Ok here's my old setup.

1 fosgate 120a bridged running to kenwood 12's

1 digtal acoustic (old weak) amp for the front highs

I bought a kenwood 400 watter ran the subs with it, and moved the fosgate to power he fronts, it workd awesome.

So, I had a bright idea. Run the highs with the old dig acoustik, and bridge both amps one for each speaker.

I wired them all up, checked the wiring, put the fuses back in and fired it up.

Now, it sounds great, but when I get it past about 18 (it goes to 60) The fronts get scratchy, and both of the sub amps quit, and power down. If I turn the volume down, they come back on.

I have them all sharing a power wire, but it is big and heavy guage I dont think thats the problem.

Is it possible that the pioneers remote wire doesn't have enough voltage to power three amps? I hear a click when they quit, it almost sounds like when i turn off or turn on the HU, and the amps geet remote power.. I guess it sounds like the remote relays in the amps then again the protect relay might sound the same lol.

Is it posible there is some rca feedback?
Ground issues? the only thing I can even remotely think is that the scratchy sound is coming from speaker wires touching, but they are not.

The amp ran fine when it was in with the fosgate
the amp ran fine when it was in with the kenwood.
Both the kenwood and the fosgate run fine when they are together.

Just when I add this third amp, it does this? im perplexed.

 

It almost sounds like you have too much current goin through the amps.

Does any of the amps heat up?

What kinda ohmage is each amp seeing?

I would agree that the protection circuit relay would at times sound like the switch relay, some protections circuits would actually shut off the amp using the same relay.

Check your grounds as well, do you have the same size ground as you do power? That might be part of the problem as well.

Hope this helps.

 

Explain too much current going through the amps? Right now I am running the fronts off the deck.. the kenwood and fosgate are powering the subs with no trouible at all.. gains up high, and prolonged sounds levels above 60 on the deck... not a hitch..

thro in that tiny amp for the highs, and it wont go past 18..

I think I should most likely check the grounds as you said.. can you think of anything else.. and the ucrrent thing....explain that for me, im slow sometimes

 

Sorry for the vague info

The lower the resistance (ohmage) an amp sees, the more current flows through the amp. The more current flowing through the amp, the hotter it gets. Typically circuit protection uses a thermistor (like a heat activated breaker) to kill power to the amp.

When the amp cools off, the thermistor will reset and the amp will have power again.

So, an amp will have more current running through its circuitry connected to a sub at 2 ohms than it would at 4 or 8.

Could you email me a diagram of how you have things wired?

demicon@yahoo.com

But yes, check your grounds, and if you have many ground wires, try getting a splitter box, where a heavy guage of wire goes into a metal box with a screw and then several smaller guage wires can be connected to the other end of the box to go to whereever.

 

Ok so heres the question you said you have the kenwood and fosgate running the subs, do you have one amp going to each speaker? or do you have one amp doing both positives and one both negitives? that could trip a protection circut, what are the watts on the fosgate? and what are the watts on the subs? also you said you have the gain on high? on a scale from 0~100 what would you say they are set at because I've always been told never to put amps above 75% gain. I used to have a problem with an old alpine low output amp of mine where I couldn't put it above like 20% gain or it would destort really bad like your saying. And last but not least what do you consider a big gauge wire? cause assuming the fosgate and kenwood putt out around 800 together and the other amp ontop of it I would be thinking like 4 gauge, I used to have a friend with a stang that his MTX 1000 watt & 2 12s would cut out on him if he cranked it and all he had to do was up the gauge of wire.. Also what ampature fuses are you using? and how many of them in the amps. I'll check back tomarrow... and yea definatly check that ground cause the only time I've EVER had a protection circut kick in is when I acidentally crossed speaker wires and it didn't sound like the amp kicking on and off it just sounded like nothing.

 

demicon, splitter box? Don't you mean a distribution block?

 

Yeah I ment that. Sorry, my mind was kinda dead that day.. 10 hour shifts will do that I guess..

 

Just so you all know I talked to a friend of mine at work who is into compitition level stuff and he said to check the grounds real good too. Said it sounds like a bad ground unless your running some wire less than 8 gauge but also recomemnded 4 gauge.

 

Sorry so slow to answer.

THe power wire comes direct fromt the battery. It's pretty big. I dont know the guage of the wire without something to measure it. It's thicker than a pencil.. I guess abouy thsize of a full size sharpie pen? Or the same width as a outside extenision cord.

The wire comes in from under the center of the truck, and the dynomat (run different than the rcas) From the it hooks the the first amp with a loop connector (connecor lookis like an O) You have to completely unscrew the terminal and put the screw through the loop to connect it. (too many forked connectors or bare wires just slipped out on me).

It hops from amp to amp with heavy guage wire, and connectors no dist block. but the connections are srtong and good.

Each sub amp is bridged and connects to only one speaker per amp.

Thw fosgate is bridge to one speaker and the kenwood bridged independantly to the other. thanks fpor all your ideas.

 

Something ain't wired right.

 

Ten bucks says that little amp you put for the front you got running on the very end or front of the "amp chain". You need a distrbution block man the way you have it hooked up the first amp will draw the majority of the power then loop to the next amp it draws what the first one dosn't and loop it again and the last amp gets whats left. The way it is now there is a power drop for every amp in the chain and the others get whats left. With a distrbution block they all draw equaly. Sounds like your starving the amps. Get a distrubution block they usually go for like $10~$15 most places. I'm gonna assume you have the grounds setup the same way you might want to think about a block for them too. Also it sounds like your running eather 8 or 4 gauge wire (if you didn't know the lower the gauge the thicker it is) 8 gauge would be a little bigger that a peceil but probably a litte smaller than a sharpie 4 gauge would be about the size of a shapie marker.

 

I agree, get a dist block and wire things up right.

You can also use a dist block for grounds, it works well.

 

Yikes! Yeah, no way man... gotta run a dist block. What are the totals of all the fuses from all the amplifiers? You might have to upgrade the original power wire. The gauge isn't marked on the heavy wire anywhere?

Here's an example... search ebay for "dist block" or "distribution block", and best bet is to get a "fused" one. Crutchfield has some, too... but you know you can do better on pricing then they could!

 

"Is it possible that the pioneers remote wire doesn't have enough voltage to power three amps? I hear a click when they quit, it almost sounds like when i turn off or turn on the HU, and the amps geet remote power.. I guess it sounds like the remote relays in the amps then again the protect relay might sound the same lol. "

I did an install on my friends Infinity with a power antanae, i had to use the power wire antanae to power both that and the amp, so i connected that up, and once we tweaked it too well and better bass, when the subs shut off, the antanae went down. We turn it down and it sticks back up then bass back. So we put a relay in and no problems since...

 

That's kinda how I rigged up my amps. The only thing my radio's remote wire is hooked to is the power antenna relay.

I should mention that my power antenna never worked since I got the car, so I removed that piece of garbage and put a regular 'ol whip antenna there.

So my power antenna relay is now my "system turn-on relay". I could chain 15 amps off that sucker, and never hurt the radio... although I might wind up blowing the ACCessory fuse.

That's weird though, theratdude64... almost sounds like the radio in your friends car was shorting out. Even if the amps turned off, the radio would still be powering the power antenna relay... weird.