Tower Speakers Shorting/Grounding????

Raider Lefty · Soul Rider Joined: 10 Feb 2003 Posts: 470 City: The 713

Over the course of the last year I've had a pretty regular problem with my tower speakers (1 pr of 6.5" Infinity Kappa Perfects) - when biased equally to the boat and tower all the speakers will cut off except for the sub. You can bias the head unit all the way to the boat speakers and it will never cut out.

Thinking it was an amp issue I purchased a new PPI PCX480 amp (160/4ch @ 2ohm) and tried it. The same thing happened (sounds like CD is skipping but sub still hits). I looked at the power light on the PPI and it flickers between green and no color. Again though if head unit is biased to the boat it will run all day.

Thinking it is in the wiring I replaced all the wiring with the correct sizes (the last install the guy used 10ga to power the amps). Last nite I put everything together and tried the system with the tower speakers sitting on my bimini. They ran w/o problem for 20mins. Upon trying to put the speakers back in the cans (stock aluminum MC cans) the speakers begin to pop and then cut off completely (same as before). When the speakers are pulled out the system goes back to working.

I checked all connections on the speaker and crossover and they are all tight. I can't visibly see where anything is touching to cause the speaker to short/ground. It does this the same regardless of which tower speaker I try.

I honestly don't have any ideas what may be causing this.....help please!!!

steelythefez · Newbie Joined: 20 Feb 2004 Posts: 34 City: Natick

check for continuity between the casing and the speaker connections using a multimeter. I had the same issue with mine. I take it your cans are metallic?

churchy · Posted: Jul 22, 2004 10:35 am Post subject:

It could be that your voltage supply is dropping to low. This also sound right because it worked for 20 min. and then went out. Does it do this when you boat is running? What battery are you using? You may want to upgrade you battery to like an Optima and maybe even add another. I use two blue top Optimas in my boat.

Raider Lefty · Soul Rider Joined: 10 Feb 2003 Posts: 470 City: The 713

Churchy I've got 2 Optima yellow tops hooked up thru a Perko. I also added a 1K Farad cap (with much hesitation and deliberation) to help. It does it whether the boat is running or sitting still.

I thought about the voltage but why does it run with the tower speakers out of the cans and then quote the second that I try to install them?