A couple months ago I bought two new 10" Alpine Type R subs each of which with dual 2 ohm voice coils. I bought a used Alpine MRD-M500 (500w RMS 2OHM stable). I listened to them relatively quietly for the first month or so to "break them in". When I started turning them up I noticed they would get distorted at fairly low volumes. I turned the gains down and still they sounded odd at higher volumes. I compared with a buddy of mine who had a little bit older type Rs and he even said that they should get louder. I put a friends 850 watt kenwood amp in there to test an idea that I simply needed more power and WOW. The subs sounded exactly the way I wanted em too...loud...deep...perfect. I went out and bought a new 1000 watt alpine class D amp got it installed tonight played with the gains for a good hour and yet the subs still distort at the same volume they did with the old Alpine amp. Is this a CD deck problem? Thoughts/Ideas/I'm crazy. Sorry for the long read. Thanks!

 

Did you test them on the kenwood in a different car?

 

Nope, have not tried them in a different car.

 

Where do you have the input switch set to on the alpine amps?

 

Your + and - may be backwards on one sub.

 

What do you mean by input switch? I have a "Gain", "Bass EQ" and "HPF" **** on the right side of the amp and thats it.

 

Do you have input mode set to 1 or 2 on the amp?

 

what are the subs wired at? 2 ohm? 4 ohm? are they bridged into 1 ohm?

 

maybe ur hpf is low.. mines distorts a lil wen the hpf is low.. i also have hpf setting in my alpine deck to..

 

hp should be OFF for subs, lp setting should be selected.

 

Subs are at 2OHM.

Deck is set to output to subs in stereo.

 

bad rca's?

 

RCA's are "brand new" monster cable from e-bay...tho I did notice a pretty big change when I put the monster cable in as opposed to my old rockford RCA cables.

 

How could it be any of that if it worked good with the kenwood and not the alpines? Sounds like a setting issue on the alpines.

 

What do you guys have your LPF and HPF set as? I've always had my HPF set at 100hz..tho recently dropped it down to 63 and it think it sounds better. the LPF on my deck has always been off.

 

Dude turn the HPF OFF, LPF should be on, not HPF.

 

Problem solved...correct settings:
HPF ON @ 80Hz On Deck
LPF OFF On Deck (Set at 80Hz on sub amp)
I just turned the gains and the Bass EQ up a little bit and problem solved. Thanks for all the help guys! Oh and nismos....turnin the LPF on made the door speakers sound odd and still sent bass to the door speakers....I don't want that...hence why I turned the HPF on..Sounds EXCELLENT!!! Now I gotta ****load of dynamatting to do on the rear deck because everything rattles like no other and the interior lights dim too so I guess time for the big 3 as well haha

 

You're really not explaining it properly, the hpf on the SPEAKERS will make no difference on the sub except for blending. I, and I'm sure others thought you had a HPF on on the SUBS. Anywho, I really don't know how turning off the lpf fixed your problem. since all that would happen having both on would be a 2nd order crossover.

 

have you checked the ground