Alright so here's the story, please stick with me. It's early so this might be confusing.

A couple days ago my dad said he had to take my truck to pick up some stuff from his work. No problem. I took out my system and flipped the breaker for the power wire under the hood. Yesterday I went to put everything back in. When I was connecting the ground (I did that before I connected the power), it sparked. Kind of odd considering there was no power, right?

I figured the amp just had a little bit of juice stored up from before. So I'm driving to buddies house and all is well. I'm bumpin hard, when all of a sudden I hear a "pop". I look in my rear view and there's smoke POURING from my amp I pulled over thinking the amp caught fire and was freaking out. Thankfully the smoke dissapated and there was no fire.

Anyone ever have this happen? What could have caused it? I'm going to take it apart today and see if I can fix anything, but it doesn't look good. If I can't get it fixed, are there some mono amps you guys can recommend? I'm running two 12W7's, and am looking to move out soon so the price needs to be decent. TIA guys!

 

Do you have a cap? Also, there are caps in amps. Caps store energy (like a battery). Not sure if this is part of the issue or not...

 

No, no cap. I've done this many a time, and this has never happened. I did notice afterwards that the grounding terminal was loose (still made contact though), but wouldn't the amp just shut off if there was no ground?

 

Alright so after a brief search, here's what I came up with.

So far the prices I've seen are around $1200, but if I can find a 12W7 for $450 I think I'll be able to find a better price for the amp. Also it's cheaper than two JL 1000.1's. I've only heard good things about Eclipse, but what do you guys think?

 

first pull the bottom off of the amp and do a visual search for burnt up things....

Sounds like a capacitor just popped, and possibly a mosfet or 2. It may be worth it to just try replace the components themselves IF the board itslef isn't toast. (I've seen a lot of those PC boards just burn up themselves....)

Having in inadequate ground will not only periodically fry amps but also take out headunits as well....so make sure your deck still works normally as well.

 

I blew a older amp when my ground wire came loose and arched. I didnt carea though, because I was already putting together a new system at that point. As for speakers its all depends on how much you want to spend. I orignally wanted 2 15" eclipse aluminums but they donr make the 15s anymore. So I had to find a new brand, I ended up buying 2 15" Rockford Fostgate T1s. I didnt want to go to 2 t2 since they would be way underpowered. Im running about 1200 watts and the t2 need more than that when running 2 subs. Thats kinda why I wanted eclipse it would have given over 500+ per sub and that would have been nuts. Right now as is IM gonna be running a huge vented enclousre in the trunk with almost no room to store stuff. Just So i can try and max out the RF t1s. But all I can say is the t1s are massive. If I could show you a scale picture of a soda can Vs the sub, I would but its gloomy outside today and there is almost no light to give a good picture.

 

Its interesting that you got an arch..... very interesting.

I would have to say your amp blowing is unrealated however. Just its time I think.

 

well if its got power and loses its ground, it might try to make itself a ground... even going through the case... arcing is highle a possibility

 

I had the cool lighting effects, the spraks and the crackling

 

Well I took the amp apart and I fried 3 transistors and what looks to be all 4 capacitors (at least I think that's what they are). I'll post some pics as soon as I can find the digi cam. It looks like the boards are ok though, so hopefully I'll be able to fix it.