Z06ster

Sharks,

For some time, I noticed that when my power amp for my woofers and tweeters (4 channel amp) is playing the music loud, the amp cuts out and it's protective mode engages. A red light indicator goes on indicating the amp was shorted. This weekend, I gutted out the car and ran all new 10 gauge wire from the amp to the front component speakers (woofer and tweeter) and rear woofers. I thought this would solve the problem but it hasn't.

Can a speaker short out under volume operation? I am thinking that this is the problem,,,by process of elimination... I don't know what else there is to check (other than the amp itself I suppose). I have never heard of this before.

Thanks!

markcz

Speakers can short out, but from what I've seen they usually stay shorted (it wouldn't just happen at higher volumes).

What's the exact amp model number, and what speakers/sub are you running?

Is there any other possible problem that can be indicated by the red light you're looking at? Check the manual. Any chance the amp is just overheating?

Z06ster

Mark... thank you very much for your response.

I am running an Alpine PDX 4.100 amp with Infinity Kappa Perfect 6.1 component speakers in the front and 5.25" Alpine woofers in the rear. The PDX amp manual said the light will come on when there is a short. I can easily reproduce the problem when the amp is cold. I just have to crank up the volume. Another reason I am suspicious of the speakers is that the problem seemed to occur after I installed the Infinity Kappas.

I have a separate monoblock amp for the sub. The sub never cuts out when the problem happens.

markcz

If it is one of the speakers or a crossover you should be able to isolate it with a bit of experimenting.

Start by disconnecting one of the front speaker wires at the amp. If it still trips, plug that one back in and try the other one. If it doesn't trip then the first one is bad...

If you can narrow it down to one side at the amp, then you can swap out the crossovers and see if it follows the crossover or a specific speaker.

If it won't trip with just one front speaker, then it may be the amp. If that's where you end up, try swapping front & rear speaker wires at the amp to see what happens.

Z06ster

I wanted to post an update on this issue... Thank Mark for your chiming in with suggestions...

Since I was running speedwire from the 4 channel amp outputs to the factory speaker harness (that is, I was using factory wiring from amp to speakers), I removed the necessary internal panels and uplifted the carpeting so that I could run new 10 gauge from the amps to each speaker (Editorial, getting the speaker wire through the driver's side door was a challenge). After going through that 3/4 day exercise, I found the 4 channel amp was still shorting out with the Infinity speakers.

As Mark suggested, I systematically looked at each speaker at a time. The rear Alpine SPR-13C speakers had no problems. However, the Infinity Kappa speakers would still short out the 4 channel amp (both independently). This still seems strange to me. So, I convinced a friend to loan me his 4 Ohm Component speakers and found his do not short out the amp when the volume is cranked. (The Infinity's and the test speakers were both 4 Ohms with comparable electrical specifications).

Looks like new component speakers are in my future...