Will a car amp rated 9-16v blow if I power it with 16.8v?

I want to power JBL Stage Amplifier A9004 on 4x 18650 lithium batteries that are rated at 4.2v each and am wondering if I can get away with 16.8v so I can get the max power out of it. I understand I can run it at 12.6v, but that's not what I'm here to discuss.
FORGET doing that. 😱

That amplifier takes 20A at full power (which you seem to NEED 🙄 since you said you are not interested in using 12.6V) which if batteries were PERFECT (they are not) would last 7 minutes. 🙄

But of course that´s the maximum battery rating, available for short (think milliseconds) peaks.

In practice your batteries will become hand burning hot after 2 or 3 minutes and die.
 
Thank you 🙂
I've been waiting for someone to state that obvious issue.
So many seem to get caught up in the details that they miss the basics.
Sad but true.
Mind you, done with the best of intentions, of course.😀

I sometimes think somebody will ask how to wire an electric chair to get rid of a relative and tons will chime in to suggest wire, plugs, insulation, OFC, switching, Teflon, silver wire, etc. paying not attention to the real question meaning or implications 😱
 
Properly designed car electronics won't go up in smoke at 16.8 V; car electronics are normally designed to handle voltage spikes up to 60 V or so, such that they survive when you switch off the starter motor or some other big load, and to handle voltages of around 24 V when you jump start the car from a 24 V truck battery. If you have really bad luck, it might go into some non-functional self-protecting mode, though.

Voltage spikes are one thing, but throwing constant voltage at something for minutes at a time while the power rating of the components inside are at or below the input voltage will kill of any component that isn't capable of handling that amount of voltage for extended periods. So yes it could go "up in smoke".
 
FORGET doing that. 😱

That amplifier takes 20A at full power (which you seem to NEED 🙄 since you said you are not interested in using 12.6V) which if batteries were PERFECT (they are not) would last 7 minutes. 🙄

But of course that´s the maximum battery rating, available for short (think milliseconds) peaks.

In practice your batteries will become hand burning hot after 2 or 3 minutes and die.

They have 18650 cells that have a discharge rating of 30 amps, thus running those type of cells for an amplifier like that is doable.

I think the best option is to go to a 3.7 volt design over a 4.2 volt design, then 4 cells would equate to 14.8 volts which is what that amplifier is designed to handle.
 
Voltage spikes are one thing, but throwing constant voltage at something for minutes at a time while the power rating of the components inside are at or below the input voltage will kill of any component that isn't capable of handling that amount of voltage for extended periods. So yes it could go "up in smoke".

How about the 24 V it has to handle during jump starting?
 
I have a few older JBL amps and they have 25v caps on the PS primary side and would probably take it. I wouldn’t like to hazard a guess at whether the caps on the secondary side would take the proportionally higher voltage on that side though.

I think that there a few brands of Brazilian car amplifiers that are high voltage tolerant.
 
I think your a bit confused about the principles behind jump starting vehicles.
Maybe something for you to research.

That would be a waste of time, I travel by train, bicycle or foot anyway.

That said, I have worked on car electronics more often than I would like to admit, and it is a very common requirement for car electronics to survive jump starting from a 24 V truck battery (and to survive when the normal battery is connected with the wrong polarity, or when the battery gets disconnected while the alternator is running).
 
Bridge rectifiers and diodes for a (potential) extra 0.8 volts? Not me, this is within tolerance of most 16v parts, 16.8 is the potential max voltage, your actual mileage will vary and more voltage potentially means more power. Most amplifiers designed for car use are extremely tolerant of voltage variation. Is this a risk? Yeah but it’s very small, up to you.
 
I think the mistake on jump starting is assuming the batteries are connected in series whereas they are connected in parallel.

If people are talking about vehicles with 2 batteries, you are correct on that one.



Bridge rectifiers and diodes for a (potential) extra 0.8 volts? Not me, this is within tolerance of most 16v parts, 16.8 is the potential max voltage, your actual mileage will vary and more voltage potentially means more power. Most amplifiers designed for car use are extremely tolerant of voltage variation. Is this a risk? Yeah but it’s very small, up to you.

Calling it a very small risk is fairly fictitious as a high percentage of mobile audio equipment is of poor design or uses low grade parts. There's a reason why mobile audio as a whole has an extremely high failure rate, or replacement rate compared to home audio. I guess if people feel the need to provide their equipment with more voltage than it's generally designed for, then they better be knowledgeable enough to know whether their equipment can handle it via schematics or visual assessment, otherwise you're just gambling.
 
Calling it a very small risk is fairly fictitious as a high percentage of mobile audio equipment is of poor design

Apocryphal, the risk is very small (not assumptions but personal experience) and ‘poor’ design is not a standard of car audio design. I have installed a few systems running at 1 ohm or less, can your home audio amplifier even sustain a 2 ohm load? Not unless its a Krell or Passlabs