Buttkicker LFE Kit

Buttkicker LFE Kit - feel the bass you've been missing

Introduction
To achieve an even more immersive home-theater and gaming experience, The Guitammer Company has developed a unique (and aptly named) product called the Buttkicker LFE. The Buttkicker LFE takes advantage of one the previously untapped senses in a typical home-theater set up - feeling. Visuals are taken care of by a big-screen TV, ambient lighting and the like; sound effects and music are taken care of by a 5.1, 6.1 or 7.1 surround sound system, but there was previously no set of components dedicated to providing sensory input to what we feel when we watch a movie or play a video game. The Buttkicker LFE fills that void - and it fills it with authority.

What is the Buttkicker?
The Buttkicker LFE is a tactile transducer - meaning that it produces vibrations that actually shake the furniture to which it is attached. The idea is to provide an additional sense of feeling the low-frequency effects in movies and games. It is designed to reproduce the "feeling" range of many natural and man-made sounds - such as helicopters, airplanes, thunderstorms, explosions, tornadoes, volcanoes, dinosaurs, various sound effects and also all styles of music.

What s in the Box?The Buttkicker LFE kit contains the BKA1000-4 amplifier, ButtKicker LFE unit, mounting plate, 14AWG speaker wire, line-level speaker adaptor, "Y" splitter interconnect, single RCA interconnect, mounting screws and bolts, a set of rubber isolators and installation instructions. Upon receiving the box, I could tell that this was a heavy-duty set of electronic components as the box weighed in at over 40 lbs! Upon opening the box, I found that each piece was individually wrapped and carefully package so that the components would not be damaged during shipping. The amplifier delivers a hefty 1100 watts into a 4-ohm load and 2100 watts into a 2-ohm load - doubling its power output if you want to connect multiple LFE shaker units. The Buttkicker LFE unit has a frequency response of 5 - 200 Hz, with power handling of 400 watts min. / 1500 watts max.

Installation
After unwrapping each piece and opening the boxes, I used the quick-start guide to start the install process. The first step is to attach the Buttkicker LFE shaker to the mounting plate, which is done with 4 bolts. A nice touch to the installation package was the included mini-wrench, which came in quite handy as I was tightening the bolts. Using a regular sized wrench would have been awkward and would have added time to the install. After the LFE shaker is mounted, the next step is to position it under your furniture. This involves placing the mounted Buttkicker LFE under a furniture leg of your couch, and then adding the rubber isolators under the other feet of your couch. The rubber isolators serve to level your couch, as well as maximizing the vibration effects.

Once the Buttkicker LFE is mounted, the last steps are setting up the amplifier, connecting it your receiver and then connecting the Buttkicker LFE unit to the amplifier. You have two options to connect to you re a/V receiver - either use the line-level adapter or the RCA  Y splitter to connect to the RCA interconnect. The RCA method is the preferred method, and the one I used. Use of the  Y splitter allows you to connect both the Buttkicker LFE and a subwoofer to your receiver, which is the optimal set up for low frequency sound. Finally, connect the 14AWG speaker wire from the amplifier to the Buttkicker LFE unit, and you ready to start calibrating your receiver and experiencing the effects of the Buttkicker LFE. The included speaker wire was about 20 feet long, which was a relief to me since I had to run it behind the couch to keep it out of sight. Another nice touch to the install was the spade connectors for the Buttkicker LFE unit and the banana plugs for the amplifier. This made the speaker wire connection simple and goes to show the level of quality of the Buttkicker components.

The quick start guide was clear and had a good number of pictures to help clarify the install process. I did find it a bit confusing to find the detailed installation instructions, as a number of different user manuals were included. Once it was all said and done, it took me about 20 minutes to get the whole set up completed, which was quite reasonable considering the number of components and the wiring involved. Having all of the needed wiring and connectors included in the kit made the installation process very smooth.

Front View of Amplifier	Top View of Amplifier