Ok well everything was going great until this morning. My sub stopped working

Here's my setup:
Kicker zx400.1-wired at 2ohm the amp is rated by kicker for 427 rms. I had the bass boost about 3/4 of the way up Xover set at 200hz (deck set for 80hz)

Kicker comp vr rated at 400rms

the amp is not in protection mode but the sub just isint responding. It has good travel although I could describe it's rebound as sluggish ( like if I push it in it moves fine just rebounds slowly)

I'm at a loss. If the consensus is that the sub is blown im done with kicker and will need alternative ideas for a sub to match the amp. Thanks in advance guys

 

ok now i'm really confused.

When I blew my first sub, the kicker rep I spoke to said the amp is 5v sensitive and because the head unit is 5v that I needed to have the gain set at 0. this has worked for a few months now.

So just for ***** and giggles I turned the gain up to 5. Sub works perfectly without distortion...... discuss

 

broken tinsil leads? have u pulled the subs out yet? sealed box

 

don't turn the gain up to high and then you shouldn't have to worry about getting distortion in your sub.

 

never got a chance to. as soon as I upped the gain it was fine. No distortion sounded exactly the same as before. Your guess is as good as mine. It's been working fine for a little over 2 months now with the gain set at 0 then just stopped working completely.

yeah it's in a sealed box.

although I do remember something I thought was wierd. When the sub first cut out the first thing I checked was travel to see if it was blown (with the stereo on) and when I would push the cone in the bass would hit. Mind you this was at med volume when I would normally be getting some decent bass out of it. Make anything of that?

I was hesistant of even turning it up at all since I blew the first sub. It's a little under half right now and seems to be working great.


I honestly have no idea. Been working fine for months, haven't moved any wiring or adjusted anything else at all it just stopped (worked fine when I was driving to work 8 hours earlier). The sub isin't blown (it's working fine now with the gain up)


Perhaps I can give a better explanation of what I expierenced this morning. Bear with me here. When I turned it up I had no bass coming from the sub so when I stopped to get a pack of cigarettes I popped the trunk and pushed lightly on the cone (because I learned the hard way if you cant move the cone that=bad) It depressed perfectly normal however the rebound back to the original position almost seemed a tad sluggish granted it could just be my preception. Checked the amp no protection lights. Ground and power wires are good speaker wires are good most importantly the amp is on the sub isin't hot to touch it doesnt smell like it's blown (that acrid smell followed by the poof of smoke wasn't there) I drove the rest of the way home almost an hour with the radio off hoping to avoid any possible further damage until I could see what you guys thought.

This afternoon i tried again and it still wasn't working so I decided to tinker with it a bit. Some of you may remember my epic gain fail from when I blew my first sub ( gain waaaaay to high) at the recommendation of the rep at kicker I spoke to his exact words were. Gain needs to be at zero 0. The amp is 5volt sensitive and the headunit is 5 volts. Been like that since that day. Bass Boost in the interest of full disclosure was set at max or 18 dec. Xover at 200 but controlled from HU. The only thingI changed was raising the gain from 0 to a little under half. Goes from 0-11. Now it works perfectly fine. I just want to make sure I'm not sitting on a time bomb.

Sorry for the length. But that's all the facts. Ideas?

 

that happened to me... my kicker just died... what i found out later was that i wasnt supplying enough power to the sub... the new cvr i picked up in los angeles which only cost me 60 bucks lol... was bridged and powered at full power from my amp after that...

 

sub is broken. i can guarantee the tinsil leads are broken. it just can still touch and still carry the current so it "works" at times. sounds like your case isn't quite as bad since its been playing more then not normally its half and half at best

reason i asked if the box is sealed is because you said you can push in the cone and it takes a while to come back out.... that's normal for a properly sealed box

 

Emp let me ask you something. Do you ever get tired of being right all the time? my sub cut out again so are the tinsel leads fixable or am I sol?

Ok I just went out and pulled the sub I found the tinsel in question it looks like it was mauled by a bear. The other leads are perfectly fine but I have no idea who could fix it or even if it could be fixed. Ill upload some pics later but ill start taking suggestions on a replacement sub

 

If the tinsel leads are gone, someone may tell you there fixable, but the sub will never be the same again. Plus it will not take much to fry them again.
IMO Junk the sub and get a new one, if you can get it fixed your just prolonging the inevitable.
May want to look into a sub with a stronger lead to it, the SSA's are good although with only 400 watts you would have to go with the DCON's (300watts rms) next step up is the ICON's at 1000 watts rms.

It all depend's on how much money you want to spend and what type of box your using. DD's are good but not if you want to use a sealed box, if your going to change subs then you should change the box as well

 

Well that sucks.
i found a guy today who said he'd probably be able to fix it. I was going to take it out there tomorrow. Would it hold up till I got a new one like a week or so?

I was thinking alpine type r

and it's a prefab box nothing special.

 

if the tinsel leads look trashed then the probably are. spun is right to some extent about the leads being un repairable but it all depends on how the leads built on the sub and more importantly how it broke in the first place. I defiantly wouldn't pay anything for the leads to be fixed at least on that sub.

Ive fixed many tinsel lead issues in my time but most break again eventually unless the whole thing is re ran (which ive done as well) and unless they are re running the lead then its not worth paying for.

 

duly noted alright then onto the next question. which sub should I get for a replacement?

I was thinking Alpine type R or Punch P3

I can get both for less than 150 which is kind of what I'm looking to spend.

any other suggestions?

Keep in mind I'll be sticking with the kicker amp for now. Vegas and Christmas coming up so money is tight. Any issues with either of these?

 

Go with the Alpine.

 

If a sub only plays half the time the tinsil leads are broken? I'm trying to clarify what you said because mines been doing that for about a week.

 

not nessicarily but in most cases. sub cutting in and out is either an amp issue (which he stated it wasnt) or a connection issue. the only moving connection is the tinsil leads so its the only logical thing that could be effected by turning up the gain. realistically it could be terminals, tinsil leads, speaker wire inside or outside the box ect

 

Well, I think I was my own worst enemy to this sub and I paid dearly for it. It depends whats happening.

when my sub first started cutting out, a few weeks ago I thought it was xover settings. setting the amp to 200 then controlling the xover from the headunit alieviated this problem for the most part but the sub would occassionally miss beats here and there.

my problem was that the amp just couldn't get any power to the sub the stock battery just didn't have it. I upgraded to the NGT Extreme and it cured all of those missed beat but I have a theory thats what caused my leads to fail. I mean someone correct me if im wrong but it was essientially clipping no?

In short when a lead goes you won't have sound from the sub. I got lucky or unlucky with mine. and it lasted another 12 hours with a bad lead.

The best way to know. Take it out and look.