Shakers - Simple/Cheap Hookup - Visual Guide - Page 74

I have a question concerning running multiple buttkickers off one amp.

I currently have one Buttkicker Advanced unit (BK4-4) powered by one BKA300-4 amp. The BK4 is rated at 4ohms, 75watt min. 400watt max. The amp is rated at 300watts at 4ohms, 150watts at 2ohms.

What I would like to do is add one Buttkicker Mini Concert unit, rated at 2ohms, 50watt min. 250watt max. to the above setup.

Would there be any issues running two transducers with different ohm rating at the same time?

I would assume I'd wire them in series, just concerned about damaging the amp and/or transducers in this configuration.

Any help or suggestions appreciated.

The only issue I would probably be concerned about is that mixing a buttkicker mini with a regular size buttkicker would be TUNING them properly...meaning how are you going to get 2 different rated buttklickers to give you proper levels of shake which each is specifically rated/designed for??? Example would be that the Advanced unit would'nt give you the punch anymore because its now powering 2 other minis...or vice versa the minis wouldnt give you the punch because the advanced unit is sucking away too much power...if you visit their website there are helpful resources or do what i did directly call the guitammer (buttkicker) company they are very HELPFUL!

Thanks for the tips. I'm not too concerned if the mini doesn't shake as much as the larger unit. Not sure how it will work out, I'll just have to try it and find out.

I'll take your advice and call the manufacture first and get their input.

Received my 50hz low pass FMod yesterday. Quite the difference in shaking. Much more appropriate than the 70hz low pass version.

I installed my bass shakers today,4 of them under my couch with the Dayton 240 watt plate amp.I can't believe what I've been missing all this time,it adds so much to the experience.

I didn't know the Clark shaker needed so much room underneath the couch. It literally needs a good 6 inches of height if attached to the bottom of a couch. I don't feel like ripping open 100 staples on the bottom and installing inside of the couch, but I may have to. Otherwise I'm going to have to really bring the couch up, much higher than any rubber isolation feet will do. Any ideas? 2x4's under the handrest sides?

What do you guys usually set the gain knob to? Using a dayton 240w with 1 aurA

To follow up on my above post-

I added the Buttkicker Mini Concert to the BKA300-4 amp with the Buttkicker Advanced unit wired in series.

It does work ok, no over heating issues. But the results aren't what I was hoping for. This amp doesn't have enough power to run this combo to the levels I would like.

I was hoping to avoid buying another amp, but just ordered another BKA300. Hope it doesn't take weeks to receive it.

Did u pay over 350-400 for the amp? If so return it... .get a behringer Epx 4000 plenty of power for all ur kickers ...sell the BK u have...

I'm wondering just how loud I can safely go while using these,Aura pro's specifically.Has anyone ever messed theirs up by pushing them too hard?

I ordered it for 169.00 with shipping. Haven't received a tracking # yet. I have a feeling it's back ordered, like most of the Buttkicker products.

The EPX 4000 looks nice, more money that I wanted to spend. 2000 watts is over kill for what I need.

Guys -

Looking at going Auro Pros for my dedicated HT because, well.. I'm tired of waiting on overpriced buttkickers to come in off of backorder.

My questions are as follows:

I have two rows. 4 seats in front. 3 in back. Looking at wiring up front row first with four shakers. I'm looking at the Dayton S240 Sub plate Amp.

Questions are:

1) Is this going to provide awesome shake for the 4 seats alone? Will I need another amp if I decide to do the back row?
2) Can someone explain to me how I would wire these shakers to the sub amp with two subs, an SMS-1 Equalizer and receiver in the chain? I'm kind of a tard when it comes to knowing what gets wired to what.
3) I'm building a riser. Does anyone have experience with the best spot to put a plate amp for the shakers/chairs?
4) What have people been doing in terms of mounting their Auras in the Berkline 12003 series recliners?

Thanks!

I picked up 6 bass shaker pros and a Crown XLS1000 amp.

What would be the best way to wire these shakers up to the amp? It is 2 ohm stable, but I don't want to fry the shakers.

Should I run the amp in bridged mode, or should I keep it in stereo mode?

I will be setting the amp's crossover at 50hz.

I sit on a plastic chair while watching my movie. (google image for plastic chair if you wanna know the type of chair that I'm referring to).

I am planning to buy and hookup a Buttkicker Gamer kit to enhance my movie experience. I think the Gamer kit is good enough to shake this light plastic chair...but I'm worried that will it be too much (in terms of force pounding on a plastic).

Any thoughts?

I just can't find a good combo that satisfies me shaker wise. I upgraded to a Buttkicker advance, but the damn thing makes annoying vibration sounds on its chair leg kit. If I could bolt the thing directly to my couch it would be so much nicer, but ripping apart the bottom of the couch isn't an option yet. I removed the Buttkicker from the kit and at the same intensity that it would rattle and sound like crap on the couch kit, it didn't rattle in my hand. It was just a nice strong shake that I wish could work with the kit.

I also tried the Clark Silver, and it doesn't have as much punch as the Buttkicker. I bolted that directly to a joist at the bottom of the couch, but the joist is too narrow. It split some of the wood going in and I think its a bad idea to keep it in. I'm going to run it a few days and play with the amp to see if the shake gets stronger without overpowering it.

