Subs causing car to lose power

[VH commodore]

dont know im not a battery expert but at work we use 'turbo battery's' they seem good. anything thats expensive is good lol.

 

[Denno]

lol ok mate, i'll look at some expensive stuff then I guess. Thanks for the help

 

[bezz]

Try turning down the gain a little on the amp. Sounds like the signal is clipping which in turn is causing the amp to draw too much current. The bass probably sounds muddy when that happens too. The stock vt alternator should be able to cope with your setup.

Failing that try the expensive stuff

Also don't bother with a stiffening capacitor, it wont do anything.

 

[Denno]

Thanks bezz. I was pretty sure te capacitor wouldn't do anything, I hae been reading another thread about headlights dimming, so I wasn't really goingto bother with that . The bass doesn't sound too bad? Although I don't actually know if I have set the gains properly or not to be honest. I was going to get my mate to have a play with it when I saw him next, and I have seen him for a couple of weeks lol. I'll see what I can do with the gains, but I don't want to loose the amount of overall bass...I freakin love the stuff lol.

 

[bezz]

Gain settings tut
this should help, links over to mea

Basically, clipping = bad, puts strain on the voice coils of your sub which can kill them over time. Not too good for your amp either.

 

[Denno]

Wow you're up late man haha. Yeah I know clipping it bad, but I was reading my amps book, turn it up until you hear distortion etc. But I didn't think I could hear distortion? This is why I wanted my mate to have a listen, bcuz he used to work in a car audio shop, and he would know what to listen for. Thanks for the suggestion, I'll have a look at that thread over there and see if I can gt my head around it.
I don't wnana change the direction of this thread too much, but with my headlights dimming, would that be related aswell? Or is that a case of battery and/or wires, bcuz you said my alternator should be fine.

 

[bezz]

Exam study (procrastination) man, gonna be up for a few hours yet lol. Yea distortion is a lot harder to hear in subbass frequencies, you just have to listen closely to hear if anything sounds 'fuzzy' when you crank the volume up. I reckon it might have something to do with your headlights dimming too. I run 2 amps in my vt using the same alternator you have and don't have any dimming or power loss whatsoever. I'm also using a regular battery with no upgraded grounds or anything.

edit: woo 500 posts

 

[Denno]

haha nice work on the 500 bezz. what exams you studying for? Uni or high school? I got a uni exam tomorrow morning haha, should prob get some rest but I think I'm gonna do ok, so I'll stay up haha.

Ok I have been reading that thread you linked me to, and I think I understand now. My alpine deck claims to have 4V pre-outs, so judging by the thread, I need to set my amp to around 1.3V? (this is exactly what the thread said lol).
If this is the case then I will be setting the gain properly before I head off to the exam tomorrow , I'll let you know how it affects everything.
Oh also, my amp has things like Bass EQ and LP Filter. I know the LP filter is just the setting for below which frequencies my sup should be playing, but the Bass EQ? Will this have an affect too? (It goes from [full anti-clockwise] 0dB to [full clockwise] +12dB.

 

[bezz]

got 1 exam left on friday, engineering project management.. pretty straightforward topic and the exam's open book so I'm not too stressed.

Yea set the gain to around that level and see how it goes. After that you should play around with it a bit to try and achieve a 'balance' between the sub and your speakers (that tut explains it a lot better).

The lowpass filter just sets a cut off frequency for the amp, so around 85Hz should be fine (dont be too concerned about it being exact as filters roll off slowly, they dont cut at the exact point). Bass EQ is a bass boost function, an equalizer specifically for the subbass. Generally leave it low until you've set your gains properly, then you can muck around with it for fine tuning.

Good luck with your exam tomorrow man, what course you do? Spose I should get back into the study now...

 

[Denno]

Ah nice, which uni you at? Which year etc?

I'll definitely play with it quickly tomorrow morning then, wake a few neighbours up haha.

I'm doing Software Engineering at flinders, in my second year. Cheers for the luck mate, good luck to u too, although as you said, open book, should get a HD! lol