speakers clipping

[tgregory]

For 2 years I have had 2 tower speakers and subwoofer driven by Alpine amp. Stock speakers not. Suddenly developed a clipping problem while on the water. Sitting in the driveway, there didn't seem to be a problem. On the water, you turn up volume much at all and everything begins clipping. Turn it down and all goes back to normal. Using balance control, I've discovered I can go all the way left or all the way right and you can crank it up as we used to (but sound is just on one side of course). Add just a little balance the other direction, and you have clipping again. All speakers are fine. I can't find any pinched wires. Now, it seems that with the sub thumping profusely in the driveway, you can duplicate the problem. After hauling to the lake, and sitting in the water, you can have the problem with engine dead. Leads me to think there is a loose wire somewhere, but I can't find one. If there is a loose one, which one would it be?? Any ideas?

[AdaminMN]

Try unhooking your cabin speakers from the headunit. Turn it up and see if the tower speakers begin to clip. If the tower speakers clip, maybe try resetting the gains on your amp.

Then do the same with the amp. Disconnect it, and run just the cabin speakers. If they still clip, my guess is you have a bad power connection (+ or -) on the HU and it's getting starved for power.

Also check your battery voltage.

[chpthril]

What amp and how is it wired?

Check the EQ settings on the head-unit, they need to be at or near flat i.e. no bass or treble. Too much of either, especially bass, can cause clipping. Also, what is your source for music? CD, tuner, MP3? If MP3, how is it connected, headphone jack or data line? The head-phone jack and or poor quality MP3 downloads can also cause poor sound quality.