ShiZZZoN's Build Log

[shizzzon 461]

amazing, i use autocad too!

Yep, call me today. We discussed this earlier that you are 6hrs behind me so call me sometime after 10:00 am today and i'll be here.

[shizzzon 461]

Ok guys.

The amps are supposed to be back in wednesday but i do not think i'll be ready for them when they come in.

Since i'm going to be changing some wiring configurations around and trying to get the most out of my midrange all at the same time, i am going to try and get these things setup asap but the day they come in may or may not happen.

I've been trying to run these amps strapped but the slave always fails so i'm gonna run each amp to it's own sub.

That's gonna involve me pulling one of the subs out of the box and rewiring everything and putting it back in.. the problem with that is the cut out for the sub is a perfect cut and has foam tape inside of the hole so unless i can perfectly balance a 50lb sub back in the hole.... it won't happen to easy.

Plus, i gotta rewire my relays in a 3" hole i have to work with... that's gonna be fun in 96 degree weather.

So, hopefully i can get the means to be able to get this stuff done soon so i can finally get some info about these AQ2200D amps out there to you all.

[shizzzon 461]

Ok, had a little time to work on my midbass and range and high range today.

I have been complaining about the lack thereof... well, let's see what i found...

Apparently... i have no phasing issue so that whole problem there saved me a lot of frustration and possible more money to correct, Thank goodness for that.

So, when balance and fade are at 0, i get maximum volume as compared to shutting one or more speakers off, basically, the way it should be.

Now, let's move on to the midbass area and midrange.

I noticed that i had my rear 6.5s highpassed on the HU at 80hz... that would explain why i wouldnt have any decent midbass... Duh!!!

So, i turned the highpass on the HU off.

I run a sundown 100.4 by the way so try and follow me here-

The 6.5s have a starting response at 45hz according to it's specs so i played a 45hz tone and with the oscope in my face, i started to increase the subsonic filter from 10hz to a point to where the output voltage from the amp would start to drop.

I noticed that on the Sundown 100.4, 25v output seems to be the maximum output i can achieve out of a channel before clipping starts. I think just under 25v but i know that in the 25v area, i do see a small clip.

Ok, back to the subsonic filter- So i keep turning it up, output voltage is running at 24.79v. I turn the filter up until the voltage backed down to 24.41v so i know now that the filter is in effect.

Just out of curiosity, i decided to play a 35hz tone to see how steep the subsonic would roll off... at 35hz, output voltage was at 24.01v... not that steep at all. This was done without a load on the amp and i'll get to what happened when the speakers were on the amp but for right now, the roll off isn't that steep which may cause a mechanical problem if forgotten about...

So anyways, onto setting up the amp again-

The crossover settings i had were completely dumbfounded.... so i changed them all again. The only thing that was set right was the gains, hehe, the hardest part for most, hehe.

So, i noticed something interesting about the Sundown 100.4. Now, i didnt measure every little note but this is what i do know-

When i set the gains, i used a 1khz tone and a 600hz tone. Both notes have the same waveform and output voltage and since i used no boosts or cuts, i "assumed" the rest of the playable range would be flat too.... nope, not true.

Once i dropped down to 200hz, the output of the amp started to drop. Keep in mind that the 600hz and 1khz tones, not exactly this but were measured right around 25.02v.

When i got to 200hz, the output was 24.09v... Droppin a little there... I took it all the way down to 55hz.

I chose 55hz because my sub box peaks at 34hz and since it's tuned low, it won't excel too great in the higher range, let's say above 50hz mostly. So 55hz is a good place to start getting the most out of my rear 6.5s.

55hz output was a lot less than 25.05v, it was somewhere around 17.7v, i was like... um, problem here...

There was still another x-over active but after fixing that, it only went up to the 19v range... So, i had to use something that they told you to never use! Bass boost! The gains are set right, however i am having a filter effect in the low end. So i bass boost somewhere in the 50hz range. I VERY slowly started to turn the bass boost. I may have gotten maybe 3 little clicks on that boost and already maxed the voltage out where it wanted to start clipping again.

Just a notice- Bass boost is dangerous, hehe, if used improperly.

Now, these rear speakers are supposed to only play up to 4khz so let's move on to finishing bandpassing these 6.5s with the Sundown...

Remember, a 1khz tone tested fine when setting the gains. I played a 2.5khz tone, output voltage just liek 1khz so fine there. I then played a 3.5khz tone and noticed the output voltage began to back off again, it dropped down to 23.78v... Luckily, that was good news for me because i needit to start rolling back off soon because i cant have these things goin full tilt too much higher.

