The installers tucked this thing up under the left hand side of the convertible tray. I has insulation sitting on top of it to keep the rattling down. The installers from Tweeter said that they've installed many other JL Audio amps under this location with no problems. The heat here is insane right now and my car sits in the middle of a parking lot all day. If you walk outside and touch the amp after the car has been sitting in the sun for a few hours, it will literally burn your hand.

When I'm playing the music loud (to where it sounds good, no distortion) the amp will shut off after about half way through a song. Sometimes it will come back in 30 seconds or so. Sometimes it will shut off and stay off until I turn my car off for a little while and when I start it back up, it's running again.

The installers say "The 250/1 amp is very resilient towards heat and we put these things under seats, convertible trays and other very inclosed areas. We don't have problems with them overheating. It's rare. It may be your amp or your sub may be blown." Well, A) The sub doesn't sound like it's blown and B) The amp worked PERFECTLY fine in my car before the S2000 but it had plenty of breathing room. I'm just hesitant to believe them because I asked if they could move it into the trunk area... This would mean more work for them and I refuse to pay extra since if they admit it's over heating from the position of the amp, then it's their fault!

I'm taking it in Saturday so they can see if the amp is either overheating or shutting off due to clipping or from the sub being blown. If it's none of the above, they're going to charge me $50 to have the amp sent in to have them take a look at it. I was wondering if anyone here is an installer and knows about these amps. Are the installers that I'm working with being truthful? Can you arm me with some knowledge? Please help me out...

 

I'm not sure where you live but do you notice the same problem occurring at nighttime just as frequently as in the day?

I would say that if the amp is too hot to touch before you even get a chance to turn it on during the day then there is no doubt it has to do with it's mounting location. Usually by the time an amp is running to the point of it being to hot to touch it not long before clipping and shutting down is the result.

Also, what gauge power and speaker wires are you running? One of the benefits of the larger gauges is that they reduce the resistance on the amp while driving your speakers resulting in less heat. This is more true for the speaker wire then the power wire.

Try running a small house fan on an extension cord out to your car and point it directly at the amp while closing the trunk as much as possible. Then play some loud music that would normally cause the amp to turn off and see if the same thing happens. If it doesn't then I would say you have your proof the mounting location is the problem.

 

I went for a drive a little while ago. It's realatively cool tonight. The amp shut off again. It's only 77F outside right now, so it can't be the heat I guess... I took it back to Tweeter last week and the guy installed a fan behind the drivers seat that drew air in from the vents back there and aimed it at the amp. He felt the amp before he did that and he said "Yeah, it's definitely too hot." He said even with it being too hot those amps deal very well with heat and rarely shut off. I asked if they could move it to the actual trunk area and he said there wasn't an ideal location to put the amp in the trunk... That's why they put it under there.

When they originally installed the amp, they turned the bass down to -7 (all the way down) on the head unit (Alpine 9851). It sucked. I could barely hear any bass from the sub at that level, so I cranked the bass up to -4. It sounds GREAT at that level... but that's where it starts to shut down. Not to mention that the front speakers get no mid-bass at -7 and just produce highs at that point and it sounds like shit all together.

Anyway, I'm starting to think that it's clipping... but I wonder if that's because the amp is getting hot and making it produce a bad signal or something? It just never shut down in my previous car and I didn't have to turn the bass all the way down to -7 on my head unit... It's just driving me insane.

Oh, the speaker wire is 10 gauge I think. Considering the battery cables are 4G, the speaker wires are much smaller.

Thanks for your help turbo!

 

99% its overheating. Move the amp where it can breathe better.

 

You were running this same exact setup before? Same amp, same speakers, same head-unit, same wiring?

If so, it's the heat for sure.

If NOT, the amplifier probably has a MOSFET on it, which will make it turn off after a while (you're asking too much power from it)

Usually it has a MOSFET or the fuse blows (25 cents to replace). If it's none of that, it's gotta be the heat man.

 

I had a different head unit before. It was an Alpine too though... The only difference is it had 4v preouts and this one only has 2v preouts.

There is this one track I've been playing where I can make the amp shut off and not come back on for a LONG time. I have to shut my car off completely. I've tried driving around with the head unit off for a while, but that doesn't make the amp come back on.

What sucks is it sounds really good in the cabin. I might be clipping cause it is LOUD... I just can't tell when I"m driving, really... I can't see it being the sub being blown. I don't even have a lot of power going to it. The 10W3v2 has 300 Watts of continuous power handling ability... The 250/1 amp is 250 Watts RMS... So, those two don't really add up. However, it's the amp JL Audio suggests you pair with the 10W3v2...

Anyway, I'm going in on Saturday and they're going to look at it. I'm sure they're going to tell me "It's your amp. This doesn't happen with JL Audio amps..." blah blah blah... I think it's both. During the day the amp is super hot and also I'm probably clipping a bit... Especially on that high bass track. But, what sucks is this thing sounded really good in my Prelude and now if I have to keep the bass turned down to -7, I can barely hear it... It's not worth the money at this point. At -4 it sounds just like I want it too... Shit rocks my seats, knocks my glasses off of my visor and makes me smile! I have to find a happy medium if I'm clipping...

 

99% chance this is a heat problem.

1% chance bad sub or bad amp


one possible way to check the sub to make sure it isn't bad (blown), is to get a multi-meter and measure the total resistance as wired (of the sub) and the resistance for each voice coil.

and pairing a 250/1 w/ a 10W3v2 is perfectly fine.

 

I like how they said they've installed many other JL Audio amps under this location with no problems... How many S2000s have they worked on

i had a JL500/1 and an alpine amp in my car and neither ever shut down due to heat - look for a PAS2KNUT amp rack and you'll be fine

 

They've apparently done quite a few S2000's... Like one place I went to was going to charge me $550 to make the box for the trunk. When I went to this Tweeter place, they told me "Well, since we've had enough experience with the S2000, we can make the box faster so we don't have to charge as much for labor" which made sense.

See, they're tellng me that all the amps they've installed in other S2000's didn't shut down from heat either... and that it's just my amp that is bad and causing it to overheat and shut down...

 

when someone tells you they done a LOT of anything on an s2000 you should RUN not walk, but RUN away....

the S is still a small volume car not too many people have experience working on the car.. especially these big box type of stores..