now i havent ever noticed this problem with my system in the past, but for some reason now that its cold out, my subs seem like they have no power, or too much of it, they sound distorted whent heres a big sub boom but fine at a long bass line. i just put a new battery in the car, and i put the rear seats down so i dont know if either of the two are factors.

my system is:
2 10" Alpine type R
1000 watt amp (i know my profile says 2000 watt, but thats wrong)

i dont think it could be my amp going bad, but something seems as though its recently off

 

when our systems are cold the coils are tighter and stiffer causing the distortion. then when warm the materials are more flexible and expand which normaly takes about 5 mins before i can see the rear window warming up from the amp then the subs hit nice and crisp.

It also never hurts to take off your ground, clean it up, get some fresh metal showing on both the connector and car.
----------
btw what color is your car, its hawt.

 

haha thanks, its supposed to be a dodge color called "go-man-go" which is off the daytona trucks....but unfortunately that costs 225 dollars a quart, so this is 'tangerine' which is very close to it but 50 bucks a quart...im having some issues right now because i hit a tire stop with the front bumper(the license plate bracket caught it by a half inch) so now the bumper has to be repainted....although im thinking about maybe just holding off on it, waiting till i get a real job and my own place and repainting it the REAL color and having it solely as a show car....but something tells me thats a bit of a distance away lol especially inthis job market
----------
by the way, what kind of amp do you have that warms up the rear of the car in about 5 minutes? mine doesnt seem to ever get that warm, should i look into something to keep the back section warm when i turn on the car or just let the heat circulate?

 

tell me about it man, just graduated college, and no jobs and a huge bill to pay $. That really sucks about your front bumper, at leest it wasnt some fool who doesnt know how to drive and scrape the whole side of ur car down to the metal. then take off without leaving a note


I thought it was tangerine, i use to ride bmx back in the day and had my bike painted that color, i loved it. Looks really good thou

 

Ive got a 1200 watt Bolt Lightning Audio Amp, looks like bumblebee from Transformers, two 10" Sony Xplodes.

I broke my box in a few days after installing the setup. I only have it 1/3 turned up on the amp, and outa -6 to +6 on multiple head unit settings there all set at 0-2 and it destroyed my box and my hearing.

The Amp has a fan in it, thats probably why it circulates so well for me, i plan on moving the amp into the storage area in the right rear fender area.
Just let your system warm up like your car before you beat on it, will last longer.

 

Yeah. I also like to have Sony Xplodes (1200). I have them on my list already. You can really feel the booming bass.

 

ya know i also have the sony xplodes, 2 10's...i havet hem in my basement because i got the alpines for a good price (half off when i worked at best buy and these subs just came out) im actually trying to sell them if you know of anyone that wants them....they dont have much time put on them and ive kept them stored properly since i stopped using them

and yeah i hear ya about scrapage, some old woman hit my car a week and a half after i got done painting it when i was in a WAWA parking lot....i was furious, i had to repaint and rebondo the door, but fortunately the insurance payment from her was enough to cover the whole cost of paint for the car lol (500 bucks)

and also my amp doesnt have a fan in it and i try to keep the system down low when its cold out anyway, maybe i should look into a way to vent heat to back there.....

 

Yeah, it's real bad to run your system hard if its cold outside and hasn't warmed up. Just like a carburetor car, or any for that matter, its not good to start it and drive it hard when its cold, causes a lot of un-needed wear. Takes about 4-5 minutes of warming, you can turn it on as soon as you get in, but don't drive it hard until about 5-10 minutes later, low volumes only. This will extend the life of the system and make it work for much longer.

Also like cars, subs wear equally, a 7-8 month old sub, will generally not hit as good/hard as a 1 month old, likewise, a brand new sub will not hit as hard as a 1 month old sub, as you need to break it in, just like an engine.

Of constant use, after working in a car audio shop, about 8 months of being driven fairly hard daily is all you will get out of a good quality sub, with occasional use, weekends, they should last years. If you drive around everyday all day hitting on it, expect 3 months tops.

 

well these ones have been lasting me pretty well (knock on wood) and i have also started thinking...what if there is some way i could put something sort of like a heat coil into the sub box, just mount itint here, and have a switch that comes out of either the direct battery line for it, or from an ignition fuse blank so that i can warm up my system.....it may not be too bad of an idea.....now just to figure out how to make a small little heater like that lol

 

well i got my hands on a carb choke heater from a holley carb that my dad had laying around....now i just have to find some way to run it with a switch or something in it so i dont overheat the box lol....hopefully this will work out and keep the box warmed up when its really cold out

 

Your subs will generate enough heat on there own, I would not induce any heat as it may sound like a good idea, but heat destroys electrical components. Just run your system like its 1 AM, and a cop is next to you type loud. Few minutes later the coils will have warmed themselves up.
Not enough heat can cause the coils to become brittle while, the foam outer ring also tightens in the cold and can bust apart if u mash it cold.
To much heat will distort the copper and pop off the coil. Deformity of the Cone part you see can happen from extreme heat from the sun.

