i have a pioneer tssw 301 sub (1000 watt max 250 rms). i had it powered for a little while with a RF punch 200.2 amp (200 watt rms bridged). that amp took a crap on me a few weeks ago so i picked up the pioneer gm-8500 amp (300 watt rms 1200 watt max) and the RF punch was by faaar soooooo much louder and deeper than the pioneer amp. what gives? no matter how i messed with the settings on the amp and my head unit (pioneer avh4100) the sub just has no kick to it like it did with my RF amp. any ideas on what the hell is wrong?

 

ya the problem is its a pioneer amp

 

its all about quality my friend. i used to have 2 twelve inch P2's in my trunk with a fosgate amp. now i got two 10 inch W7's with a JL Audio amp and the difference is night and day. in the audio world it really is about how much ur willing to spend.

 

thats baby bass. isn't that the same as the stock subwoofer?

 

ok so i guess the concensus is that my pioneer gm-8500 amp sucks ass. so im gonna return it b/c im so not happy with it at all. what suggestions for an amp do u guys have? im only running 1 sub so a mono channel amp would be cool, but multi channel would be good too if it'll be better. help me out yo. btw im not an audio noob at all in any way. ive installed many a head unit, speakers, systems, caps, you name it if done it haha.

 

what impedance is the sub? also it may or may not be worth it but the shop i work at could repair the fosgate amp for ~70 bucks

 

i got a 1200W coustic bass amp for sale if you want it.

 

I'm not trying to be a dick, but to OP, I wouldn't do that (^^)
Chances are its better than the Pioneer but still, you get what you pay for.....Or sometimes you don't even get that. The price tag on that Pioneer looked large for it to not be preforming, however you just learned what many before you found out the hard way, Pioneer is over priced and pulls even with Alphasonik and Pyramid quality wise. I can't for the life of me figure out how they manage to stay in business.

If we knew the make model of the sub, it would make thing easier but to take a shot in the dark, since that Fosgate could only do 4 ohms bridged, I'm guessing you have a SVC 4ohm sub thats rated for about 300 watts.
My advice to you, without knowing what sub your running is if you liked the Fosgate, get another one. For the price you paid for that Pioneer you can get the P500-2 at woofersect. and have a little head room, or get another P200-2, or a P300-2 and list goes on.

 

agreed

 

hey spun, let me quote the first sentence of my thread.

and yes it is 4 ohm

 

get another P200-2 or P250.2 and call it good

how did ur first one fry anyway?

 

my opinion...dont waste your time on anything other than JL. if you have to save up a little for it....do it. cause trust me...ITS WELL WORTH IT!!

 

pfff jl is good but not everything is worth what they charge. **** they wernt selling enough TMA so they renamed it JL to sell more. and no it didnt get better to meet jls standards. their standards just got worse.

 

its not completely fried i dont think but its definitely just about donezo. it'll be working for a few minutes then go into "protection" mode and shut off, then turn back on for a few seconds, then shut off again for a minute or so. at first i thought it was b/c of the heat b/c i noticed it doing that on the first really hot day we had a few weeks ago, but then after it cooled down outside it still continued to act up. i checked all my wiring and everything is fine. I'm lookin for some more suggestions on an amp that would power my sub better b/c IMO the p200.2 was underpowering it significantly. ive heard good things about audiobahns amps, anyone agree/disagree/have better ideas?

 

disagree

 

I def liked my rf p200.2 so I was looking around and think im prob gonna go with the p400.2. Its rated at 400watt bridged @ 4 ohms. I found it on amazon pretty cheap so im probably gonna go that route. Unless someone has a better suggestion (im looking in ur direction emp haha).

 

sure its a good amp. the p500 is a hella alot bigger thou so if ur looking for the ultimate. but im positive the p5002 or p500.2 will blow that speaker if you abuse it

 

in sense i can see what your talking about. but at the same time...i can knock the **** outta my neighborhood. im telling you man, my ***** frickin LOUD!!!!

 

i bet man. not saying anything bad about jl but they are a company like everyone else. not everything they make is gold.

Im just saying that they are more expensive then most and really is dependent on the car. i can sell a 450 dollar total system thats "ok" and at the end of the day its the cheapest **** we got whatever. but you can go down the street to the jl audio dealer and buy the same or worse equipment for 1000 and its not going to be any different other then the name. If jl was maybe 25% cheaper all the way thru the line then i might say its worth it but

 

ok so ive decided im gonna go with the p400-2 amp b/c that seems to be more in my budget and should put plenty of power to my sub w/o blowing it up haha. but i have a few more questions. RF suggests 4ga wire so thats what im gonna do. im gonna run 1/0 wire from the battery to a distribution block, b/c theres a good chance of me upgrading all of the speakers in the future and amping them, and then run 4 ga from the block to the amp. should i put a fuse on the 1/0 between the distribution block and battery or on the 4 ga between the amp and block? also, what amperage fuse should i use?

 

with the battery in the back u dont really need 1/0 4g is fine for 2 amps as long as its real 4g

if u do do 1/0 then u want a normal fuseholder and a fused dblock. so a 250-300a fuse on the 1/0 (again real wire) and fuse for each amp on the d block

 

another good idea is to a second battery for the system. i did my with Kinetik. its a really small battery but it juices the system perfectly! here's a link for more info....

http://www.kinetikaudio.com/2009/products.asp