21 replies to this topic

[s10bassjunkie]

Look what I found on eBay.

http://www.ebay.com/...=item1c260afb44

[CrazyKenKid]

DAMN I have heard of those, although never seen one! and for 6k$ that is a steal! although keep in mind the size!


37x22x10
and
180lb

but he will hand deliver!

Edited by CrazyKenKid, 22 April 2012 - 08:44 PM.

[CHRIS 323]

Look what I found on eBay.

http://www.ebay.com/...=item1c260afb44

how many batteries do you need to power this beast ? i wish i had $6k

[SteveMead]

$6k seems like a shit ton to pay for 15000w.

[s10bassjunkie]

Battery I don't know, I know Meade916, Steve Meade on you tube has 8 d3100's powering 2(two) t15k's and that is ferocious. 4 alts from mechman, the 370 amp versions, 8 50 foot rolls of 0 gauge just for the alts and amp. Wtf. A warhorse from kicker would seem more logical

[Bobobass]

Iirc, these things cost over 20k new

[s10bassjunkie]

$25k to be exact. And only 18 ever made. Steve Meade has 4 so that leaves 12 left in the world!

[Fearz]

It just seems like something to buy to say " I got 1" like Steve said $6k for 15,000watts is not the logical choice.

[BaMF101]

What makes this amp unique is that is actually OVER 100% efficient, which means you dont have to have as much for electrical than a standard 15k amp, and thats due to the fact that it has 180 caps. So its pretty much its own power house, and thats why you only see 1 set of 1/0 inputs.

[bigjon]

100% you say? i dont buy that.

[Sencheezy]

What makes this amp unique is that is actually OVER 100% efficient, which means you dont have to have as much for electrical than a standard 15k amp, and thats due to the fact that it has 180 caps. So its pretty much its own power house, and thats why you only see 1 set of 1/0 inputs.

Are you sure about that? Lets think about this here, where does all of this energy come from? The energy that these 180 caps need. Tell me how a capacitor works and operates.

[s10bassjunkie]

I don't buy the 100% either. Power in = power out. You have to charge the cap, then it discharges. But along the way ther has to be some power loss and distortion somewhere due to heat, thermal dynamics, wire resistance, circuit board resistance? How can it be over 100% efficient?

[bigjon]

lol over a 100%... that would mean it makes its own electricity some how!!...

[BaMF101]

From the designer himself.

Yes it is true the idea came from a defibrillator. It seemed silly to me that all these guys in the db drag lanes need to have 1/2 of their vehicle full of batteries and alternators to maintain a decent B+ voltage for a few seconds. That and the fact that the amount of total energy all those batteries contain is huge and they are only using a fraction of it during their burp. It is like taking a NASCAR car to a drag race. A vehicle that is designed to go 200mph for hours on end probably isn't the best design for a 1/4 mile burst.
So when you look at the way a defibrillator is used its like burping an amp. Defibrillators don't have massive power cords that need mega amps at 220V, in fact some of them are portable and run off a very small battery. Why, because they don't need to shock someone for hours at a time, just a quick burst. They just draw a small amount of power continuously during 'charge up' and once all the energy they need is accumulated they release it all at once.

With the operation of the defibrillator in mind, I tried to apply it to car audio. I set off to build a prototype which was based on (2) T1500.2 output sections, I had to liquid cool the MOSFETs because even the FETs in the T1500.2's were not big enough to handle the kind of power I wanted. By keeping them very cold they could be pushed beyond their limits. (This may be the radiator ect... part of the story that someone posted). Then I needed a way to store a bunch of energy, electrolytic caps and some of the carbon based caps that are commonly used in car audio were not even close to being capable of storing the amount of energy I needed, so I used 12 small motorcycle batteries in series to get 140+ Volts. Then I built a power supply that would convert 12VDC to 140VDC to 'charge' these batteries.

I got this contraption all put together the night before the Annual Rockford Fosgate Employee Sound-Off. I didn't really how much power it would make exactly, but to try to shorten this long story it ended up putting out 15,030 Watts RMS! This is how 15k Watts became the goal for a 'real' amp.

The first step towards making it a 'real' amplifier was I had to eliminate the array of batteries. I began searching high and low for something that would do it. I found a company that makes capacitors for hybrid cars and large wind turbines. These worked perfectly. The caps I ended up using are 400 Farads, and there are 180 of these in the T15kW. Then I needed an intelligent power supply that could monitor these caps and add energy to them as needed, and it had to be fast, really fast if this amp was going to play music and not just a burst. So during music these caps are charging, discharging, charging, discharging. The power supply in the T15kW can charge the caps 35,000 times per second.

Of course many other things had to happen like finding MOSFETs that could handle it, a way to keep it cool without antifreeze and car radiators ect. The final product met all the goals and then some.

The main idea is that with this technology the amplifier can put out more power during transients or bursts than the car it's connected to could supply.

[Sencheezy]

Could you please answer my question sir?