[Euniqe]

The amp has an issue. If focal will not warrant it for you. I would move on.

Receipts etc. are long gone, so warranty unlikely an option I'm afraid. Perhaps I can have it repaired somewhere, but I'll probably take this opportunity if the amp is unsalvageable to replace it with a four channel to add the missing two to make the system fully-active.

You are probably running it at a lower input voltage than it is rated at.

What voltage is your amps running at? I am guessing maybe 12v with the car turned off... instead of the 14.4V it is likely rated at? Just a guess...

This is correct, I was setting the gains with the engine off. But even so, I find it unlikely that a 14% drop in potential would cause a 34% drop in output

 

[Euniqe]

So are you running the signal from the headunit, through the new DSP, then to the amp? If so, it sounds to me like the signal in the DSP isn't staged correctly.

What does your O-Scope show for the signal coming out of the DSP, before the amp?

Correct, this is how I measured it. I haven't checked the signal coming out of the DSP, I'll do that and report back. I'll also try the head unit signal straight into the amp to see if anything changes. Thanks guys.

 

[Euniqe]

Thanks for doing the research cman, that's fascinating I guess I was assuming nominal and RMS was the same thing. Perhaps you're right then, that it's all operating as intended. The speakers I am using for the midbass are Dayton DCS165-4 Spec sheet. Spec sheet reports an RMS of 100w, and the sensitivity seems to be about 83/85 db in the 75-200hz range which is where they are being filtered. As I was using stock speakers before I cant report on their sensitivity.

Maybe the answer is to upgrade the amp to a true 100wrms model and raise the sub/midbass crossover freq. Thanks again for pointing that out about the Focal amp, I was blissfully ignorant before thinking it was a good match for the midbass speakers