Pro 60's crackling

[Gessleje]

Has anyone else experianced their Brand new Tower speakers crackling? I picked up my 22Ve in November of last year and had them install the Pro 60's from Wet Sounds rather than the Kicker Tower Speakers. I was supposed to be getting an amp equivalent in power to the Kicker ZX 350.4 amp Tige includes in their "Tower of Power" package. Unfortunatley the equivalent amp that came with my boat to supply power to the tower speakers was the Kicker KX 200.4. Unequivalent to say the least.

My tower speakers are set up as my rear speakers on the fader dial. I turned my fader fully to the rear and after turning the volume up to 28 the speakers start crackling. It sounds terrible. At that volume all you hear is noise while you are wakeboarding, it is not loud enough to make out any words from the music. This was a huge dissapointment as everyone raves about how loud the Pro 60's are.

I gave a local audio shop a call and they told me that the crackling was due to our amp being underpowered. I called Wet Sounds to see if they would say the same thing and I got the same answer from them. I tried bridging our amp to try and get some more juice out of it and the volume was louder at lower levels. The problem still exists the only difference being the speakers are now crackling when we turn the volume up to 22 versus 28.

I know that the KX 200.4 amp will not put out the 150W RMS each Pro 60 speaker will handle but would this amp cause my speakers to crackle? I am not an expert in boat audio so I was wondering if anyone could explain the logic before I shell out some more coin on a new amp? Or does the problem lie with the speakers themselves?

If it is an amp problem then I am considering purchasing the Kicker ZX 650.4 which would supply more than enough power for my pair of Pro 60's.

[dogbert]

I'd check the grounding between the head unit and the amps. My guess is that they are on separate circuits. A cheap solution is a ground isolator that goes between the amp and the HU. You can find them at Radio Shack or Best Buy.

[Jeff T]

I'd check the grounding between the head unit and the amps. My guess is that they are on separate circuits. A cheap solution is a ground isolator that goes between the amp and the HU. You can find them at Radio Shack or Best Buy.

Just an FYI, i couldn't find an iso at either location (Shack or BB). I ended up getting one from my favorite ebay store:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Stinger-High-Pow...713.m153.l1262

[Jeff T]

If it is an amp problem then I am considering purchasing the Kicker ZX 650.4 which would supply more than enough power for my pair of Pro 60's.

This is what I use to power my pro 80's. I have the amped bridged and it supplies way more than enough juice. Just an FYI.

[wetsounds1]

Sorry to hear that. It is the hardest thing for us as a manufacturer when it comes to speakers. As you never really know what power and how they will be set up. But the speakers are what get "heard" so they are what gets judged on if they sound good or bad. But quality sound starts at the head unit, the amps, the wire, the source (cd or ipod) the setttings etc.

There are a lot of things involved when it comes to getting good clean sound. Which is one of the main reason why Wet Sounds will have a full line of amplifiers. With power ratings matched to our speakers. So it will really be a no brainer. As there will be no guess work.

What is happening in your system is "clipping" The amplifier is under powered. So when you crank it up to get to the level you want, the amp clips. This turns a nice smooth wave form into a "sqaure" wave. Which is distortion. So the speaker just plays what is being sent to it. It is like running a car at red line. You are overdriving it. When that happens, things start to act up and overheat etc...

So the number one thing is to get a new amp.

I am not sure why your boat came with such a small amp. As the factory installed amps for the tower are the 350.4. (which is still under powered but better than the 200.4)

The 200.4 is rated at 35 x4. The PRO 60 is rated at 150 watts RMS. Even if bridged on one pair, the amp will only do 100x2. Still short.

So do you have one pair of PRO 60's or 2 pairs? I assume one pair and they only had half of that 4 ch amp running to them which is how you were able to bridge them.

For instance the 650.4 is rated at 120x4 at 4 ohms. This would allow you to get 120 watts rms to 2 pairs. Not as much power as I like to run but many on this site run that amp and are very happy with it.

Tim
Wet Sounds

[philwsailz]

You have two pro 60's speakers only, right? at 150w RMS power handling the ideal KICKER amplifier is the ZX450.2 which will deliver a solid 150 watts into a pair of 4-ohm speakers.

As a general rule, for a stereo speaker pair, buy a stereo amp. Do not buy a 4-channel and then bridge it unless your longer term plan is to add another pair of speakers in the future for a setup where each speaker has its own amp channel.

Now to try to address the crackling:

Try a few things with the existing amp. In bridge mode, it will deliver about 90 watts per four ohm speaker. Not up to the Pro60 rating, but it will drive them respectably. If you are hard clipping the amp, the first thing that the Pro60's will do is put the tweeter into protect mode, and the highs will go away, so my gut is hat is not what you are hearing.


Now, the ground isolator. It is NOT a fix for crackling. If it were buzzing at a frequency that varied with engine RPM, the groung isolator might fix, but it will not take care of crackling.


Tower amplifier settings:

Turn the HI-PASS crossover on.
Set the HI-PASS frequency, (knob on front) to 50 or higher
Turn BASS BOOST completely down.
with the radio set to roughly 75 % of full volume(with bass and treble set to flat and bass boost off), slowly turn the gain up until you hear bad sound, then turn it back down to clean. That will be the best initial setting.

Give it a listen at a distance and see what you think.


Are you hearing the crackling with an MP3 player connected to the stereo? If so, I bet you are using the headphone output of the MP3 player connected to the auxiliary inputs. It is REAL EASY to over-drive the radio inputs with an MP3 player that is turned up too high. If this is the case, turn the MP3 player down, and I bet the crackling goes away. In that case the crackling is the sound of the aux inputs being over-driven, and has nothing to do with the amp or the speakers.