If you can keep the heat between 75-85 range that's cool, but seems like a lot of work you don't really need to do Just give it a few to warm up.

 

well i was just figureing that because my sub box is way int he back, and it doesnt get enough heat back there that this would be a good idea, you said that your amp keeps the rear end of your car warm but i also noticed tha tyoure from cali....here in jersey its pretty damn cold, like last week it didnt get above 25 degrees int he sun, and i was thikning about trying to put a timer or switch on this heater to warm the inside of the box for a few minutes and not let it get too too warm, just enough to maket he coils want to move

 

Since its cold as &((* there, why not try a remote start so your warm to when you get in Then your ride should be nice and toasty, system should be warmed up, motor will be warmed up, and be GTG without ever leaving the house

 

well i think that might be a bit out of my price range lol...i dont drive very far anyway andi have a bass switch for the subs up in front thati can just turn them way down with...can the cold be making my treble extra loud from my tri-tweeter speakers also or is that just my imagination?

 

well so far ive driven nearly 100 miles in the past two days, and its been around 50 degrees out each day....and while driving for about an hour i would have thought my sub box would have gotten warm enough from the coils to have made the subs sound right.....so i figured i should check the wiring and make sure i didnt pull something loose or something lke that, nothing was wrong....then i noticed the screws for the top of the subs were pretty loose....anyone think this could be an contributing factor as to why when i get a long bass line it sounds fine but at a bass bang it sounds like crap? i havent tried out the system yet but if it still sounds crappy then im going to just try to reset the amp and re-tune the power....i have a new car battery in this and the connection to the battery is better than before now (i had to kinda jerry rig the 12v wire before) and this is when the problems started...almost like now i have too much power although it doesnt sound it when i have the system low

 

Your box could be cracked, sounds like a situation i had. Sounded fine till it hit really hard then sounded blown. Took the carpet off the box, turned up the system, out shot a bunch of splinters to reveal a crack down the box

Try pushing on your box in various places when its playing, see if it sounds different.

 

ok...i'll give that a try...my box fits really tightly in there though...i made it so that i have to slide handles onto the box in order to get it out though so i dont think theres too too far taht it can move...i'll try though, i'll also try using it while its out of the pit in the back of thecar to see if i can notice or hear any air coming out

 

If you smoke or have access to something that produces smoke, it will be easy to find, just look for a blast of air coming out pushing the smoke away.

 

well tightening the screws seems to have done it....it didnt sound liek crap today lol

 

Its always better to overpower than to underpower, thats what the voltage screw is for on the side, louder and quieter. I found shortly after putting mine in that my alternator charging wire (18ga for some reason) was far too small going to the battery, I replaced it with a 10ga charging wire, and it put out alot more of a charge which solved my headlight/heater blower drainage problem this winter.

If your charging wire is too small it could make it sound like crap because it is only achieving 12v or less, an amp can use up to 18v, which it produces itself in voltage amplifiers and capacitors internally.

Also it is a good idea if you run 800+ watts to get a 1f capacitor for the car, this will make the heavy hits sound a lot better and harder, and the quick stuttery hits of bass sound better, or possible at that.

Capacitors discharge and recharge power MUCH faster than a battery can, this is why it is ideal for sound systems. If you pull an amplifier apart it should have a capacitor bank inside, sometimes this alone isnt enough.

 

ive been wanting to get a capacitor for a while, but i havent had the money when its been on my mind and when i do have the money i forget lol

 

can you maybe put a pic up of the wire that youre talking about about fromthe alternator by the way? just so i make sure i dont replace the wrongwire lol

 

Yeah, I'll take a picture in the day. But all you have to do is follow the wire coming out of the alternator that goes into the battery terminals.

 

Here is the pictures you wanted.

 

ya know i was just actually thinking today...seeing as how GM engineered this car to run with a smaller (i think you said 12 gauge) wire, wouldnt that mean that sending more power through the alternator may have a chance of overloading the whole electrical system and start blowing fuses like mad? and if it was meant to run with more power from the bigger gauge wire, then the original wire on there would burn up?

 

The alternator has a voltage regulator in it, it can only charge at a maximum of 14.4v

This is also why we don't use 24v alternators for our amps, and instead use extra batteries and capacitors is so that we don't overload electrical systems.

The wire that came as the charging wire factory I believe is a 14 or 16ga wire, I'm not entirely sure why the wire wouldn't burn up.

I've been running with a 10ga charging wire for months now with no problems.