Now, onto the strange part for those who haven't seen this before-

The amp is currently set on full pass playing a 4khz tone outputting 23.18v. I set the range to X10 and turn the LPF ALL the way over to 5khz. I then switch to LFP and the output voltage dropped from 23.18 down to 20.38v... But, i am within the filter's settings by far!?!? Apparently, the LPF is attacking the 4khz area even though it's set not to start rolling off until 5khz. I then played a 4.5khz tone and it rolled off even greater so for those with the amp, i am unable to sustain FULL potential output up to 5khz using the LPF setting on chan 3\4, i'm assuming chan 1\2 would do the same but never tested that for my case.

Well, anyways, i needed it to roll off so it's all good there.

I then hook the oscope up to the fronts and set them up.

I HPF the fronts, the lowest i can go is 50hz so 50hz it is...

Again, the HPF is active above 50hz in this case. Playing a 55hz tone with HPF at 50hz compared to running Full pass resulted in a loss of output voltage. But.... ding ding ding, if you remember, i also had to bass boost this low end range on chan 3\4 so i figure maybe the x-over isn't active right now?

Haha, boy was i wrong. So i bass boost a little bit more than the other channels for some reason to get it to max potential... out of curiosity, i decided to play 80hz to make sure i boosted the right range.... 80hz was Pretty clipped! That means that the HPF was in fact active higher than what it says it is. I know this because i was able to see what center frequency was being boosted and the notes above this were being boosted a LOT harded that notes below it.. which the HPF was effecting...

So, i readjusted the bass boost and fixed that dilemma.

Again, on chan 1 and 2, i noticed that somewhere in the 3-4khz range, i get a small dip in output voltage from the amp. I do not know what it does between 4-10khz but i know it does it between 3-4khz. From 10-14khz, output voltage was the same as compared to 1khz and 600hz.

This may be the amp or it may be the Head unit, who knows.

So, i finally get all that done, hook all the speakers back up and time to hear some music again...

I balanced and faded everything to 0 then faded and balanced different speakers and again, no phasing issue so there is only 2 things left to test, i just did one of them a while ago, the 2nd i will finish either tomorrow or sometime later if i have to do a more drastic approach to it-

The last things are to test mechanical limits of the speakers-

The thermal limits have been set but i gotta make sure no speakers break their mechanical limits...

So, i faded everything to the front and turned it up to where i would get maximum clean output potential. Startied playing a song with some bass, perfect, clean midbass in doors non sealed. Sounded pretty nice honestly. I turned it up just one more notch into clipping and still no audible warnings as to mechanical limit fatigue, so good so far.

I then go to fade all the way to the rear and start the song over.

Both speakers in the rear are having "popping" issues. Too much excursion. They did this once before and i built an enclosure around them with 1\4" cardboard and non expanding foam... Apparently, the non expanding foam isn't NO where near as strong as expanding foam BUT after i created these enclosures, the popping stopped so i figured it helped because it did with the settings i had at the time.

Well now, they are receiving more power because the output of the amp on the low end has been set that way via oscope. So, they will move more again. So now, i have 2 options-

1 - increase subsonic filter until they stop popping or

2 - take them off of their baffles and spray expanding foam in there this time but prevent the foam from expanding into the speaker's space by pressing it back out. Basically just using the foam as a sealer, a strong sealer. Then it should make it air-leak free.

The subsonic filter option is still a toss up in the air BECAUSE, if you remember at the beginning of this post, the subsonic filter went active at 45hz but at 35hz, it had barely dropped output power. I fear that at lower notes, it may be making these speakers move WAY too much as they shouldnt be playing below 45hz anyway.

So, later on, i'm gonna have to start playing notes below 45hz on them to see what's causing them to pop, or any notes further on up until i see where the frequencies begin that's making these speakers move too much.

So, that's where i am at right now.

Amps didnt come in today so they will probably be here tomorrow.

[slim2fattycake 85]

i stopped reading after 2 paragraphs lol. your just goin to have to tell me.

[shizzzon 461]

I did not receive my amps today... so i called and found out why.

They were just about to ship them out to me last friday when they remembered that they still needed to test them strapped up... They stated that they play fine for hrs independently.

So, they strap em up.... BooM!

The slave amp pops AND for the first time that i am aware of has now damaged the Master amp as well!

So, out of frustration, i've been without amps for over a month, driving around almost 400lbs of dead weight, no bass in the car, constant damaged amps... I am about to give up.

