The 1999 season has just begun, the first competition was the end of March '99. Most of the regulars were there, some with new creations they'd built over the winter. I was using basically the same system as the '98 finals.. but had a few problems just before the competition. I was having a severe voltage drop when I got near full power, to the point the amps were shutting off!! (very bad) So I hit a mere 142.6dB, which was a major disappointment compared to the 147.8dB I hit at the finals. Well bye bye stock battery, and in comes the deep cycle optima battery (hopefully a second optima will be in there for the next competition). But that's not the only change I've made for competition #2, instead of 9 Phoenix xs 12's sealed, I've given 6 xs 12's ported a try. Sofar just by listening I believe I'm at or above the 147.8 dB score I had last year. And i'm only running 2 XS 2500's to power it all (1.3 ohms mono) I was told by many many people DON'T run it at that load you'll fry them.. but the amps have been workin great and loads of power. I've seen the XS 2500 tested and put out 690 watts 2 ohms mono, so I'm guessing somewhere over 750 1.3 ohms mono (very little chance it's gonna even come close to doubling from 2 ohms to 1 ohm) But all in all that gives me somewhere near 1500 watts to 6 12's in a ported box. And all of this still fits in the hatch of my Golf. and this time I'll be competing in the 0-200 watt class so it should be fun.
There were some interesting new creations by last years regulars. Dustin, who didn't get to compete much last year was there with a new car and 4 safire 12's ported running off two old Phoenix M50's.. The box was designed by a friend of his.. but the port tuning was VERY wrong, I gave him a new design to test out for the next competition so he should better his first score of 138, by about 3dB (if he builds it right). Travis, who was running 12 xs 12's in a flat box last year turned that into a wall, and switched from coustic amps to Phoenix XS 2500's (hmmm wonder where he got that idea from..) he still needs to do some tweaking, and beefing up of the electrical system, he only hit about 146dB. Old faithful, Cory in his Saab, that's been competing for the past 3 years with the same system still comes out on top everytime in Calgary. He must have done some tweaking because of a 151.5 dB run, which I believe is his best score ever in Calgary. My arch rival Cory (in the civic) didn't show for the first one, which is good cause he would have kicked my ass (due to my electrical system problems) But with him not there I was able to take the win in my power class even with all the problems I had. But the next competition I hope to post some more respectable numbers.
Well that's all for now folks, I'll update this sometime after April 28th (the next comp)
