Car Audio Turning Off

[Jay_R33]

hey guys

pretty much the problem im facing at the moment is that...i have a kenwood dvd player and a JBL sub in the boot pretty much when im driving all good but when im stopping at lights and music is cranked up so subbies goin nuts lol (mirrors all shaking) the audio cuts out the dvd unit just turns off and then re load itself and turns back on and if i havnt taken off yet it just goes straigh back off as soon as the bass hits..but when i start driving again its fine..its like the battery cannot generate enough power to keep the bass going?

any ideas? been told to get our of those power supply thingos that look like NOS bottles lol

[danielr34]

You have answered your own question.

Battery power is the most important thing for big bass, your amplifier is going into protect because your battery voltage is dropping below the minimum recquired for the amp to run ie approximately below 10.8V for most amps.

Upgrade your battery or install a second battery for maximum results.

Battery sugestions: Alco Batteries (thats what I use)

Yellow Top Batteries

Red top Batteries

Odyssey Batteries

Look for CCA level (cold cranking amps) 12V 400CCA or higher.

P.S It's all about the "BASS!"

[Jay_R33]

yeah i had an inkling that would be the problem, however stupidly i listened to the guy at autobarn who told me no it cannot be the battery, you need one of those power holders or suppliers (NOS Bottle looking things)...he prob just wanted to sell me that and then when i come back and say it aint working he would say yeah now u need to upgrade your battery...grr why do i listen to them

heading out today to get a new battery thanks dude

[Jack88]

dont asume anything!

Get a multimeter on your battery with the car running at idle with nothing else on like audio gear and take down some readings for voltage,then crank up your system to the volume you normally listen to it at where the problems happen and take down some more readings, Then post them all up here.

Jack

[Jay_R33]

yep will try and get onto it...ive realised today its cutting out alot more because the air con is on clearly lol so drains even more battery power..normally it will only do it when theres massive deep bass average bass is fine but with a/c on it cuts out all the time but will get a multimeter and post it up thanks mate

[.:: GimpS-R34 ::.]

also how big is your amp.. i had a massive sound system in my old car.. spent over 4g's.. and i used to pump it.. and it can cut off cause the amp is hot as! check cause there is only so much the amp can take then cuts off to cool down... i bought 2 heat sinks and the heat silicon to try draw some heat outta it and had two fans (amps were in custom install in wheel well).... one fan blew cool air in.. one fan blew hot air out.. gave me another 30-50min on playing time at high bass levels

[Jay_R33]

also how big is your amp.. i had a massive sound system in my old car.. spent over 4g's.. and i used to pump it.. and it can cut off cause the amp is hot as! check cause there is only so much the amp can take then cuts off to cool down... i bought 2 heat sinks and the heat silicon to try draw some heat outta it and had two fans (amps were in custom install in wheel well).... one fan blew cool air in.. one fan blew hot air out.. gave me another 30-50min on playing time at high bass levels

hmm not very big but its not just the amp cutting out the whole headunit cuts out? could the amp cause that? i actually just looked at my amp and the fuse is pretty much melted and the fuse holder is all melted really really bizarre

[GTRBOYZ]

OK from what you have explained I can tell there might be a few issues.

1. simpliest test Clean both your battery terminals use sand paper or a file. *Make sure Earth are well grounded to the body/chassis

2. Check your head unit wiring too make the Ground wire have good earth.

3. Make sure your Amp is well grounded too.

4. what size cable are u using must be atleast 8G and have atleast 50AMP fuse this will be fine.

5. check your alternator using a multi meter while engine running. atleast 13.8v to be decent.

6. The Nos bottle you're talking about is a Capacitor this baby are good for holding Power while u pounding away with bass. Mount as close to ur amp as possible.

see how u go

[Kujotk]

nothing to do with any of that. simply its the head unit's built in amp getting too hot.

Only way to avoid this is connect the rest of your speakers to a cheap four channel amp. My head unit used to turn its self off for the same reason, only difference is my head unit used to say "too hot" and would stop for a minute. Nothing to do with your sub or amp, but get a capacitor in the mean time to keep a constant level supply of power to your amp. in the mean time don't run your speakers at full blast untill you get an amp for the speakers or you risk destroying the built in head unit amp.

your spekers quality will start to get worse over the next few months depending how loud and how often you play it loud.

If it was a power supply problem you wouldnt have much bass at all, and your system will be run by distortion.

[Jack88]

Jay if you want some advice from a installation technician that actually does this for a living please answer my questions and stop taking advice from "experts" on here, i know you mean well guys but please do not post if you do not know what your doing,you are just going to waste peoples time and money telling them to buy things they really dont need.

