BASSFACE BlackDB1.1 User manual

BlackDB1.1
Technical Data 1
Firstly, thank you for your purchase. Every element of this product has been optimized
to give you the best possible performance for your money. We think that Bass Face
represents the highest quality to price ratio available on the market today.
Please take the time to read these instructions carefully. You will need to follow them to
have a successful install and get the most from the product.
Do remember that incorrect installation or abuse is NOT covered under warranty – it is
YOUR responsibility to make sure that your installation and partnered product is suitable
and compatible.
Before you even get the amplier out of the box (realistically, you will have done this
already and boy it looks sweet doesn’t it!) you will need to install a suitable wiring kit in
your vehicle. We recommend the use of a 4AWG wiring kit with appropriate termination for
maximum performance, especially if you will be running the amplier at 1 ohm impedance.
If you are planning to run multiple ampliers you will need to up the gauge of the wiring
accordingly. Do bear in mind that many manufacturers offer wiring kits that actually come
up smaller in true wire gauge than advertised.
To begin, disconnect the car battery, taking note of any required precautions suggested
by the vehicle manufacturer such as alarm or radio codes, or on board computer or AGM
battery requirements.
You need to nd a suitable point on the rewall (bulkhead) to run the power wire through.

If you have to drill a hole, you will need to t a rubber grommet to ensure the wire does not
get damaged as a short will ruin the whole setup and can be very dangerous. The positive
wire needs to go to the + positive terminal on the battery. A fuse of appropriate size to
protect the needs to be tted in line and no more than 18” from the battery.
Once you have the cable in the car, run it back to the boot or to where you intend to t the
amplier. When you do this, be aware you will need to run the remote cable and the RCA’s
from the head unit back to the amp too. A common mistake is to forget that a car amplier
needs the remote 12V turn on cable to see power for it to even work! If you only t power
and ground you’re going to get…. Nothing!
If the wires you are running have to run over or go alongside other looms of the car, try to
cross them at right angles to avoid unwanted interference in the signal, and try not to run
them parallel with other cables either. If you can, run the power and the signal cables down
opposite sides of the car. This isn’t essential but if you do get any interference once the job
is complete the rst thing to look at will be separating these wires so if you can do it rst it
makes a lot of sense!
The absolutely most important aspect of the power install is the earth wire. This wants to be
very securely bolted to the chassis of the car. We recommend drilling a hole (take care not
to drill through your spare tyre, brake lines or anything else!) in the boot oor and sand off
any paint to the bare metal where the wire will be connected. A bad earth is a very common
aw in installation and can cause a number of headaches later down the line so be sure to
take care in doing this. Do NOT use a self tapping screw to try and screw the earth down, as
it will come loose and impair performance. Other common disasters include trying to earth
to rear light mounting bolts, boot lock mountings and other ways to “trap” the cable in the
vein hope you might get a good earth. For every volt the amplier doesn’t see it requires
TWICE the power to create the same output. That means poor performance and a possible
broken amplier…. DO THE EARTH RIGHT!
Once your power cable, RCA and remote lead are all securely running through the car to
where you want the amp and the earth wire is fastened securely, somewhere close to the
amp, you can t the amplier. Don’t forget to t the bass remote control and run the control
cable with the other wires to the amplier! This can be plugged in right away.
The amp needs to be mounted on a solid surface, favorites are boot oors, backs of seats
etc. Wherever you do choose to mount the amp, it needs sufcient ventilation; 2-3” around
will be enough. We do not recommend mounting an amplier on a bass box as the vibrations
can cause damage to the internals of the amplier over time.
You are now ready to connect your subwoofers! The BLACKDB1.1 has 2 sets of positive and
negative connectors, this is for ease of connecting multiple speakers and bridges inside
the amplier (they are not separate outputs) Take care that the positive on the speaker is
going to the positive on the amplier. If your car speakers and woofer are connected “out
of phase” then it can severely affect bass output as the speakers might cancel each other
out acoustically.

