Outlaw 5000 Amp going into protection mode

[lovinthehd]

Cover up the ends of the coax with something?

 

[TLS Guy]

Pretty sure I found the culprit.

I changed the Front Left wiring to another channel that had previously been working fine, and it still went into protection mode. I took the wall plate apart to see if there was anything that looked wrong on the inside. Pulled the wires for the FL channel off, and retightened the wires.

Then I noticed that there are coaxial cable ends inside the wall, very close to where the wires for the FL are hooked up. So I left the wall plate hanging away from the wall. We then watched the movie '1917', but I only ran the 3 front channels off of the amp. It didn't go into protection mode, so that's a great sign. I'm thinking there was contact inside the wall box between the FL wires and the coax cable.

I hooked the 2 rear channels back up to the RX-A2040 before we watched the movie, I'll try hooking them back up to the amp again today and see what happens. Fingers crossed.

It sounds to me that you have a "bird's nest" for your speaker wiring. That mess is going to destroy your new amplifier. You are flailing about and guessing. Your fault finding seems limited to seeing if your amp goes into protection or not. That is NOT an acceptable fault finding technique. You can only send an amp into protection a few times, before it is destroyed.

I think your speaker wiring needs a redo from start to finish, if you don't want a really expensive repair in your future.

 

[Pogre]

Pretty sure I found the culprit.

I changed the Front Left wiring to another channel that had previously been working fine, and it still went into protection mode. I took the wall plate apart to see if there was anything that looked wrong on the inside. Pulled the wires for the FL channel off, and retightened the wires.

Then I noticed that there are coaxial cable ends inside the wall, very close to where the wires for the FL are hooked up. So I left the wall plate hanging away from the wall. We then watched the movie '1917', but I only ran the 3 front channels off of the amp. It didn't go into protection mode, so that's a great sign. I'm thinking there was contact inside the wall box between the FL wires and the coax cable.

I hooked the 2 rear channels back up to the RX-A2040 before we watched the movie, I'll try hooking them back up to the amp again today and see what happens. Fingers crossed.

That'd definitely do it! I suspected you had stray strands and/or bare wire touching somewhere. At least you seem to have somewhat isolated the issue.

TLS may be a li'l gruff, but he's right. You're lucky you didn't blow your amp. You have to be careful when running wires that every connection point is clean with no bare spots or stray strands from start to finish. I think it's a good idea to check it all from one end to the other and make sure you don't have any other potential problems.

 

[}Fear_Inoculum{]

That'd definitely do it! I suspected you had stray strands and/or bare wire touching somewhere. At least you seem to have somewhat isolated the issue.

TLS may be a li'l gruff, but he's right. You're lucky you didn't blow your amp. You have to be careful when running wires that every connection point is clean with no bare spots or stray strands from start to finish. I think it's a good idea to check it all from one end to the other and make sure you don't have any other potential problems.

The room was pre-wired as a media room for 5.1 long before I bought it (house was built in 2004, we bought it in 2013), so checking from end to end is impossible. I can only check at the terminal points.

Right now, I don't need the 2 channels that I identified as potential 'problems', so I'll leave it wired as is. Once my new pre pro arrives, and I get Atmos speakers installed (for 13.3) I'll need the extra channels and I'll revisit my options then.

The Atmos speakers won't be until sometime next year when we do renos on the house and I re carpet the HT room/risers (there is also talk about adding an addition to the house, which would give me the option of expanding the length of the HT room, but we'll see). That will give me the chance to pull everything out of there and open up the drywall to run in wall wiring for the Atmos and surrounds.

 

[Eppie]

That bare coax would do it even if it's not in use. It would be connected to a splitter somewhere else in the house and if you have any cable boxes in use that would complete a connection to ground. Yup, very lucky you did not blow up the amp. Guess the protection circuitry worked as designed. Cut the end of the coax so that there are no bare strands showing and cover it in electrical tape if not in use. Check that the outer shielding on the coax does not have any stray wire touching the centre conductor before taping it up.