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clarion amp issues

Printed From: the12volt.com
Forum Name: Car Audio
Forum Discription: Car Stereos, Amplifiers, Crossovers, Processors, Speakers, Subwoofers, etc.
URL: https://www.the12volt.com/installbay/forum_posts.asp?tid=92140
Printed Date: July 04, 2025 at 5:37 PM


Topic: clarion amp issues

Posted By: mitco39
Subject: clarion amp issues
Date Posted: March 26, 2007 at 1:13 PM

I recently bought a DPX11500 Clarion amp (last week) and right up till today I couldnt have been happier with it.

I was listening to it at about 80 Precent volume when the bass just cut out. Ill try my best to descibe what happened. When the bass cut out I pulled over on the side of the road to check it out. The amp was still on with no codes (flashing led/fualt light), was a bit warmer than my hand (i could just feel the heat it was producing). The subs were still moving, however very little and irregular.

I tried everything with reguards to troubleshooting. Checked out each sub indivdually measuring the resistance of each sub. They were 8 ohms each and at the amp 4ohms total. The amp did not blow the 100amp fuse, and is rated for a 200amp fuse... so overpowering the unit was not possible i do not believe. There was no smoke or smell and i even took off the cover and looked at the board...not a sign of buring anywhere, everything looked new and smelled new...

Its just funny how the amp triped no fualts...

I do have a question tho...upon looking through the manual for this unit it said the ground for the sub speakers should not share a common ground with the amp...what does that mean? I measured from the ground of the - polarity speaker terminal and the ground of the unit itself and there was 0ohms...

I also measured the reistance between the positive and negative termanils with the wires removed and there was no continuity.

Anyone have any suggestions as to what happened to this amp...or what could have caused this...



Replies:

Posted By: one_bad_jap
Date Posted: April 12, 2007 at 5:00 PM

I do have a question tho...upon looking through the manual for this unit it said the ground for the sub speakers should not share a common ground with the amp...what does that mean?

In short, it's stating do not connect the (-) speaker wire to chassis ground. 

Are you only using the DPX11500 or multiple amplifiers?  Also, what gauge of power and ground cable are you using?  That amplifier needs at least a 4-gauge power and ground cable.

For starters, I'd do the following:

1) disconnect the fuse from the battery

2) disconnect the speaker leads from the amplifier

3) reconnect the fuse

4) connect a temporary speaker to the speaker outputs of the amplifier  (Temporarily turn-off the low pass filter)

5) turn on your head unit at a low volume level.  make sure you have sound.

If there is no sound, double check your chassis ground and other power connections to the amplifier with the fuse removed.  Once you double checked your connections, then test it again with the test speaker.

If you have sound, disconnect the test speaker and hook back up your subwoofers.

I would also suggest you use a relay on your remote turn on lead.

Relay configuration:

terminal 30: fused +12v constant (5 amp fuse)

teminal 85: chassis ground

terminal 86: (+) remote trigger from head unit

terminal 87: (+) output to remote turn-on for the amplifier(s)






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