Big 3, 1/0awg wiring, second battery - for saz1500d v1 amp
Senior Member
Joined: 09-20-2008
Posts: 210
From: Iowa
Ok so basically I have all stock electrical
I just bought a sundown saz1500d v1 amp and I'm not getting very good results with the sub (american bass VFL extreme 15")
both sub and amp do 1500w rms @ 1 ohm
I have 4awg 4' from the battery. amp is in the storage above the battery
Wondering if I can just get away with bigger wire (or perhaps even just doubling or tripling the 4awg runs?) or would I NEED to do the big 3 and get a second battery?
A few notes:
1. Box is 4 cubes. I have been told it needs to be 3 cubes.
2. The bigger box means it can handle more power, but if you don't have enough power, it's going to be bad.
3. I smell a toxic sort of rubbery smell at higher volumes, but hear no audible clipping or distorting. Sub DOES play loud and low however.
I just bought a sundown saz1500d v1 amp and I'm not getting very good results with the sub (american bass VFL extreme 15")
both sub and amp do 1500w rms @ 1 ohm
I have 4awg 4' from the battery. amp is in the storage above the battery
Wondering if I can just get away with bigger wire (or perhaps even just doubling or tripling the 4awg runs?) or would I NEED to do the big 3 and get a second battery?
A few notes:
1. Box is 4 cubes. I have been told it needs to be 3 cubes.
2. The bigger box means it can handle more power, but if you don't have enough power, it's going to be bad.
3. I smell a toxic sort of rubbery smell at higher volumes, but hear no audible clipping or distorting. Sub DOES play loud and low however.
2. Take out the 4 gauge and get you some nice 1/0 OFC.
3. Run a run of 1/0 OFC from the alternator to the back of the car, also run a ground from the engine block to the rear. Also use 1/0 OFC.
4. A second battery is great to have since our vehicles alternators are regulated by the ECM and you dont get 100% of your alternator all the time. Get a good AGM Group 31 battery.
Is the smell your smelling, the voice coil heating up? Just because you don't hear any clipping from a sub doesn't mean it's not.
As far as the box. Those subs prefer larger boxes and ports from what I've come across. 3.5-4 cubes, anywhere from 50-70 square inches of port tuned around 35hz should perform pretty well.
But in conclusion upgrade your electrical. 4 gauge on that amp and stock everything is no bueno. Those amps are pretty stout amplifiers. I've gotten over 1900 rms out of one, no problems.
Member
Joined: 05-06-2012
Posts: 42
From: Florida
That wire is under about 3 layers of shelving, and carpet. I'd bet the sub is overheating more than the wire. Keep the 4ga, run a second battery and turn the gains down. Doubt that sub can take full tilt very long at 1500+watts.
Senior Member
Joined: 12-14-2007
Posts: 2,964
From: Toronto ON Canada
And when you do the big 3, make sure the battery ground to the body is clean. If its like mine, they painted the body THEN attached the negative battery cable to it. Just removing the bolt and reseating it helped with some alternator whine I had. For higher power setups Id sand some of the paint off for better contact.
Joined: 12-03-2010
Posts: 9
From: dothan, al
Question, are you running the stock radio? My experience with some gm radios are they lower the bass at full volume to prevent distortion.
I have not seen anyone mention a capacitor, this will make a big improvement keeping the voltage to the amp constant keeping the bass nice and tight.
You might want to consider upgrading the size wire for the speaker, this is as important as the size wire going to the amp from the battery.
You probably need to spend the time and money to sound deaden, when I did my system the roof put off such a high pitch sound it drowned out my bass. It sucls but there is way more to a good system then just an amp and speaker, hope this helps.
I have not seen anyone mention a capacitor, this will make a big improvement keeping the voltage to the amp constant keeping the bass nice and tight.
You might want to consider upgrading the size wire for the speaker, this is as important as the size wire going to the amp from the battery.
You probably need to spend the time and money to sound deaden, when I did my system the roof put off such a high pitch sound it drowned out my bass. It sucls but there is way more to a good system then just an amp and speaker, hope this helps.
Thread Starter
Senior Member
Joined: 03-17-2012
Posts: 1,042
From: Bay Area, CA
Question, are you running the stock radio? My experience with some gm radios are they lower the bass at full volume to prevent distortion.
I have not seen anyone mention a capacitor, this will make a big improvement keeping the voltage to the amp constant keeping the bass nice and tight.
You might want to consider upgrading the size wire for the speaker, this is as important as the size wire going to the amp from the battery.
You probably need to spend the time and money to sound deaden, when I did my system the roof put off such a high pitch sound it drowned out my bass. It sucls but there is way more to a good system then just an amp and speaker, hope this helps.
I have not seen anyone mention a capacitor, this will make a big improvement keeping the voltage to the amp constant keeping the bass nice and tight.
You might want to consider upgrading the size wire for the speaker, this is as important as the size wire going to the amp from the battery.
You probably need to spend the time and money to sound deaden, when I did my system the roof put off such a high pitch sound it drowned out my bass. It sucls but there is way more to a good system then just an amp and speaker, hope this helps.
I forgot about this thread. email notification wasn't working
anyways, here's an update
I've installed 1/0 OFC wire 2 feet from the battery to both the positive and negative of the amp (and battery)
I will probably end up getting more 1/0 wire for the battery ground to chassis tomorrow.
I almost bought a kinetik hc600 which was "100 farads" for $50 which seems about 100 times better than a 1 farad capacitor and about the same price.
I don't want to spend $300 on a new battery...
also I traded that sub and fried another so I'm currently looking for a 15" or 2.
the mojo I had was 400w rms and fixmyspeaker can fix it and make it 750w rms for $100. I might just go that route and build a better box for it and mount the amp on it and make it look nice/custom/built in
was also thinking maybe even 4 10's or 12's?
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post