new install, confused why amp flickers

[STROKD]

ti 500.4, running 2 ohm stereo to 2 6.5 mid woofers from 80-400 hz bandpass, and the rears bridged 3 ohm mono to an old 12w6. when it starts to sound good, the speakers sound stressed and the amp starts to flicker (red leds inside and blue trileds...). wtf? Its got constant 13-13.4 volts with car on... its not real loud either... I figured it'd slam compared to the alpine i had running in there, which seemed much louder.

could it be cause the input voltage is like half a volt? could there be something wrong with the amp? it sounds great just no nutsack that all my other PGs offer... dunno what to do. thinking bout swapping amps for another TI tomorrow and seeing if its the same.

[Eric D]

Off hand sounds like something is wrong with the amp.

[STROKD]

Eric, I thought so at first, but the problem is the voltage. Today when I started the car the voltage was almost a volt higher (13.9 today vs 13.0 last night), and it got to 32 before shutting off on the volume setting vs last night it was struggling to hit 28... The lights on the headunit and the amp also flickered a lot less and the entire stereo was much cleaner sounding... Its an old car without a cap, so probably just PG being voltage picky, as I know the older amps were non regulated. Oh well it's just temporary, Ill just have to keep charging the battery overnight if I wanna bump. Ill prob try and throw a cap in there too just to help the amp out if I can find one laying around the house. I know I have 2-3 Im not using anymore due to swapping them for Powercores.

[vladthebad]

Could your alternator be slowly failing? Short drops of voltage have caused issues for me in the past. If you've got a couple other amps in the system, maybe throw an rmd on the goofy amp and one that isn't having issues. Could also be corrosion in a fused distro possibly? Failing that, try using iPod or phone with headphone jack to RCA adapter straight into just that amp, turn deck volume to zero or 1 if zero kills remote signal... And see if it sounds any better with a different signal source and no other amps working to steal all your current.

[zeropoint0.5]

If you indeed could make a test with putting a heavy deep cycle battery directly on this system, and

if the issues are gone, then there is definitly something wrong with the electrical system and not

with the amp(s).

A failing alternator, battery or even a bad ground connection could be the problem.....

I even remember long ago an issue with an amp and after a long search, replacing a glass fuse

solved the problem .............

watch out you don't damage you're amps cause of a faling electrical system......

good luck

[ttocs]

just for the stupidity of it(not an insult) you should start simple and just check all your power connections. A slightly loose connection can build up resistance and end up with some crazy electrical gremlins. At the very least grab/pull/tub on the power/ground connections to ensure that they are not loose. If you want to go one step further to be 100% sure that they are all good remove the connection, clean both ends and then re-tighten them down. It sucks when you have been shot-gunnin parts in/out and chasing that gremlin only to find out that its the one LITTLE thing that should not go wrong, but that you should have checked.