Both are were tested on the Buttkicker 300 watt amp. I'll be testing the Dayton 100w amp with the Clark today since that has freq control. I don't like how you cant see the intensity you are running the amp at on the BKA, or how you cant control the cutoff freq.

I have a feeling I'm going to want to sell these off and upgrade to the LFE kit, and eventually install inside the couch. It would be nice if the chair leg mount from that kit handles rough vibrations better, but I don't think it will.

Anyone?

OK I hooked two shakers up in stereo mode and I am now horrified to find that my Onkyo 809 doesn't have enough juice coming out the second subwoofer output to properly drive this Crown XLS1000. Now what? Can I buy a simple preamp to boost the signal going to the Crown?

Right now I have to have the Crown's gain set to FULL to get any sort of vibration out of the shakers that might be possible to feel through my chairs. The green lights on the front of the amp barely light up at all during heavy bass, so obviously they are not getting enough of a signal from the Onkyo. I tried turning my subwoofer output up by about 5 db but it hardly made much difference.

Any ideas?

Most likely there's nothing wrong with your Onkyo, and there's no need for any "juice" from it to provide a signal to your Crown. Two options:
1) Buy a splitter and split the signal from your 'first' sub output so that it feeds both the sub and the Crown amp.

2) Go into your Onkyo's setup and actually specify that you have two subs, so that the second output is activated, and then play with its gain so that a decent signal is actually being passed through to the Crown.

I've been through the setup menus and I can't find anywhere that you can specify you have 2 subwoofers. Did I miss it somewhere?

I will give the splitter a try though, although it seems funny to have to do that when there are two subwoofer outputs sitting there already.

Go through the area where you can set the gains adjust the test tone volume. I have several x007 models of the Onkyos, and I suspect no that much has changed in setting them up in the past 2 years. There really is no need to use a splitter. Perhaps in the lower models there's just a splitter internally? Is your sub's gain level set very high? It could be that your sub output from the Onkyo is set very low. This happened to me. The difference between -6 db and 0 db is huge on the low frequencies.

I've been through there and there is no option for two subwoofers.

I just tried splitting the signal off just one output and it made no difference.

I found this thread where someone else experience voltage problems with the Crown amp and had to use a preamp to adjust the gain.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/archi...t-1295375.html

The Hsu bass optimizer sounds like it would be perfect but they don't seem to ship to Canada.

My sub level was set around 0 db and I raised it to +5, and while that helped it is not enough. The shakers aren't getting enough power.

Apologies. I recall someone else having this issue in this thread, and needing a preamp too. It depends on the sort of amp you have, I believe.

You definately need a pre amp for the crowns/behringers AMPS...I used the "ART DJ Pre II Phono Preamp" got it from Amazon for like ~$40. someone here recommended it to me and it worked perfect!

Excellent! Thanks. And for anyone else that was wondering it does look like Hsu will ship to Canada, you just need to email them first. I think I will go with your phono preamp instead though since it is cheaper.

No problem glad I could help! I went through the exact same issues had everything hooked up and connected to the AMP and nothing working after spending a boat load of loot. Luckily I am a member here and people are so helpful...glad I was able to pass along info which was passed along to me!!!! :-)

Where in Canada? I'm in Montreal, and if you are too, I'll be picking up stuff I've had shipped to my address in Champlain, NY, on my way back from Barbados next week. I'd be happy to pick up anything you want if you're local to me and want to use my address to save some $$$ on shipping.

Thanks for the offer. I'm in Ontario near London so probably a bit too far anyway. I ended up finding a site that sells the preamp dukedallas mentioned so I don't need the Hsu anymore. Thanks again.

Question for those of you using Behringer or other amps for your Buttkickers. The BK amps all have low pass adjustments to set the max frequency going to your Buttkickers. The normal sub out on a receiver typically passes everything from 120 Hz and down while many adjust the BK amps to only send 80 Hz and below. Are those using non BK amps doing anything to limit the max frequency sent to the Buttkickers or are you finding the Sub out to work fine. I understand that typically you need to add a preamp to get the level up for amps like Crown and Behringer. My BK amp died and am looking to replace it with a Behringer EP2000 or EP4000. Both are in the $300 range which is about the same as a new BK Amp.

Mine works fine I am using a behringer EPX4000...the pre amp i use has 2 filters on it and my receiver has sub woofer filters too, I just posted about the pre amp the other day. I suggest the EPX 4000 because it has the RCA inputs, the older version EP4000 has some other inputs which wont be compatible with your home receiver unless you get special wires.

DukeDallas,
Thanks for the input on the EPX4000. If I don't get my BK1000 fixed (so far I have replaced numerous Lytics and a Bridge rectifier) I will be picking up one of the Behringers. I noticed that the preamp that you recommend is a phono preamp. I couldn't tell for sure but it looks like it only has an input for phono which means it applies the phono RIAA equalization curve to your subwoofer signal. That does not sound like a good idea as that is not a flat response like one would desire. A microphone preamp might be more appropriate.