DiS_TuNg

Well, I'm looking to upgrade my alternator soon and have done a lot of research, but still haven't really decided on where to purchase a nice HO alternator for a good price.

Was just wondering if anyone had any opinions on the following:
Excess Amperage
Iraggi
HO Alternator
Ohio Gen

This is a bit more recent, anyone have any opinions or personal experience?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/SCION...spagenameZWDVW

Thanks in advance for your help.

Winter

thats most likely 165amp max production, i would go through Iraggi and get something realiable. lookin at about $380 for a 115idel 180max and about $400 for a 130idle 200max with Iraggi.

cee_dub2003

I second the Iraggi. I have had one for at least a year still working hard.

lantzdarla

you can get a 180 amp from excessive amperage with underdrive pully so it produces high amps at idle for about $420 with shipping and insurance.they are hand built by the owner and not mass produced.i cant comment on the iraggi because i havent used one but i hear good things about them too!

lantzdarla

lantzdarla

Winter

DiS, what is your system's total potential RMS power? to figure this out, add up the RMS ratings of your amplifiers.

i'm just wondering is all since you never specified it and it could help detirmin just how powerful of an alternator you need.

DiS_TuNg

I will not be running too much power. It'll be a JL 450/4 and a JL 500/1 running a 12" W7. It may not sound like much of a draw, but the amps caused major dimming in my previous car (96 Lexus ES300 w/ 130A alternator + Big 3 upgrade). I have yet to hook the amps up to the xB but i am definitely planning ahead to do upgrades when necessary. Thanks for the replies and inputs.

lantzdarla

hey winter, please explain to me what you mean by adding total rms. i have two amps and the total actual rms is 1952 and i have a 180 amp alternator. i feel kinda dumb right now but is there a formula to this?

Winter

@ Lantzdarla - ya it's easy, first you total up all the true RMS ratings of your amplifiers, then divide by a common voltage. so say a mean area to divide by is around 12-14volt depending on how much voltage drop there is, so you would take 1952 and divide by say 13.8 for a common voltage and that would give you about 141 or 141amps of continous draw. this formula only works with sign wave output like from a signal generator used for DB comps.

for general music play, you can subtract a percentage off your resulted amps. so say... if you listen to metal/rock then subtract about 10% because music wise your power draw isn't consistant and heavy metal/rock uses alot of mid and low tones consistant;y. aftwords, say about 25% less for RNB and rap since the bass hits are a little more drawn out. country and whatnot more like 30%. Drum'n Bass/techo style is around 15-20%.

so to simple it up, if you want to know how much you could be drawing, here are the simple formulas:

sign wave - total system RMS / common voltage at full amp pull

Music wave - (total system RMS / common voltage at full amp pull) - 10-75% depending on the type of music or tunes normaly listened too.

you can also do this formula for easy listening, say you want to know how much you are pulling at 10% system power:

Sign wave - (total system RMS / common voltage at full amp pull) X 0.10 = *x*amps which = 10% system pull

for Music wave, *X*amp - 10-75% depening on the type of music normaly played.

hope i made that understandleable enough.

Ghost_1

I run one amp and my lights dim poop, I need to buy one of these alts.

Winter

in other words, Lan

at 13.8v your system is pulling about 141amps at full RMS potential power with signwave input. probably around... 110amps at full RMS potential power with musical wave and about 11-14amps at 10% system power depending on the music you listen too. at 10% power you should getting a pretty good thump as it doesn't take much to get to that point. after that when you start really blasting it, your ears can't handle it so you don't notice the mechanicel diffrence of output at that point unless it's a huge diffrence of 200 watt to 1000watt output.

Winter

oh and also, if the company doesn't supply anything about total dynamic power of the amplifier, then i would say it would safe to assume a room of about 5-25% of error on the amount of system draw due to amplifier efficiency. great thing about JBL is that they supply the RMS rating of the amplifier based on it's efficiency, not it's total dynamic power. dynamic power should always be more then RMS, when this happens, you'll see an amp with an RMS of 600 while having a 700watt dynamic power range, this means the amp has a 85% efficiency. to find this out, just take the RMS power and divide by the dynamic power. if the amp has muliple channels, add each channel up before dividing by the dynamic power. if the amp has multiple channels and is capable of bridging you will notice diffrent efficiency ratings, this is because the amplifier current is having to take shorter or longer routes to come up with your power. the longer the route is, the hoter the amp will get and the more energy is lost and turned into heat from the amplifier.

lantzdarla

thanks for that winter...i bet your fingers hurt!!LOL!! i'll show a pic of my stuff!!

Winter

haha not a problem

ya lets see them pics Lan, what are ya runnin in there?

lantzdarla

lantzdarla

i'm not completely done with the install ...i'm still waiting on the radio to get here! those are four t1 12's ...two of them are dual 2 ohm and the other two are dual 4 ohm. i'm only installing the 4 ohm for now and if i want to run my amp at a different ohm..i'll install the 2 ohm. so you could call those my backups. that is a t10001bd rockford amp for the subs and a t4004 rockford amp for my highs and mids. the capacitor is 6 farad and the power wire and ground is 1/0 gauge. i'm running 8 gauge wire to my subs and i have the bass ***** in the compartment(oven some call it) under the radio slot.my door and dash speakers are t1 power series and i'm not worried about the rear speakers because you cant hear them anyway!!!the battery is stinger 1000 if that means anythand it is very heavy for its size!!hey, my fingers hurt!!!

DiS_TuNg

I suppose going with an Iraggi for the price of $400 isn't too bad compared to some of the other companies out there, how much extra is the warranty that's offered with his alternators? Does he have any contact information?

Winter

aye he does, not sure about warrenty or anything like that though. Dom Iraggi is just him self last i knew so he's a busy guy. his email is dominick@tds.net and will be more then happy to do business with ya. the alternators i posted above *115amp idle/ 180amp max and 130amp idle/ 200amp max* are the ones he told me he has available for the xB regardless of year.

@Lantzdarla - looks wicked, one thing though, unless you are planning to go into SPL comps. i wouldn't bother with the cap. it will only make your alternator and batteries work harder then they need to keep it charger all the time. cap's are only good for massive 1 second bursts for SPL comps.. i would just set it aside and use the battery if sound quality is your main goal. you'll still get loud, but if you arn't aiming for shear SPL at a specific tuning point then i wouldn't bother with the cap.

lantzdarla

well, i didnt think about that. good point!!!!