The Phase control on the amplier is there so you can quickly ip the phase of your subwoofers
to your car speakers, instead of taking out the wires and changing the + and – around. This
can be very useful if you are trying to get a specic sound or if you have wired your door
speakers and subwoofer out of phase to each other by accident.
This bit is VERY IMPORTANT. You need to ensure that the load you subject your amplier
to is within specication and of a sensible nature and that you have the appropriate cooling
where applicable. This particular amplier is suitable for running a mono load at a minimum of
1 Ohm, however at 1 Ohm it may generate a large amount of heat due to being less efcient.
At 1 Ohm loads, it is YOUR responsibility to ensure the amp is kept cool. Vertical mounting,
“hot boxing” or other improper installation can cause severe damage to the amplier.
The apliers protection circuitry reads current draw to dene protection parameters, the
algorithm it uses presumes the amplier is used at 4 Ohm. If you are using the amp at 1 Ohm
you will need to bear in mind that the protection circuitry may not intervene in time. That is
not to say that the amplier can not function reliably at 1 Ohm. It just needs the appropriate
cooling; if used in a conned space it needs fans to circulate the air (especially if mounted
vertically) ideally the amp needs to be horizontal on the ground plane and be mounted to a
heat conductive plate. A regular mistake that is made is to mount the amp onto a board that
has been covered in carpet. This restricts airow under the amplier, limiting the amount
of convection cooling that can be achieved and insulating the amplier underneath. This
actually builds up heat inside the amp! Avoid mounting on to carpet where possible.
Just as important is to remember that as well as the actual physical impedance you need
to consider the type of load you are going to subject your amplier to. A single (or pair of)
8, 10 or 12 or 15 inch subwoofer of an appropriately matched construction and in a nicely
designed enclosure will be ne run off a BLACKDB1.1 amp at 2 ohms or 1 ohms in the
case of the pair (assuming proper setup) but you don’t want to try and run eight massive
heavy coned dual voice coil monster woofers off it, even though on paper you might well
have a 1 Ohm load. You have to use a bit of common sense – if you need to ll a van with
eight woofers like that then use eight DB1.1’s. Big power woofers often have heavy cones,
these type of woofers can have big impedance dips and can cause clipping on transients.
If you are going to wire in 2 of these or a DVC heavy coned subwoofer, we recommend
that you wire them in series at 2 Ohm and use a higher gain setting on the amp. For wiring
instructions please see the diagram later in this manual.
Obviously, we recommend the Bass Face range of subwoofers and speakers for ultimate
compatibility. It’s also worth mentioning at this point, that, running audio into the amp, with
any level of gain, but no speaker attached can and will seriously damage your amplier if
done for long periods of time. Some amps have load sensing and will shut the amp down if
no speaker is attached, some do not. Car ampliers often do not.
Another danger to your amplier is mounting it onto your bass box. While this is a very
popular technique, people completely overlook the fact that the bass box will cause the
internals of the amplier to be vibrated violently and can cause components to become
disconnected from the board, or crack the board itself. This will of course break the amplier
and would not be covered under the limited warranty.

Time to lay on some power. Connect the earth rst. Then 12V power, then remote. Then
connect in the RCA cables and you can move onto setting up the gain and sound controls
on the amplier (the fun bit!)
Setting the “Gain” or “level” on the amp is a crucial aspect and needs to be done with care,
otherwise you can easily damage your equipment. Before we move onto this we need to be
sure the crossover settings are right for the application.
If you have an active crossover elsewhere in your system (such as the head unit) then you
may wish to set the crossover switch on the amp to OFF. Otherwise, in most cases, this must
be set to ON.
We recommend a LPF of about 100hz initially as an excellent starting point for most car
woofers. Try 80Hz and 120Hz too – you will notice the sound change. If you are running a 15
inch woofer then you will want to be looking at a lower crossover frequency (like 80Hz) – if
it’s an 8 inch driver then you may want to go up to 120, 150 or even higher.
Once your crossover settings are set up, you can move on to the gain or “Level”. This bit is
REALLY important!
Before you do anything else, please ensure the BASS BOOST knob is set to 0 – I.e. switched
off. We also suggest you turn the bass remote level to a mid setting to allow adjustment later
to taste.
Next, you need to learn about the subsonic lter. This is a crucial part of the setup. When the
music frequency goes lower than that which the subwoofer system can reproduce with any
guts you are wasting a lot of energy asking the amplier to create those parts of the music.
Worse still, your woofer will try its best to create them and nd itself moving backwards and
forwards at very large levels of excursion and distortion from the overstretched amplier.
Many bass ampliers do not have subsonic lters – this is MADNESS and results in a lot of
burned out woofers and ampliers. Many bass ampliers DO have subsonic lters that their
owners do not understand – this is MADNESS and results in a lot of burned out woofers and
ampliers!!!
As a rule of thumb you should set your subsonic lter to about 30Hz – this is a generalization
because obviously different subwoofer setups can play to different low frequencies.
Something like an 8 inch sub in a ported box designed to be very punchy will struggle
to get below 50Hz – in which case inch up the subsonic to that level to improve all round
performance and protect the components. If you have a 15 inch woofer in a well sized sealed
box that is designed to sound low and atmospheric then you may be able to come down to
20Hz with the lter. As you turn the lter up you will hear it stopping the low bass from being
played – but you will notice that you can play the music louder with less distortion. You need
to set this to optimum balance later.