Go see if my suggestions will help make a difference, and get back to us right away with the results. I will be only around a half day, but if we can get to it quickly, I will be more than happy to assist!

Phil
Kicker

[Jeff T]

If you are hard clipping the amp, the first thing that the Pro60's will do is put the tweeter into protect mode, and the highs will go away, so my gut is hat is not what you are hearing.

I'm not trying to hijack. But this is exactly the problem i outlined in this thread http://tigeowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7072. The response in that thread was that I was overpowering the speakers and needed to turn the gain down. Here it sounds like it could be an underpower issue (clipping). Which is it?

[wetsounds1]

Jeff T-Hard to say but there is a number of ways to clip an amp. You can clip the amp on the input stage if you over drive it using a line driver, you can clip the head unit by turning it up too high and the signal is clipped before it even gets to the amp, turning the gains up too high, as Phil mentioned, MP3 aux over driving the input stage etc...

His sounds like a classic case of an under powered amp. It is hard to say as some call it static. Some call is distortion. hard to say without actaully hearing it.

You called it muffled. Which is what I have heard some call it when they hit the protection. As muffled is what usually sounds like when the horn mutes.

I guess the best advice is there is always any number of reasons. But looking at the system as a whole and starting from the source back is best. As there is no right answer all the time.

Tim
Wet Sounds

[philwsailz]

I'm not trying to hijack. But this is exactly the problem i outlined in this thread http://tigeowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7072. The response in that thread was that I was overpowering the speakers and needed to turn the gain down. Here it sounds like it could be an underpower issue (clipping). Which is it?

Both, really, and I think Tim might have a slightly different take on this, but let me try to talk it through from my perspective.

Clipping does not talk to over-powering or under-powering per se; amplifier clipping happens any time the amp is trying to operate at a power output which is in excess and beyond its capabilites, regardless of amplifier size or power.

To make music come out of a speaker, the amplifer puts out a constantly changing voltage at the speaker terminals. the voltage changes with the frequencies put in as music at the inputs. If the voltage changes really fast, it makes higher pitched notes, (higher frequency). same thing with slower changes which create lower notes. If the voltage goes from full peak positive volatage to full peak negative voltage 60 times in a second, it will create a 60 Hz note in the speaker.

Any amplifier has a maximum voltage it can put out. Large voltage is loud, and low voltage is quiet. When an amp is "clipping" it is trying to make an output voltage greater than is possible. During that time, the amp is putting out DC voltage instead of AC voltage. DC voltage makes nothing but heat in a loudspeaker, or its protection device. DC voltage is the bad part of the thing we call clipping, or hard clipping.

Hard clipping is really bad... So bad in fact that is it really possible to burn up a 100 watt speaker with a 10 watt amp that is in a really horrible clipping situation.

SO... clipping, by the fact that you have a bunch of DC voltage present creates heat, which can trigger a protection device.

A grossly over-powered amplifier can create the same heat in a speaker, or its protection device, solely by the huge relative power it can produce, relative to the speaker.

I know this is a long response, but I hope it makes sense, and points to the very real need for doing a good job of accurately matching speaker power handling to amplifier output.

[philwsailz]

Jeff T-Hard to say but there is a number of ways to clip an amp. You can clip the amp on the input stage if you over drive it using a line driver, you can clip the head unit by turning it up too high and the signal is clipped before it even gets to the amp, turning the gains up too high, as Phil mentioned, MP3 aux over driving the input stage etc...

His sounds like a classic case of an under powered amp. It is hard to say as some call it static. Some call is distortion. hard to say without actaully hearing it.

You called it muffled. Which is what I have heard some call it when they hit the protection. As muffled is what usually sounds like when the horn mutes.

I guess the best advice is there is always any number of reasons. But looking at the system as a whole and starting from the source back is best. As there is no right answer all the time.

Tim
Wet Sounds

I totally agree with Tim on the statement that it would be hard to know without hearing it. Too many variables at the moment. No right answer is SO right Tim...

How are you?

[wetsounds1]

Rocking and Rolling

How bout you?

[philwsailz]

Rocking and Rolling

How bout you?

Awesome here, except for the air conditioner is on the fritz at the house. 'Gotta run out there in a while and see how much coin I have to pony up for a new compressor...

[chpthril]

Oh god, I've been having withdrawls all day, my account was on the fritz

Who sold you the upgrade???? Sounds like the dealer spec'd the boat out with no tower speakers, then got ya matched up with a too light an amp for a set of Pro 60's. As noted by the experts, Tige doesn't use that amp.

If the dealer or stereo shop rec'd that amp, I would have them trade is out. If anything, the stereo "experts" that did the install should have questioned it in the beginning

[dogbert]

Oh god, I've been having withdrawls all day, my account was on the fritz

Who sold you the upgrade???? Sounds like the dealer spec'd the boat out with no tower speakers, then got ya matched up with a too light an amp for a set of Pro 60's. As noted by the experts, Tige doesn't use that amp.

If the dealer or stereo shop rec'd that amp, I would have them trade is out. If anything, the stereo "experts" that did the install should have questioned it in the beginning

In my experience, unless the dealer's service techs have been trained in hi fi, they really wouldn't know the difference.

[noworries]

Yea, start by having them swap out the amp for an "equivalent" one. They should at least have gotten one with a model number as large as the one they're matching