, the amp has no power. Would having a blown sub cause the amp to not have any power? No lights on the amp at all?

So the loud pop at start up stopped happening but my amp hasn't turned on in two days

Any ideas? Thanks

Nightmare9

Sounds like your amp was overheating and cutting out, i had an OLD Sony years back that did the EXACT same thing, eventually it fried the cut-out switch and i got a much nicer more powerful amp.

Common causes of overheating:
-Poor air circulation
-Really hot weather
-input gains up too high
-input voltage too high (ie, using high level inputs for an amp not designed for them)
-incorrectly wired subs (ie wiring short circuits(
-wiring the subs/voicecoils in parrellel (some amps can handel lower resistances, some can't)

Spun

iTrader: (1)

The loud pop is from your RCA's disconnect them from the HU until everything is fixed and it won't happen any more.

How long have you had the system in the car, is it a new install or have you had it for a while.

If the subs were cutting out at any volume then coming back on ect. the this is a good sign that the amp is over heating, the above post is a good example of reasons that it might over heat.

If its a new setup then it might be wired wrong, if its a setup that you have had for a while and it just started doing this out of the blue then theres a good chance something in your amp is pouched.

Have you checked the fuse on the sub amp?

Another posibility is you have a short somewhere but since you said you disconnected the pos terminal and cleaned it then it work for 5 mins then I tend to think its an overheating problem. You see what you did was give your amp a few mins to cool down so it work again when you turned it back on...if only for a few mins.

One more thing, you have a 500/1 running what? (since the JL amps are good from 1-8ohms then I don't think its a impedance (ohms) problem.)

CullinanCut

So the loud popping noise stopped, not sure what was causing it because it stopped out of the blue, I didn't do anything except start my car and it was gone

The system has been installed since right after I bought the car so about April of 07, never had a problem until now.

I looked for a fuse on the amp and couldn't find one, reading the manual online for the 500/1 it doesn't appear to have one on the amp. It does however say that the RIPPS system that it uses to regulate ohm load as well as voltage will turn the amp off if it has less than 11 volts and more than 14 volts so if for some reason I was running outside of that the amp would turn off. That would explain why it only affects the sub amp and not the other amp

The 500/1 is pushing a 10w7 BTW

Any idea on what would cause the voltage to be outside of those numbers? What can I check to figure out if that is the problem?

Also I'm in Washington with 30-40 degree weather. The 2 times I have looked at the amp while it was having a problem with it, it was cold to the touch and there were no lights at all on; as in no power light or protection mode light. Could the amp over heat while still being cold to the touch?

Thanks for everybodys help!

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

if thats the case its probably a connection issue with the power ground or remote. If it was going into protect or thermal u would see the lights

while the 500/1 doesnt have a fuse i would check the inline fuse on the wire while you are at it. Ive seen fuseholders melt and still half ass carry current so its pretty much impossible to diagnose without looking at it

Nightmare9

Poor power/ground connections will give insufficent voltage, but it sounds like that might be just a guess. You could test your theory by checking the volage on the leads on the amp when it cuts out to see if you are actually under powering the amp. A flaky remote wire could also shut the amp off at random.

If the amp is cold to the touch i would highly doubt its overheating (unless there is an internal failure)

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

might be a broken amp... but the 500/1s I've seen have just been destroyed. so smell around the amp and see if you smell anything. only thing that could turn off the lights is either a connection problem or busted amp

CullinanCut

Ok I checked the fuse and it looks good but JL says to use a 50 amp fuse and it is a 200 amp fuse for both the 500/1 and the 300 watt zapco amps. Had autozone check the battery and alternator and the battery was at 11.5 volts not running and 14.1 volts while running. Checked the connections on the amps battery and cap and all seemed good. Switched the amp to RCA signal sensing to eliminate the need for a remote turn on wire and still nothing

I'm starting to think it might be that the amp is fried, I'm not sure what else to check. Checking the voltage at the amp is a great idea, I will try that next, and then if that doesn't seem bad than I guess I will switch the amp with a different one I have and see if that fixes it

Could the cap be causing any of this? Do they fail or could the voltage coming out of the cap be lowered somehow?

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

caps can go bad yes BUT don't think that's ur issue

11.5 was with the system playing or everything off? because a battery reading 12.0 is completely dead. 11.5 is normally not good at all. a JL amp will shut off at 11.5 but the lights *should* stay on and it *should* begin to play once the voltage goes up again

Your gonna need to get a digital mulit meter and test all those connections. with the car running test what the battery is sitting at voltage wise. then test at the fuse holder before and after the fuse then test at the cap then the amp ect ect. If its a connection issue you should be able to see a difference somewhere along the chain.

cobaltss#01

iTrader: (4)

you said you have a 200 amp fuse for both amps does that mean you have both of them running off of one single power line without a distribution block set up? maybe try a distribution block from there go with 2 separate power lines with both lines having there own respective fuses. mine was setup that way and i never had a problem setup that way in my other car. i only have my 500/1 and a 1 farad setup now till I get the rest of the money for another set of components for up front and an amp.

what kind of speakers are your amps running(respectively)? Also when we checked my battery it was bad and it was coming up as 12.8 volts when the car was off. And my cap has a volt meter on it and without me pushing it, just at a normal volume it's coming up with like 14.9 volts.

scoshus99999

mine did this before too. check your ground cable and make sure its as short as you can get it (no longer than 3 foot). turn your gain down too just a tad and it will stop.

cobaltss#01

iTrader: (4)

yeah that was my next suggestion and check for lose connections caused from vibration. had that happen before to.

CullinanCut

Problem solved!! Sub amp works again! So I haven't had much time lately to check this out but yesterday I was able to use a multi meter and found that the sub amp was only seeing 9 volts, so that why the amp shut off. I had a hard time checking all the connections since the sub box is so big I have to remove the seats to get the box out. After a lot of messing around with it I was able to get to all the wiring connections and found that the sub amps ground wire, although it looked good, was actually not making a good connection anymore due to the short screw that was used. After pulling the screw and replacing it with a longer thicker one everything works great!

Thanks to everybody with their help and $.33 for a new screw and washer I can enjoy my stereo again!

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

glad u got it figured out man