A customer reach out after having a system installed by a different shop in hopes to resolve some of the issues he was experiencing. The entire system was cutting out above volume 25 and the customer was not thrilled on the overall look of the installation.

Installed was a VFL Audio 8K amplifier powering 2- Sundown Audio Z-Series 10 inch subwoofers in a ported enclosure, PRV door speakers powered by a Banda 400.4D 4 channel amplifier and a secondary yellow top Optima battery. All equipment was provided by the customer.

We first scheduled an appointment to do some testing and get an entire overview of what exactly needed to be done and provide the customer with a estimate. We found a few interesting things. After about 20 minutes of listening, the main power wire running front to back was physically hot. This was caused by the natural resistance within the CCA wire that was installed. This was also causing the secondary battery to receive poor voltage when the system was playing, dropping as low as 10 volts! Secondly, the secondary battery was not mounted to anything. It was also not protected with any fusing either. Lastly, The door speaker did not sound right. We unfortunately did not have any time to pull the door panels off to further investigate. So we set time aside in the quote to further investigate this issue.

We provided the customer with a quote and got him on the schedule. Roughly one month later, we had the vehicle in the bay. The first thing we did was pull all the equipment out of the vehicle so that we could test in on our test bench to ensure that it was in proper working order. We also removed all wiring from the vehicle. 

From front to back, we upgraded the big three with Stinger Pure OFC Copper 0 ga. wire and replaced the alternator. The VFL 8K amplifier is one power hungry amplifier with 2-0 ga. power and ground inputs. With the length of wire that we needed to run and referencing our wire length to amperage chart, we needed to run 3- 0 ga. wires front to back to ensure this amplifier would get the voltage/ amperage it needed. 

Next, the door speakers. The PRV speakers installed were not mounted flush to the inner door panel causing an improper seal. Luckily we had some vehicle specific aftermarket speaker adapter from Metra on hand. We were able to get the speakers mounted properly.

Stinger X Sound Dampening material was applied to the roof, rear quarter panels, trunk floor and rear hatch. This helps stop panel vibration and exterior road noise from entering the vehicle.

Onto the trunk. In front of the box, behind the rear seat, is were the secondary Optima battery and XS Power battery would live. This were firmly mounted to the floor with a custom ABS plate. Separating the main battery from second and third battery was a 500 amp Stinger Battery Isolator. This ensures that the batteries do not attempt to charge each other when the vehicle is powered off. 

Before the VFL amplifier was mounted directly to the enclosure. This did not allow the massive fans on the back of the amplifier to properly cool the internal components. We are not a big fan of mounting amplifiers to enclosures but with an amplifier of this size, we did not have a choice. We spaced the amplifier our from the box using rubber spacers. This helps lessen the vibration.

Lastly, we installed an XK Glow interior and exterior lighting kit and man does it look amazing.