fungrified

Hi guys,

I have an AC-15 and love it to bits but as much as its bedroom level sounds are nice, there's a little voice in my head nagging away at me that I'm not making the most of it and I need somewhere to crank it. I live in the city (well, Hobart isn't really much of a city but that's not the point) so the only way I'll be able to do that is to drive somewhere and find a secluded area and go nuts. Yes, I do know being outdoors will ruin it a lot but I'm not concerned about that; I plan on making it pretty loud and being pretty close.

So I have a couple of questions before deciding if it's worth saving up a few hundred bucks for.

Firstly, where it says 100W at the back of the amp, does that mean that's the maximum power it's going to draw, or does it mean it's what to expect at normal levels or what? This concerns me because while a car battery would seem to be able to run something at 100W for a couple of hours, if cranking it will exceed that by a fair amount, I'm not sure it'd be worth it to go ahead.

Secondly, is there any way this could be bad for the amp? What I gather is that I'd need a deep cycle 12v battery, a 12v - 240v inverter, then probably a regulator (then I'd probably stick in a surge protector for good measure as well). I hardly know anything about electronics so I don't know if that's going to give me close enough to what the amp's designed for or if any portable system that isn't made up of super high quality equipment will be inherently unstable and possibly damaging.

Thanks in advance!

PS feel free to point out any other flaws in my crazy plan

AcousticMirror

you'll be able to run the amp for like 13 seconds.

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George Juggles

If that.

The amp would use too much power

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ikey_

find a way to sound proof your closet and point the amp towards the wall, close door (while running cables underneath of possible). that might be a good possibility.

thats what i would do that go through all this - field in the middle of nowhere mess.

i would somehow seal all the cracks to my closet and door (effectively sealing myself inside my bedroom)

OR

get yourself indoor storage at an storage complex and close yourself inside. some people i know have a climate controlled place where they dont care about bands and its indoor, in the middle of the facility. you could probably crank a full stack in there and from the outside...you MIGHT hear something.

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fungrified

Really? Hmm, I must have the theory completely wrong. I thought 100W at 12V DC = 8.33A draw. One of the batteries I found was 38Ah, so that's a few hours usage. Which part of this am I wrong about?

As for sealing the room, I'm in an apartment where there's glass on one side which loud noise would carry through to people on the other side and there's nothing I can do about the wall between me and my neighbour.

Storage is a good idea but there's no way I can afford that

Edit: Mentioned this to my dad and he suggested a generator, which sounds like a much better choice. Any thoughts about that? I guess it'd be more than enough power but I'd just need to spend a bit more on the stability side of things?

Heilz

A generator will give you continuos energy which is what you need. I'm pretty sure your amp has a safety feature that it wont start up if it didn't had enough voltage that it needs. Because basically it just takes your AC signals amd turn it into a flat and leveled DC signal which is what you want for a good noise and skip free sound. Using your car baterry isn't going to be practical unless you have enough spares... It could live up to the amperage but if it doesn't have enough power in it thennnnn.... Yeah it wont lite up lol.

Short, go for generator. Amen.

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tubetime86

Why? I call bullshit. They make huge inverters that can run just about any household item... Why not an amp?

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greeny23

whats the longest power lead you can afford?

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fungrified

Yeah I don't know why I didn't think of a generator in the first place! Definitely heading down that track now.

So you reckon I shouldn't need too much in the way of power regulation etc? Will even just a decent surge-protecting powerboard be enough to make sure I don't do any damage?

Keep in mind I probably won't be looking at an expensive generator as even the ones for about $100 are rated for over 700W continuous power so even if they're overstating by a heap I should easily be fine. So if there's anything else with cheap generators I should be particularly careful of, please tell me!



Why do you ask? Are you getting at running a cable from the CBD to the middle of nowhere or are you being serious?

tubetime86

Ever since I saw this video I've been wanting to go camping and take my drum kit, a generator and some instruments. It would be awesome as hell to be in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the night, and rocking with a full band.

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Cruel Angel

Rent a warehouse to play it in.

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fungrified

Haha brilliant, that cop's awesome.

Cruel Angel, as I mentioned, that's too expensive.

AcousticMirror

you'd get a few hours of random loads on the battery at most, if it was a fresh battery with a deep charge.

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rocknroll93

hook a battery up to an inverter, then plug amp into said inverter.
problem solved. it's how they run all the electronics in busses/ campervans ect ect

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tubetime86

What if the car was running? Why would you shut the car off?

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jj1565

generators tend to be loud and obnoxious.

there's a couple of quiet ones, you might want to check out.

also, i can run an amp off my car. might be easier modding your car.

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AcousticMirror

oh then you can run it forever.

for like 4.5 an hour.

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tubetime86

A gallon of gas isn't $4.50 here... And I'm sure cars don't use a gallon of gas per hour when idling.



(Thanks blktiger, love the gif. )

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AcousticMirror

try it and see?

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_..._idle_in_1_hour

seems like 1 gallon per hour of idling is pretty standard/average. also will destroy your engine.

also my gas is 4.50 a gallon.

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