[Kujotk]

i had same prob as him EXACTLY and thats how i fixed it, amp and capacitor..... even if its not the head unit running too hot, my method of capacitor will fix it if its power supply prob. Either way i'm still right and I had the same problem as him exactly, this is how i fixed it, will work for him.

either way running the other speakers from a cheap external amp instead of the crappy inbuilt 18-20ish rms built in amp is a billion times better/safer/clearer than running of the head unit if he is going to pump the sound as often and as loud as he says he does, constantly stessing the head unit, in the end he will end up melting the kenwood amp in the headunit in time anyway.... i have already done this in a cheaper brand sanyo head unit, that didnt have rca's so i had to then change the whole headunit (cost more than a cheap amp) anyway.

and looking back at original post looks like its 99% chance your alternator is going to shit itself and/or your current battery is about to die. When my battery died when i had the capacitor connected to it i had no warning that the battery was old because the battery is in the boot (looks good clean and new), and no power problems untill there was NO acid left in the battery at all. The capacitor kept the car going as usual right untill there was no battery acid left in it. turns out the battery was a japanese brand battery that went broke and closed its doors in the year 2002 so the battery was super old.

More than likely it must be the battery because the alternator cannot produce enough amps at a specific time to handle a sudden power drain (from sub). The battery would take over for most of the power being supplied and the alternator just keeps topping up the battery and supplying extra power when the battery drops....

[DRD-00F]

Altenator seems to be fine as it pushes the power through the system when the vehicle is in motion.

Most likely you need a bigger battery. But check your earths to make sure they are making good solid connection. Don't worry about a capacitor, that's like buying a second battery, the only difference being that it is solid state and can release all its stored energy almost instantly...

[GTRBOYZ]

I think the best way is to get it inspected in person. Hard to find a correct solution if not enough info is given and it could be many possibilities that causes the the cut off. For god know could be a faulty unit ( knock on wood). But the way I have show you is to eliminates possible causes. IF you have wired the Speakers directly to your Unit. Then it is possible that the unit could over heat from high volume. Factory Unit inbuild amp is not that strong. Plus I dont know what size is your speakers or how many is hook up to the unit. Some unit come with inbuild thermo protection that cut out the power when overheating to save your Unit from melting up. When the unit turn off so will your amp. Unit have the remote wire link to your amp unless you have wired differently.

Incase of over heating then best way to solve is buy a 2 or 4 channels amp and use that to run the speakers 2 or 4 speakers and have the unit free of heat and produce better signal to the amp. *better sound from amp anyway , louder, stronger, clearer and more control.

good luck this is my last post for this topic.

Yeah Sorry We're not expert like some in here. cough cough...

Ok guys non expert packing up and leave.

I am packing up and leave now.

Edited February 2, 2009 by GTRBOYZ

[Chris Rogers]

too many chiefs not enough indians I figure. take it to someone and get the thing looked at.

[Vik]

Professional help needed

IMHO, seems like it is the battery.. If the amp got hot and turned off, why would that trigger the DVD player to turn off.

Im guessing you dont have a Volt gauge. Thats one of the first things i got when installing my system.

Do your lights start to dim when you say its "about to" turn off.

Capacitor will give it a constant feed, but you dont want to turn around and get one, and it doesnt solve the problem. Try another battery, borrow a mates one. Do the cheap things first .. so you dont just spend on useless junk.

MRXTCZ

[Kujotk]

Professional help needed

IMHO, seems like it is the battery.. If the amp got hot and turned off, why would that trigger the DVD player to turn off.

Im guessing you dont have a Volt gauge. Thats one of the first things i got when installing my system.

Do your lights start to dim when you say its "about to" turn off.

Capacitor will give it a constant feed, but you dont want to turn around and get one, and it doesnt solve the problem. Try another battery, borrow a mates one. Do the cheap things first .. so you dont just spend on useless junk.

MRXTCZ

headunit has a built in amp that when it overheats the head unit turns off and in turn makes the external amp turn off

[Jay_R33]

well i forgot about this thread and hadnt read the last few posts but in case you guys were ever wondering again...i took it to one of my strathfield stores and got em to look at it as my amp had f*ked up anyway i needed a new one

as you kno r33's have the battery in the boot and in turn the red battery/power cable going from amp to battery was full length never been cut so it was cable tied together which in turn i found out when it heats up the whole cable was heating and cutting the power off to the amp or something like that but as of now since we cut it back the amp & headunit had not cut off

although thanks for the help boys..