Amp Problem!!! pls pls HELP!!!!

[clayparkley]

My amp, PPI PC450, suddenly won't turn on.
When I turn on the HU, it turns on for like half second and shuts off and it repeats every five seconds or so. Everytime it turns on for quick second, green light comes on and the speakers make slight popping noise.

Here's things I did to better understand the situation.
I installed this amp and a HU w/ stock wires and the speakers are PS.
After the install I was impressed with the improvement of the sounds.
I listened to it for about five minutes and I turned up the front gain a little, since I wasn't getting any distortion w/ the volume all the way up.
I didn't have much time so I left it as is and came back to it about 4 hours later. Car did not move and everything was exactly same as I left it.
Before I started the car I slightly turned up the front gain again, because I still did not hear any distortion on my previous adjustment.
When I started the car, I felt like I'm not getting the bass like it did earlier.
And for some reason it did not sound good to my ears, even though I was playing the same song I did earlier.
So I went back to the amp and turned down the gain all the way to start over and when I checked the sounds it still sounded funny.
Suddenly sounds got very distorted and dimmer and then no more sounds, but popping every 5 seconds.
When I went back to the trunk, I've learned that the amp is keep shutting off.

I bought the amp used and I know it's an old amp back from 90's.
But I want to know if it's the amp causing the trouble or something else.
Power is coming from front battery with 4 gauage wires and the ground is connected to the back of the trunk with the paints scraped off.
Remote wires are the stock remote and the antenna twisted together into the HU's Blu/wht cable.

Any ideas? and pls teach me the easy way to trouble shoot where the problem is coming from.

Thank you in advance.

[MozMike]

If the green light on your amp turns on but then the amp turns off you probably need a new one some amps will not turn on at all when they are fried others will get a green light end then go into protection mode, i can almost guaranty that your problem is or was caused by overheating and if you were running a powerful amp on 4 gauge wire or your using some power hungry speakers you will overheat that amp very fast, if the amp is of poor quality it probably didnt survive that explains why the sound was degrading the hotter the amp got the worse the sound became. Check your fuses but i doubt thats the case if your setup turns on but then turns off.

[clayparkley]

If the green light on your amp turns on but then the amp turns off you probably need a new one some amps will not turn on at all when they are fried others will get a green light end then go into protection mode, i can almost guaranty that your problem is or was caused by overheating and if you were running a powerful amp on 4 gauge wire or your using some power hungry speakers you will overheat that amp very fast, if the amp is of poor quality it probably didnt survive that explains why the sound was degrading the hotter the amp got the worse the sound became. Check your fuses but i doubt thats the case if your setup turns on but then turns off.

The green light does not stay on. It turns on for quick second, just like the amp itself.

Can Stock premium speakers could have been the power hungry speakers?
And running amp on 4 gauge, is that bad?
If the overheating was the problem, is that mean the amp was not in good cond. or did I do something wrong?

[StereoInstaller1]

First, lets make a few things clear: The 'Power" LED means basically nothing. In LOTS of amps it only means the remote wire has 12V on it. Obviously the protection LED SHOULD mean something, but even they are useless. They never say what is actually the issue, just that the amp is pissed off about something.

The description you give of the sound is actually the most telling. Your most likely to be an install issue, let us hope that is the case. Fixing that amp will not be easy, parts can be a bitch to get.

i AM GONNA GO GET ON a decent keyboard, I am using my home theater to post, it is useless.

[clayparkley]

First, lets make a few things clear: The 'Power" LED means basically nothing. In LOTS of amps it only means the remote wire has 12V on it. Obviously the protection LED SHOULD mean something, but even they are useless. They never say what is actually the issue, just that the amp is pissed off about something.

The description you give of the sound is actually the most telling. Your most likely to be an install issue, let us hope that is the case. Fixing that amp will not be easy, parts can be a bitch to get.

i AM GONNA GO GET ON a decent keyboard, I am using my home theater to post, it is useless.

Alright, I got my fingers crossed. I loved how it sounded when it was working, so I really hope it's just a minor issue.

[StereoInstaller1]

Cool, back to a decent keyboard. The cheap POS I have on my HTPC is just worthless. Combined with my total lack of skill at typing, it is miserable.

What you are describing sounds like the amp is starving for power. Lets hope that is not an internal issue!

OK, so lets look at power connections first, starting with ground. You should have a ring terminal attached to a hunk of wire as ground. It should be no more than 18" or so, possibly a bit longer is OK since you have a rear battery, meaning shorter power wire.

The ground wire should be at least 8GA. 4GA is fine, that is what you said you have. Too big will not hurt a thing.

That ring terminal need to be solidly connected to the floor of the car. NOT a shock tower, not a mount for something else, it needs its very own connection. Next it MUST be scraped clean of ALL paint. If it is not shiny clean metal, keep going. Paint does not conduct electricity. Use a razor blade to scrape, or some other sharp metal object, or sandpaper if you must.

