Ok this is my problem I have a Alpine CDA deck it one of the nicer expensive ones 7897 I think. I have a subwoofer control on there that is on a scale of 1 to 15. WhicH i usually keep on 12. A low frequency level control on a scale from -12 to 0. Which I keep on -2. and the gain on my amp is lil more than a half way. Ok a ahve a friend wit 2 10' s and a 300 watt amp and his bass is so much louder and u can hear him accoross the lot. I cant do that. I have one 12 Solobnaric L5 wit600 watts RMS going to it. Should I turn my gain up more and control it from the deck.

 

I wouldn't turn up the gain....what kind of amp are you running, and are you sure the box that the sub is in is built right? Also, what kind of box, sealed/ported, which was is it facing. Is the amp mono, bridged, etc....

On top of that, I have noticed that the alpine sub-out is cleaner than most, but not as powerful for some reason, but regardless, you should be able to get a hell of a lot more bass that it sounds like you are getting.

What subs and amp is your friend running?

 

Thanx for the input Streeteffectz.
The sub is a 02 Kicker L5 dual 2 ohm wired at 40hm load bridged in a sealed box.
bass amp is a Fosgate Power 550s. The thing is rated at 590 some watts at 13.9 volts.
My encloures is a little bit more than 1.0 cu ft, and is placed on the drive side of the trunk
heres a pic of it with my old amps and cap.

http://acura-tl.com/forum/showthread...threadid=48102

I just upgraded to the Power 550s and 550x about 2 weeks ago and got rid of that cap and got a stinger chrome digi cap.
I called Fosgate tech support today and they said keep the gain down on the amps and just turn it all up on the source unit, is that the right thing to do. That shouldnt do any dammge to the deck corrrect casue it isnt powering anything.
My friend has a mitsu lancer wit 2 polk GNX 10s powered by a alpine mrd 300. I noticeed the spl level on those polks was pretty high to.

 

also about the bass boost remote is that just artifical bass. Are the amps tested with bass boost up?

 

Well, if all settings are correct, your setup should sound pretty good. I would recommend moving the position of the sub however to fire towards the rear of the car and not the side of it, and also listen to it with the ski pass OPEN.

You other problem may be that the box is too big. Kicker only recommend 1.0 cubic foot MAXIMUM sealed enclosure volume. All the solobarics I do I build right in the .70 area, and kicker recommends .66 MINIMAL.

The kicker sub is rated at 450 watts RMS, so you are definitely fine there, and the fosgate 550S is something like 550W @ 4 ohms, so you have a good combo.

 

Thanx again. My sub requires .88 min. and its a 12 not a 10. my RMS is 600 for the sub. I am gonna move my amps and the cap to the side of the trunk soon so I will see how much of a differ it will be.

 

Here is my reccomendation

set all the hu features back to there normal "neutral setting" no bass boost, sub preout set to normal... no boost or decrease....

set the volume near its highest level... most deck do produce a clipped signal at their highest level, so you never want to adjust it from there.... most say 3/4 volume i say more like 5/6 is when they start to distort... (example: i set my eclipse deck on 73 out of 80 volume when i do my system setup)

set your gains with no boost whatsoever on the amp... whatever watts the amp is, thats what it is.....

when you hear the bass "clip" back off on the gains a tad... that should be good for a start.... different cd's have stronger/weaker signals, but this should be a good start....

if you insist on haveing the bass boost on and such, i would just set the volume at the max you listen to... adjust the gains untill the signal clips, and then back off a tad

 

I called fosgate and I have to admitt there tech support was really helpful. I have my bass boost really low now and turned my gain down a bit to. I set the levels on the deck up and they said its the safest thing to do and my system does sound alot better. I turned my mids and highs down alot to.