Stupid things you've done in car audio (make me feel less stupid)

[2010hhr]

Today I bought 4 feet of 1/0 awg for $40 (including 2 copper one time crimp ring terminals)

My battery is in the back and the amp is right next to it, so it could have been worse.

I'm glad to have my amp properly wired, but I looked on ebay and I could get 4 feet for $10 shipped.

Anyways, post stupid things you've done Car audio wise.

[tarnationsauce2]

Hmm, if getting a bad deal is stupid wait till you hear this.
Back in 1998 I bought a chrome plated HiFonics Colossus VII I found through the Autotrader for $500. Guy even demoed it for me on a pair of JL W0 8's. Yes 8" subs lol - my suspicions should have been roused here. But I was excited to get such an awesome amp I had always dreamed of. So I bought it before anyone else could. You didn't see these Zed amps pop up every day and this was pre eBay (for me).
Anyways I buy it and take it home. First thing I do is open it to look at the beautiful guts and to my horror a little Crunch amp was mounted inside!!
Of course he didn't answer my calls and when I did talk to him he played stupid. I kept it though and sold the empty case years later for $200 and the Crunch amp for $30 to recoup some of the money.
Now when I buy a big amp used I will demand the bottom be removed before I show money.

[Mr. Crunch]

now thats is a new one. Me, years back, like 06, i had a 2400 watts stereo. Was killing my power. this was before i knew about big 3, large Wire and such. to fix this, i brought a second battery. i never grounded the battery. brought another and didnt ground that one either. i dont know the pontential harm that could have happened, but nothing did thankfully

[2010hhr]

well apparently the wire I bought was actually good. and apparently, decently priced

but another thing I did was be impatient and wanting bass

but I am still cheap.

so I saw this $50 visonik sub and box on CL

I meet some piece of **** guy at night, and he walks over with the stuff in his hands, towards me.

I go to set it down on his trunk and notice the wires hanging out (clearly wired for an amp). he said his is not wired and he can't test it out.

Then I press on the sub and it's clearly blown or fried.

and I still bought it....

Originally Posted by tarnationsauce2

Hmm, if getting a bad deal is stupid wait till you hear this.
Back in 1998 I bought a chrome plated HiFonics Colossus VII I found through the Autotrader for $500. Guy even demoed it for me on a pair of JL W0 8's. Yes 8" subs lol - my suspicions should have been roused here. But I was excited to get such an awesome amp I had always dreamed of. So I bought it before anyone else could. You didn't see these Zed amps pop up every day and this was pre eBay (for me).
Anyways I buy it and take it home. First thing I do is open it to look at the beautiful guts and to my horror a little Crunch amp was mounted inside!!
Of course he didn't answer my calls and when I did talk to him he played stupid. I kept it though and sold the empty case years later for $200 and the Crunch amp for $30 to recoup some of the money.
Now when I buy a big amp used I will demand the bottom be removed before I show money.

wow you sold an empty case for $200?? wtf

I would have used a friends number and tried to get him to meet you to buy something else of his, then beat his ass. (now you can use text free/text now/text plus/google voice/talkatone to make new numbers)

Originally Posted by Mr. Crunch

now thats is a new one. Me, years back, like 06, i had a 2400 watts stereo. Was killing my power. this was before i knew about big 3, large wire and such. to fix this, i brought a second battery. i never grounded the battery. brought another and didnt ground that one either. i dont know the pontential harm that could have happened, but nothing did thankfully

you didn't ground the batteries to anything? as in you just hooked the positive terminals to the other batteries?

[Mr. Crunch]

man, i remember a bit more. i had the amps grounded to the batts, but never grounded the batts. i feel so shame

Pics of said setup. Only have one batt here:

[tarnationsauce2]

Originally Posted by 2010hhr

wow you sold an empty case for $200?? wtf

I would have used a friends number and tried to get him to meet you to buy something else of his, then beat his ass. (now you can use text free/text now/text plus/google voice/talkatone to make new numbers)

Oh man did I want to exact revenge somehow but I really didn't want to cause a problem and I had no way of proving he knew he was ripping me off.

I actually sold the case to my roommate at the time and he offered the money to me. He had a colossus that the bottom and side plates were rusty and the heatsink was banged up. The chrome case I had was mint. I think I did sweeten the deal by giving him a VII Odin that was not working but he thought he could fix it.

[49konvict]

my worst mistake was my first system with two xploder 12s on a keeker zx400 that i wired with 12 gauge as the power wire. this was in a 95 civic so lets just say i didnt have dimming, i had my lights shut off on me on longer bass notes.

i also was testing out an amp for a friend and acadently wired the ground to the remote and the power as the remote. that equaled magic blue smoke. this was the same car so all of the wires where 12 gauge so they all looked the same.


good ive come a long way since 08

[Mr. Crunch]

yeah. i say you make all your major mistakes in the few year or so

[Burkem_10]

I used to think that Crutchfield had all of the best deals/equipment.

[southerntrendkill]

Originally Posted by Burkem_10

I used to think that Crutchfield had all of the best deals/equipment.

lol never did i think that i just used those magizines to see what new stuff was out and see pictures of everything. than buy it somewhere else.