He was muffled when he was talkin but said somethin like some blade or metal or somethin was found under the PCB which caused the slave amp(the one that always goes out) to go out which actually damaged the master this time.

These amps have been worked on SO MANY times now... they better act like brand new when i get them forever.

I have never had a problem with an amp ever and to find out it has been something under the board...supposedly if i heard him right.

Well, i can say again that it's nothing that i am doing because they definitely replicated the problem.. Luckily, they fried them there instead of shippin em back to me and fried in my face for the 3rd time...

IF that happened, hehe, i'm not even goin there.

So again, when i get em back this year damage-free..., they will NEVER be strapped again. IT's too risky and too prolonged for repairs.

[ABXX49 20]

Well I know what amps I'm not buying now...haha

[shizzzon 461]

yea, i've been sayin it since the beginning, something isn't right if an amp is that sensitive to a slight rca issue.

Apparently, there never was an issue with my setup.

I install all my stuff myself so i know how things are wired and i never once doubted myself of a wiring or install error.

Now, since launch date, this is the 2nd amp that is defective.

abxx - when i do eventually get these damn amps back, i am testing them and comparing them to the sundown 1500d tests.

In terms of performance, it will be close.

In terms of reliability... The world will never know.

[shizzzon 461]

Well, got some more news today-

The Repair Center has stated that they are GUARANTEE-ing that when both of these amps get back to me, they will be working in perfect order. They are going to be putting in overtime to try their best to get these amps done, tested and shipped out by tomorrow.

So, they will arrive here either next wednesday or next thursday. That is if nothing else goes wrong.

[jonbearsmt 919]

Well, got some more news today-

The Repair Center has stated that they are GUARANTEE-ing that when both of these amps get back to me, they will be working in perfect order. They are going to be putting in overtime to try their best to get these amps done, tested and shipped out by tomorrow.

So, they will arrive here either next wednesday or next thursday. That is if nothing else goes wrong.

who is doing the repair?

[shizzzon 461]

www.amprepaircenter.com

[shizzzon 461]

Ok some more news-

I dont think the amps shipped today but it's not like i'm pissed because they didn't.

I got in touch with AQ a few minutes ago and they said that the last time they had them in for testing, they were strapped together being tested and 6hrs of constant output, they finally blew each other (hehe that sounds funny)

Well, i already stated what the reason was to that but because AQ knows how frustrated i am with waiting so long, the repair center is going over these amps like a mite in a haystack to ensure there is absolutely nothing wrong with either of these amps and WILL be tested in every possible configuration method to ensure 100% working order before they leave this time.

Just for the sake of safety, i am going to be running these independently to each sub and using the PAC Audio universal remote gain controller to adjust the gains when i need to attenuate the output, so for my purposes, they will still act strapped.

I'll just level match the hell out of them and set the crossover settings perfect with the oscope and i'll be all set.

[shizzzon 461]

YAY!!!

Some news of GooD!!!! lol

Audioque messaged me today saying that one of the amps, i'm assuming the Master, has been successfully repaired and tested both independently and in strapped mode and is guaranteed to work. They are not going to send the slave amp back to me, instead they are shipping me a brand new amp that just came in from the factory. It to was just tested again, independently and in strapped mode and is guaranteed to be in working order.

I am to assume they will be in next week for sure, hopefully by next tues\wed.

If all goes well... we will have ourselves some extensive power testing!!!

ALL Power tests will be posted in a separate thread so this log doesnt get overrun with questions and comments about the results.

They will each be ran independently but will be level matched and tested at moderate volume to test for matched output. If the output is slightly different, it will be posted in the thread. I'm not gonna meter each amp, it will be understood that the power outputs are similar once i test that out too.

So far, for those just waiting for results, the only number i pulled off so far was this-

408w of output @5.39 ohms, 100% clip free at 13.1v.

Amp rated for 700w @4ohm with 1%THD at 14.4v.

I will be doing VERY extensive testing-

We'll be getting the entire impedance curve over the normal playable range for these subwoofers first before we do power testing so i can choose which resistance loads i want to test at.

We will be getting power output clip free, and clipped signals in small increments until we reach system fatigue.

We will be getting efficiency levels at each chosen resistance load and will record the battery voltage when done so.

The test will ONLY be done with the vehicle off to ensure lowest possible voltage test for more real world scenario or more of a worst case scenario.

2 D5100 and 1 D3100 will be powering these tests for a total of 237aH worth of bank.

These amps are sustainable down to an incredible 8.5v but will shut off before then so we shouldnt have a low voltage issue, hehe.

