Hey, I need some advice, I have a Pioneer Premier 400 watt amp, powering a 10' Kicker Comp VR. When I turn it up past 30, and a major bass hit happens, my headlamps will dim, and my volt hand drops to 10 or 11 volts. How do I fix this?

 

make sure the grounds are good and solid using quality connectors. also the ground wire ideally should be the same size as the power wire. a capacitor will help absorb those big bass power hits, making life easier on your battery and alternator.

 

Work on your wiring and doing he "Big 3," before wasting money on a cap.

Best bet though would be getting an alternator out of a Tahoe or Suburban. Cheap and gives a nice upgrade to your existing electrical system for roughly the same cost of a quality cap.

 

Okay Guys, my grounds are great, the power cable is LARGE and everything is hooked up professionally. So, I need a 140 Amp Generator or a Capacitor?
If a Cap will correct it, what size & brand should I get?

 

what size ground wire do you have and where is it grounded? it should be the closest grounding point to the amp you can find. a 1F cap would work just fine. they can be had for like $75 or less.

 

CAPS are worthless. They discharge way to quickly to solve your issues. I would only suggest a properly sized cap for one reason - to filter out AC ripple from your alt. I would focus on a more stout battery and then the upgraded alt.

NO SPL competitor would use caps. I have been in SPL comps for many years and have been quite successful. Our team's last comp vehicle had well over 30K WRMS and had a single 200 amp alt with an adjustable voltage regualtor. NO CAPS. however a large bank of batteries. Our voltage drop was minimal for what we were doing.

Where is your X-over set at for your sub amp? You may wish to drop it lower (under 100Hz) If your slope on the x-over is not steep, consider to go even lower (75-80Hz). Reason is that you may be wasting your time producing frequencies out of your amps efficiency range and therefor pulling current that is "wasted" IMO.

 

I am not a fan of caps, the drain is on your charging system regardless, and caps are just a band aid to cover up the real problem. Get a good alternator and you'll be set.

Also - is that amp 400 watts RMS or 400 peak? If you have the gain turned up too high and are overpowering the amp it will clip the output signal and draw huge amounts of current.

 

Krambo, Thunder550 and unredeemed have it..
Caps are not the way to go. I have 2 of em and my headlights dim like a **** with only 800w RMS from my JL amps.

Making sure your wiring is of sufficient size and well grounded is the first problem. Pioneer doesn't have very large amps so I'm surpised your having an issue at all. Most of their stuff is rated at PEAK and at 14.4v lol

 

that was the first thing i suggested - to check grounds and connections. those issues do need to be taken care of first and foremost before any system will be rid of any gremlins and work properly. i wasn't suggesting a cap was the cure all to his problems, but an addition to his system.a larger capacity battery and alternator isn't going to do anything if there are grounding/bonding and connector issues.