[Livinloud33]

Before I knew any better I ran dual 2 and dual 4 off the same amp at the same time 2 10" w3s and 2 12" explodes

[mporettim]

Originally Posted by Burkem_10

I used to think that Crutchfield had all of the best deals/equipment.

been there

[little-kid-wit-bass]

This probably won't surprise you all, but when I first joined ROE, I put my old Kicker cvr 12's in my sisters car with a battery in the trunk. But I didn't connect it to the battery in the front. So after my nice friend that didn't laugh at me told me that I need to connect it to the front battery so the alternator can charge it, I did that. (It gets worse) So I left the extra battery in the trunk and connected them both together. But the fail was I connected the back battery to a 20 amp fuse since that's all I had. And I connected the batteries with 8 gauge... This is before I learned the stuff that ROE taught me.

[Chevy]

The one about the little amp being inside the hifonics amp really gave me a chuckle. What a d!ck.

Anyways, I've made plenty of mistakes. The ones that I look back at now that really piss me off is how I used to use butt connectors to hook my stereo's up. Also, in my first truck, I couldn't find a hole in the firewall (ACTUALLY, I looked for one for about 10 seconds and my patience level got the best of me), so I just ran it through the fender and in between the door and the a-pillar. That was like that for a few years until just a few weeks ago when I seen it and remembered how much of an idiot I was. Then I ran it through the firewall with a grommet.

Another one that wasn't my mistake, but somebody in my high school. This kid just bought 2 brand spankin new 12" xplod's. He put them in way too small of a box, and he was talking about how they weren't that loud. One of the kids that he was talking to told him to poke two holes in each of the subs, so he did. They fought the next day and that kid beat the **** out of the other kid who told him to do it. I thought it was hilarious.

[KingPen]

Lest see...

Mistakes

#1... Purchased a Kicker zx2500.1 new for $750
#2... Purchased 2 Kicker solo x new for $450 each
#3... See #1 and #2... I purchased kicker to begin with lol
#4... My truck broke down one day and I called my cousin to come help me move it off the highway to a parking lot off the next exit. Before we left he mentioned that I should remove the subs from my truck so they aren't stolen. I did. He then took me home and asked if he could use the subs till I got my truck back.... long story short, I never saw them again.... (not the solo x's they were just some 12" "Coustics")

[wetamup]

Let's see.....
1. First car's HU got wired up by twisting the wires together and slapping electrical tape over that. Lots of it. Yep.
2. Second HU in that car got butt connectors for the harness the second time. Marked improvement lol. I've since learned to solder.
3. Someone gave me two JBL 12" subs in a small "ported" truck box for free and I used them. Wanna know why they were free? Because they sucked. More vibes than bass. Those "ports"? Two 2" diameter holes cut in the top. Yep.
4. I let a jack penetrate one of those subs when I was in a hurry and didn't secure the jack in my trunk.
5. Down one sub, I thought I'd just bridge the amp to make up for losing one sub. Well that meant overpowering that sub by 100W. No biggie right, if you keep your gains down? Well mine were cranked to the max because that setup sucked. Three days later, the smell of fried subwoofer filled the car.
6. That amp and sub setup, I ran the power wire from the battery to the fender and across the door frame to the kick panels and to the trunk. Being the conscientious installer I was, I didn't want to go under the rubber door seal and risk having the wire chafed through by the sharp metal edge, so I went over the seal and had the wire pressed between the seal and the door. I had no way of securing the wire to the seal, except my good friend, black electrical tape. Lots of it. Yep.

I'm better now for functionality, but I gotta improve on presentation. My next setup...

[KingPen]

Originally Posted by wetamup

Let's see.....
1. First car's HU got wired up by twisting the wires together and slapping electrical tape over that. Lots of it. Yep.
2. Second HU in that car got butt connectors for the harness the second time. Marked improvement lol. I've since learned to solder.
3. Someone gave me two JBL 12" subs in a small "ported" truck box for free and I used them. Wanna know why they were free? Because they sucked. More vibes than bass. Those "ports"? Two 2" diameter holes cut in the top. Yep.
4. I let a jack penetrate one of those subs when I was in a hurry and didn't secure the jack in my trunk.
5. Down one sub, I thought I'd just bridge the amp to make up for losing one sub. Well that meant overpowering that sub by 100W. No biggie right, if you keep your gains down? Well mine were cranked to the max because that setup sucked. Three days later, the smell of fried subwoofer filled the car.
6. That amp and sub setup, I ran the power wire from the battery to the fender and across the door frame to the kick panels and to the trunk. Being the conscientious installer I was, I didn't want to go under the rubber door seal and risk having the wire chafed through by the sharp metal edge, so I went over the seal and had the wire pressed between the seal and the door. I had no way of securing the wire to the seal, except my good friend, black electrical tape. Lots of it. Yep.

I'm better now for functionality, but I gotta improve on presentation. My next setup...

This just happened didnt it....

[wetamup]

Originally Posted by jcarver1112

This just happened didnt it....

No actually, it's been almost two years since. I've learned a lot. I don't even have that car anymore. My sub is matched to the box based on the specs for the sub, sounds much better. My gains are set around halfway, I'm using a HPF for the interior speakers now, and despite the video I posted in my intro thread, I keep the trunk mostly clear, all the stuff that could damage my subs is in the spare well where it should be or roped off so it doesn't move. My power wire is going through the firewall like it should and my harness is soldered together now. But you gotta start from somewhere right?

[Slobalt7]

I think I got gypt I have no bass at all... Smells wonderful though, I have gained a few pounds since I installed them.

[KingPen]

lol that is priceless