The Phase control on the amplifier is there so you can quickly flip the phase of your subwoofers
to your car speakers, instead of taking out the wires and changing the + and – around. This
can be very useful if you are trying to get a specific sound or if you have wired your door
speakers and subwoofer out of phase to each other by accident.
This bit is VERY IMPORTANT. You need to ensure that the load you subject your amplifier
to is within specification and of a sensible nature and that you have the appropriate cooling
where applicable. This particular amplifier is suitable for running a mono load at a minimum of
1 Ohm, however at 1 Ohm it may generate a large amount of heat due to being less efficient.
At 1 Ohm loads, it is YOUR responsibility to ensure the amp is kept cool. Vertical mounting,
“hot boxing” or other improper installation can cause severe damage to the amplifier.
The aplifiers protection circuitry reads current draw to define protection parameters, the
algorithm it uses presumes the amplifier is used at 4 Ohm. If you are using the amp at 1 Ohm
you will need to bear in mind that the protection circuitry may not intervene in time. That is
not to say that the amplifier can not function reliably at 1 Ohm. It just needs the appropriate
cooling; if used in a confined space it needs fans to circulate the air (especially if mounted
vertically) ideally the amp needs to be horizontal on the ground plane and be mounted to a
heat conductive plate. A regular mistake that is made is to mount the amp onto a board that
has been covered in carpet. This restricts airflow under the amplifier, limiting the amount
of convection cooling that can be achieved and insulating the amplifier underneath. This
actually builds up heat inside the amp! Avoid mounting on to carpet where possible.
Just as important is to remember that as well as the actual physical impedance you need
to consider the type of load you are going to subject your amplifier to. A single (or pair of)
8, 10 or 12 or 15 inch subwoofer of an appropriately matched construction and in a nicely
designed enclosure will be fine run off a BLACKDB1.1 amp at 2 ohms or 1 ohms in the
case of the pair (assuming proper setup) but you don’t want to try and run eight massive
heavy coned dual voice coil monster woofers off it, even though on paper you might well
have a 1 Ohm load. You have to use a bit of common sense – if you need to fill a van with
eight woofers like that then use eight DB1.1’s. Big power woofers often have heavy cones,
these type of woofers can have big impedance dips and can cause clipping on transients.
If you are going to wire in 2 of these or a DVC heavy coned subwoofer, we recommend
that you wire them in series at 2 Ohm and use a higher gain setting on the amp. For wiring
instructions please see the diagram later in this manual.
Obviously, we recommend the Bass Face range of subwoofers and speakers for ultimate
compatibility. It’s also worth mentioning at this point, that, running audio into the amp, with
any level of gain, but no speaker attached can and will seriously damage your amplifier if
done for long periods of time. Some amps have load sensing and will shut the amp down if
no speaker is attached, some do not. Car amplifiers often do not.
Another danger to your amplifier is mounting it onto your bass box. While this is a very
popular technique, people completely overlook the fact that the bass box will cause the
internals of the amplifier to be vibrated violently and can cause components to become
disconnected from the board, or crack the board itself. This will of course break the amplifier
and would not be covered under the limited warranty.