I'll go ahead and say that i will not be able to test it's 1 ohm rating due to the wiring configuration and impedance curve but am expecting to be able to hopefully get a load as low as 1.3ohms, we are crossing fingers.

The test thread is ALSO SPECIFICALLY dedicated to compare the AQ2200ds to the Sundown 1500ds.

I'll compare test loads to that amp's tests that fit the matched resistant load and that's it.

I want to make a point to show people 2 choices they may have... or will they?

[Adrian_D 520]

for new amp

Why not try them with the car on and start each once the voltage is at a certain level ? With full-power tests you are going to be pulling a bit of current from the batteries and even with 237Ah, multiple tests are going to hurt a bit

[shizzzon 461]

ahh, you're gonna make me post it, hehe

I currently have a stock alt right now and i don't like abusin it with 4500w of amp on tap...

The main reason is that the voltage up front rests at 13.5v with the car on.

The voltage in the back rests at... the battery's float whish is usuually between 12.9-13.1v

Yes, that is a decent voltage drop, i just havent had time to experiment with what's causing it.

the system runs through 2 solenoids and 3 separate fuses.

[shizzzon 461]

Diddly diddly do dah.. da da da duh da, hmm hmm, OH, i forgot i was in my build log!

Well, i've already said the amps are on their way back to me so hopefully this will be THE final time i'm going to install these amps!

In the meantime, i have some other things i have to do to prepare for the finished install-

1 - Sound Deaden the doors

2 - Re-seal the rear fill with expanding foam.

3 - Replace ALL speaker wire with fresh wires for the new install. CHECK

I have new speaker wire... 40ft of it actually. I needed 8 runs, 2 subs, DVCs, so 8 runs of 5ft each.

Went to the store and picked up 40ft of 10AWG cable for the speakers, that should help get the power out of these amps to the subs a little better. The amp only accepts "supposedly" 12awg wire but we'll see won't we

Amp says it only accepts 1/0 power\ground but i got 2/0 in there so i'm sure i can get this 10awg in there too.

I have a voltage drop as i have stated before, it's unknown how big it is since my alt voltage level to my float in the rear is only a 0.4v difference so it's hard to tell how bad it is. I'm gonna have some time soon to start tackin that issue and let you guys know what it causing it.

[shizzzon 461]

One of the 2 amps came back today...

I'm not gonna test it because it's been raining all day.

Still waiting on the other one so hopefully it'll be here tomorrow.

I'm gonna test EACH one at a time to make sure they work before i secure them in the car.

The repaired amp is the one that came in today... I will say it "Smells" different, hehe, it smells newer than the new amps, i dont know any other way of sayin it other than that.

[TreyE 0]

...

Edited August 8, 2008 by Chevy350TPI

[shizzzon 461]

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[chad.SQ 0]

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[slim2fattycake 85]

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[shizzzon 461]

UPDATE---

PS - pay no attention to the previous posts, they're irrelevant.

Ok, I got the amps back from repair, one was repaired, the other brand new.

I have tested each amp myself one at a time and BOTH amps ARE successfully working now.

However, there is one thing i'd like to add, it may be nothing because too many variables right now.

I tested each amp at 1 ohm using 1 HDC3 in free air because it's out of the box.

The repaired amp was making the sub bottom out or sounded like it. That amp was only turned up a little more than the other amp but still yet, it's odd because the HU volume is far from where it usually is.. I know the sub was free-aired so let's pray that it was popping because of that and not because of some "other" amplification problem.

I will be redoing most of the wiring tonight and tomorrow so i can run these unstrapped so i should be up and running soon.

I did not test them strapped because i no longer want to risk that anymore.

[sick6ness 1]

Great to hear.... Now maybe you'll get it in without any problems!

[shizzzon 461]

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Everything has just been installed and wired!

Everything works!!!

Now, i gotta order my 250A alt from Mechman so in the meantime, all play and tests will be done with the car off when ran at full tilt.

On a side note, my spoiler is about to fall off now

I am now waiting for anybody who is available to help me meter these amps so i can get all of that extensive testing i said i was gonna do done... i just cant get ahold of anybody now...

[Adrian_D 520]

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Everything has just been installed and wired!

Everything works!!!

For the win ! ! !

[shizzzon 461]

Well, i cant get ahold of anybody for tomorrow either so it's lookin bad test-wise...

After i eat here shortly, i'm gonna go out there at low volume( in my neighborhood), and find my impedance curve so i know what frequencies to burp at when testing the output of these amps.

I'll start a new thread about all this because this has to do with comparing the AQ2200D to the SAZ-1500D.