I need the community's advice on which affordable amp to get.

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FeelTheMusic

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Hello guys. I love car audio, I've designed and built several VERY good sounding systems on previous vehicles in the past, and now I just bought another vehicle (a 2000 Toyota Tundra) and this thing REALLY needs a sound system upgrade! I'm doing everything: receiver, component speakers in front, coaxials in the rear, and a single 12" subwoofer. I know the subwoofer I really want to get already. What I want advice on, is the type and power necessary to give me the exact sound that I want from the sub, for a reasonable price.

Ok so here's what I want: crunchy, tactile bass. I'm going to have a single 12" sub in a small sealed enclosure. To me this is the sweet spot for subwoofers. I want accuracy over max decibels. What I really want though is a really hard-hitting, stiff, initial hit of the bass note. I want the thing to kick you in the kidneys, without just jamming the volume up all the way. In other words I want the driver to deliver that initial speaker movement as close to instantaneously as possible. I'm not going to buy one of those $300 fancy deep-cycle batteries yet. I was thinking of adding a huge car audio capacitor to the sub amp just so that the sub can create a really nice crunchy, immediate bass hit. But! I know that a good amp has a lot of capacitance built into it already from the factory, just for this type of thing. I want to know if there is an affordable amp out there, less than $100 (and I don't mind buying it used), that will be particularly well set up for that immediate power draw in the first fraction of a second, so that I don't have to buy a huge capacitor to provide it.

For instance does anyone recommend buying a class A/B or class D amp for this purpose?

Would anyone wire their subwoofer for 2 ohms instead of 4 ohms or vice versa, for this purpose?

I can't wait to see what you guys say about this. This idea has been rattling around in my brain for years. I made an account on this forum just to understand this topic well. Thanks for your help.
 
Damn, 100$ for the sound that you’re looking for....in a tundra. I don’t even. Have that and I have those $300 agm batteries you speak of:) Hopefully it’s not a crew cab and you’re just gonna sacrifice the access can space of the access cab for a bigger enclosure. Maybe do a t-line enclosure.

Seems like everyone’s getting great output out of the taramps amplifiers, a 3k is right around $200 and the 1800 is about $150.
 
You will need solid electrical though for what you’re wanting for achieve

Thanks for the input. I'll check out taramps amplifiers. I was thinking an 8 gauge wiring kit just to be safe. That's probably overkill though, in terms of wire thickness. What's your take on the necessary wire thickness of the wiring kit?
 
Ummm, probably not 8 gauge. You have to factor max amps drawn from the amp and the distance you have to send that power from the battery. For the sound you’re aiming for overall your build will probably need to incorporate 0 gauge, 2 gauge if you want to shave pennies
 
Damn, 100$ for the sound that you’re looking for....in a tundra. I don’t even. Have that and I have those $300 agm batteries you speak of:) Hopefully it’s not a crew cab and you’re just gonna sacrifice the access can space of the access cab for a bigger enclosure. Maybe do a t-line enclosure.

Seems like everyone’s getting great output out of the taramps amplifiers, a 3k is right around $200 and the 1800 is about $150.

Hmm, I checked out those Taramps amps on Amazon, good price, interesting features, lots of power in a small physical size. I would almost buy one of those right now but there's no remote amp volume knob! I can't live without a separate volume knob for my subwoofer amp. I'm pretty handy electronically, can one be made and added pretty easily with a potentiometer or something?

Wow 2 gauge!?! I've never bought such a thick-ass wiring kit before. I do want that intense amount of current in a fraction of a second though, maybe incredibly thick wire is needed so I have as little resistance as possible at that moment...
 
Hmm, I checked out those Taramps amps on Amazon, good price, interesting features, lots of power in a small physical size. I would almost buy one of those right now but there's no remote amp volume knob! I can't live without a separate volume knob for my subwoofer amp. I'm pretty handy electronically, can one be made and added pretty easily with a potentiometer or something?

Wow 2 gauge!?! I've never bought such a thick-ass wiring kit before. I do want that intense amount of current in a fraction of a second though, maybe incredibly thick wire is needed so I have as little resistance as possible at that moment...
Musically your probably fine with 4 gauge but if your going to stick with your amp budget your probably going to end up with an amp that your really going to have to push to allow you to achieve the sound you want from your sub stage. The right enclosure can really be your best friend in your build/budget goal. Welding cable could help you budget wise.
 
Musically your probably fine with 4 gauge but if your going to stick with your amp budget your probably going to end up with an amp that your really going to have to push to allow you to achieve the sound you want from your sub stage. The right enclosure can really be your best friend in your build/budget goal. Welding cable could help you budget wise.

That's a good tip about using welding cable. I looked up some really nice 2 gauge welding cable that is affordable on Amazon. Also it looks like welding cable uses pure copper wire instead of copper-clad aluminum like all the car audio amp wiring kits use.
 
That's a good tip about using welding cable. I looked up some really nice 2 gauge welding cable that is affordable on Amazon. Also it looks like welding cable uses pure copper wire instead of copper-clad aluminum like all the car audio amp wiring kits use.
If you get car audio wire ofc is pure copper vs cca which is the less expensive alternative
 
Ummm, probably not 8 gauge. You have to factor max amps drawn from the amp and the distance you have to send that power from the battery. For the sound you’re aiming for overall your build will probably need to incorporate 0 gauge, 2 gauge if you want to shave pennies

Hey what gauge wire do you recommend between the amp and the subwoofer then?
 
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FeelTheMusic

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