Again, do NOT use an existing bolt. Make your own hole and make damn sure it is tight. A solid physical connection is the only chance you have of proper transfer of energy. You can use a nut and a bolt if you wish, just make sure you use a "nylok" type nut.

Now, on to the power wire. We can both assume you got your connections on the amp nice and tight...or you can triple check to make goddamn sure. Don't break the screw, but make sure that son of a bitch has ZERO connection issues.

You have not said what type of fuseholder you got, but that is no matter: they ALL suck. ANL style suck less (google that shit) but a big issue these days is that the contacts in the fuse holder itself are crappy metal. These tend to weaken and by not holding the fuse tightly fail to pass power properly.

Same story with the fuse, many times I have seen a fuse that had poor solder joints internally. This made for a fuse that looked just fine and even measure just fine with a voltmeter...but as soon as there was some load, it failed to pass current.

So now, go triple check that stuff. Move your ground if it is not EXACTLY as I described and make certain it is on the FLOOR of the trunk, do NOT fuck around with it.

If you have a testlight, use that to check your fuse too.

[clayparkley]

OK, so lets look at power connections first, starting with ground. You should have a ring terminal attached to a hunk of wire as ground. It should be no more than 18" or so, possibly a bit longer is OK since you have a rear battery, meaning shorter power wire.

I have front battery not rear.
I crimped the ring terminal myself and I found out that I did a poor job after the amp started giving me a trouble. I did not crimp it tight enough so I was able to just pull it out of the ring terminal. I fixed it, but still not satisfied with how it looks because it's not holding all the wires cleanly. (I'll post up a pic. later).
I think it might be longer than 18", since I used the whole length that came with the amp wiring kit package.
Same story with the power line I'm using the whole length as it came.

That ring terminal need to be solidly connected to the floor of the car. NOT a shock tower, not a mount for something else, it needs its very own connection. Next it MUST be scraped clean of ALL paint. If it is not shiny clean metal, keep going. Paint does not conduct electricity. Use a razor blade to scrape, or some other sharp metal object, or sandpaper if you must.

Ring terminal is connected to the back of the trunk not bottom, where you said the 4 triangles needs to be cut out for the vert sub box.

You have not said what type of fuseholder you got, but that is no matter: they ALL suck. ANL style suck less (google that shit) but a big issue these days is that the contacts in the fuse holder itself are crappy metal. These tend to weaken and by not holding the fuse tightly fail to pass power properly.

I think I have ANL. http://www.amazon.com/PK4Z-Gauge-Pow...6801657&sr=1-2 This is the amp wire kit I've bought...DB Link PK4Z.
I'm not sure if I connected the wires correctly to the fuse. It had a circular thing where wires should be connected to the fuse, which seemed smaller than 4ga, so I removed it thinking that's for people with thinner wires.
I don't have a test light, any other way to test the fuse?

I'll make all the changes you've metioned tomorrow and see what happens.

Last question. If there was problem with install. Why did it work the first time?

[StereoInstaller1]

That fuseholoder is AGU, not ANL. Those have been the worst of all types of fuses for shitty connections. The solder joints inside the tube fail and you cannot see them.

Ground it to the floor for goddamn sure, that panel is only tack-welded in, not an adequate ground at all.

The reason that it works for a few is the magic of capacitors...a little trickle of power charges the cap up, then you turn it on and place an actual demand on it and it craps out instantly.

Don't take it that I know exactly what is wrong here, this is the troubleshooting phase of things. The stuff I am suggesting is only the basic stuff.

[clayparkley]

That fuseholoder is AGU, not ANL. Those have been the worst of all types of fuses for shitty connections. The solder joints inside the tube fail and you cannot see them.

Ground it to the floor for goddamn sure, that panel is only tack-welded in, not an adequate ground at all.

The reason that it works for a few is the magic of capacitors...a little trickle of power charges the cap up, then you turn it on and place an actual demand on it and it craps out instantly.

Don't take it that I know exactly what is wrong here, this is the troubleshooting phase of things. The stuff I am suggesting is only the basic stuff.

alright, I'll get the basics straighten up first. Thanks~

[StereoInstaller1]

go kick its ass!

[clayparkley]

go kick its ass!

[StereoInstaller1]

So how about some updates?

[clayparkley]

sorry, no updates yet. I had a very busy weekend. I'll probably get it done tonight. When I'm drilling a screw throught the bottom of the trunk, do I need to worry about not to drill through something underneath?

[StereoInstaller1]

You sure do, just like with anything.

It would be hard to cause damage, but no sense not knowing, right?

[clayparkley]

I have shortend both power & ground cable.
Crimped a new o ring to the ground cable and moved it from back of the trunk to the bottom.
It's still doing the samething.
I don't know what else to do.
I'm thinking about trying to find a local stereo shop who's nice enough to test the amp for me and see if the amp itself has any problem.