Amps popping? Speakers popping?

Okay guys- Here's the deal- I wired up 2 Clarion 400w 2 channel amps in my 24SSV. When I ran the remote wire off the deck to the amps they seemed to overload (??) the deck and it would intermittnetly turn on and off. To fix this I thought I would forego the remote wire off the deck and ran power directly to the amps through a switch up under the dash.

Now when I flip the switch I hear a popping sound out of the speakers say 75% of the time. I am assuming this in bad- what can I do? Should I be worried? Have I wired anything incorrectly...?

Thanks in advance

How do you have the amps wired to power?

Ideally, you would use heavy gauge wire, the negative wired directly to the battery and the positive through a fuse or circuit breaker, located as close as possible to the battery. If you picked up power or ground anywhere else it can cause all sorts of problems.

If you have good clean power and still have random noise or strange behavior then I would recommend running a second ground wire directly from the stereo to the amps. This doesn't have to be a really big wire, but I would recommend 12 to 14 guage wire. Most stereos have a spot in the back that is made for connecting a large ground strap.

Rod-

First off thanks for taking the time- I have the amps wired to power with 10 or 12G wire just like you say... It's only popping when I hit the switch on the remote wires running into the amps...?

Some Head units have 2 remote's 1 for the power antenna, (that leed dosent have that much juice) you might have the power antenna leed running to your amp's. The 2nd leed is for the Amp kick on. (this leed has more kick on power).

When I set up a big systems I hook up a relay that the head unit turns on and this relay is what I use to Kick on the whole system. Keep in mind that im turning on like 4 amps TV's screen and DVD players so Im sure you dont need somthing like this just giving you some ideas if your head unit dosent have enough power to kick on your amps

Thomas:

It is possible that the amps don't like the remote input being controlled by a mechanical switch.

Most amps (every one I have seen in the last 10 years) have a "soft start" feature. This keeps the speakers quiet while the amp powers up or down. The amp powers up based on the remote signal. When this signal is driven by a head unit it would switch cleanly, that is, it will either be ON or OFF.

A mechanical switch is by its very design very "noisy". The common term is "contact bounce" and is a major problem with any device that needs to respond to a switch input. Devices that are expecting to have a switch input will have some sort of "debounce" circuit.

What happens is this: When you flip the switch, the contacts are shoved together very quickly to minimize arcing. Unfortunately, when they hit they bounce, and switch makes contacts, then breaks it, then makes it, then breaks it, and so on for as long as it bounces. This will happen very quickly and you would never notice it on a light circuit or similar device.

It is possible that the amp gets confused by this. It is being told to turn on, then off, then on, then off, then on.... This may cause the "soft start" feature to malfunction.

As for the size of wire to your amps: I was suggesting adding an additional wire of size 12 guage between the stereo and amps. You should be using much larger wire between the battery and the amp. If you are using the same set of wires to supply two 400 watt amps then the wire needs to be able to provide 800 watts of 12 volt power, or 800/12=66 amps. If you are running 66 amps through 10 guage then you are overloading the wire to start with, and unless the wire run is very short (like less than a foot) you will have an unacceptable voltage drop due to the wire.

To properly size the wire you need to know the total wire run. If it takes 10 feet or wire to get to the battery to the amps, then the total run will be 20 feet because you have to account for the ground return as well. If you wanted to keep the voltage drop to less than 3% then for a 20 foot run at 66 amps you would need to use 4 guage wire. If you were running 10 guage you would be getting almost a 20% drop when the amps really worked hard, which would drop the voltage to 9.6 volts and the amps could shut down due to the low voltage.

My suggestion is this:

1) Beef up the wire size between the battery and the amps. If in doubt, go to the next size larger wire! You may need to add a junction block near the amps that can accept 4 guage wire and then go from that to the amps in whatever size wire they can accept.


2) Add a second ground wire directly from the stereo case to the amps. This wire can be 10 guage.

3) Reconnect the remote input of the amps to the deck.

A simple suggestion that you might try before you do any rewiring (assuming you are happy with your current set up with the switch) is to turn the switch on before you turn on the head unit. This way your amps will turn on before they receive any signals, which could lead to the elimination of the "pop" you hear.

Do you currently turn your head unit on before you flip the switch? If so, you are sending signals to your amps (before they are on) and once you flip the remote switch the amps turn on and see an impulse or spike in the signal to be amplified and you get a "pop"



(Message edited by wakeprodigy on July 20, 2005)

(Message edited by wakeprodigy on July 20, 2005)