Low volume from power amp

[tribass3]

Well I just purchase a used Nady XA1100 power amp that i'm using for our Bands PA system. The problem being that at full volume in either channel it only goes to about 5-10 watts. I have it hook up to Two Electar ES-409 Mains with 10" Speaker and 1" Horn rated at 100 watts each.They don't even hit close to peak power.And technically I should blow them to bits. I just recently bought a Nady RMX6 mic/line mixer also any suggestion on connecting the two together.Even running the XA with a power mixer still no volume, What is wrong. thanks for your time Billy

 

[DonF]

A couple of possibilities:

1. The inputs are not connected properly to your mixer (not too likely)

2. The speakers are not connected properly to the amp's outputs (more likely)

3. The "mode" switch is not in the correct position (depends on how the speakers and inputs are connected)

4. You're not hitting the amp with a strong enough signal (the amp input clips at +4dBU)

5. Your speakers are already blown to bits, so they don't draw much power from the amp

Hope this gets you somewhere....

Don

 

[Massive Master]

The DC thump just from turning that amp on could probably liberate the voice coils on those tiny little boxes...

 

[punkin]

Yup...put a continuity/ohm meter to the speakers. What's the reading?

 

[tribass3]

The speakers work ok with the original 100 watt amp/mixer combo. But the XA1100 does have a a safety switch built in not do blow speakers. So what your saying is that the amp is shutting down because it doesn't want to blow the speakers. If this is so maybe i'll try connecting my Bass Cab rated @450 watts peak since the amp is 300/ channel . thanks guys

 

[punkin]

Hmmm...maybe I'm not quite getting it yet but the safety switch really has no way of knowing the power handling capability of the speaker cab...does it? I mean...a speaker coil is a speaker coil. It's my understanding that these protective circuits sense ultra low resistance (excess high current) or ultra high resistance (unacceptably low current) and then cuase the amp to shut down.

I suppose its "possible" that one or more of the speaker coils could be showing up a short or open when tunes are pumped through...some sort of foreign metallic debris laying across the coil perhaps but the coils are usually coated and should otherwise sound like crap if this were to happen but you say that it sounds ok on another set up.