Now it is time to disconnect all other subwoofers or speakers so that you can hear only the
woofer powered by this amplier. Next, turn the level on the amp all the way down. Choose
some music that you’re not particularly keen on that has a good range of bass, treble and
vocals (helps not to get lost in the music whilst you work on the system.)
Then go to your head unit and gradually turn up the volume until you begin to hear slight
distortion from the subwoofer. This is normally about ¾ the way up the scale. This is the
maximum setting that you will EVER use from now on – make a mental note of it. Next, turn
the head unit down from here by around ¼. This builds in a little bit of “headroom” so should
you have a track that is recorded quieter than the others or is at a lower bit rate, you can
boost the volume without pushing anything into distortion.
Once the volume is set on the head unit, go to the amplier and slowly start to turn the
“Level” knob up, keep going till it is at a level you are happy with (that isn’t going to deafen
you!) or until your woofer(s) are just about to distort. If they do start to distort, turn back down
till they sound perfectly clear.
One thing that you need to learn is how to actually hear a woofer “distort” – it sounds different
than a full range speaker because rather than hearing distortion in the conventional sense
you will hear it as an unclean bass note – you may hear a cracking, a metallic slapping
sound or a rattle. It is CRITICAL that you detect this sound and back the amp off to stop it
NOW. If you do not perform this step you will become another sad statistic in our “rejected
warranty” book – you will be ringing up in about a week wondering why your woofer or
amplier is toasted. Don’t be this sad individual!
You will notice that earlier in the text we set the bass boost to off. This is because more often
than not this EQ control is misunderstood and can cause damage. The bass boost control
ramps a range of frequencies in the bass region that will cause more bass to be created
than the signal coming in from the head unit expects. It will also consume more power and
can push a system into distortion if the settings are not made carefully. An example of a valid
use of bass boost might be where your woofer system has an uneven response – as you
turn up the gain the upper region of the output becomes strained and begins to distort but
yet with low frequencies you are able to turn up the bass without distortion. In this case, you
would go back to the beginning of the setup instructions, get the woofer playing at a modest
level and then swing in some bass boost until the distortion happens at the same volume
level, regardless of the music you are playing. Then, you would set the gain with the bass
boost control in THAT position – to take account of that level of boost. You ABSOLUTELY
cannot increase the bass boost once you have already set the gain level – you’ll overdrive
the amplier and burn something out.
Treat the bass remote with similar caution. It is effectively an overdrive gear – designed to
allow you to ne tune the sound to your preference. It cannot, however, make the system
more powerful than it already is! So yes, as you drive slowly with little tyre noise you might
want to reduce the setting on the cockpit knob to reduce the bass level. And yes, if you are
listening to a track with a low recording level and you fancy a bit more output you might

increase the setting. But it is your responsibility to listen for “dynamic compression” (where
you are turning the system up on the knob and yet the actual volume is not increasing)
since this is an indicator that the limits of the power available have been reached and over-
reached!
We hope that these instructions have been helpful and that the information will help you to
build a well balanced and stable system that will provide years of listening pleasure.
Enjoy your system!