I purchased a used DSP amp from a member here who is a pretty nice guy in good standing. My amp was blown out due to a small leak in the drivers rear tail-light this winter. The amp was toast but was the only thing that got wet in that area of the well.

Anyway BMW diagnosed that it was only the amp that needed to be replaced and I did not want to replace it with a new one at that ridiculous cost considering the DSP systems suck.

So I buy this used amp which the member removed to install an aftermarket amp and I believe him when he states it was working when removed. After installing the amp in my X5 which consists of three pin clips that can't be installed incorrectly even by a blind person. My system powers up and works fine for about 40-60 seconds and the amp shuts off.

So to test the amp I called up a good friend who purchased my 2001 5-Series BMW with DSP and I checked to see if his amp had the same part number as my 2001 X5 with DSP and it was an exact match. So I removed his amp and hooked it up to my system and it worked fine. I then plugged the amp I purchased from this member into the 5-Series and it cut out after 30-60 seconds.

My guess is the ride from Florida was too much for the amp to handle and something knocked loose. It was bubble wrapped but the large air bag in the box to prevent shifting was burst and the amp moved freely in the box.

So the question. What should I do in this instance. I realize on one hand this is going to suck for us both. This was a used amp so some might say buyer beware. On the other hand I would expect for $260 it would work when it arrived. Seeing there is no possibility I could connect this wrong thus blowing up the amp and I've tested a working amp in my X and the amp I received in another car and duplicated the problem I've concluded that I'm not at fault here. However, with that said I can't ask him to shoulder all the burden. I'm thinking it would be right to ask him to share in 1/2 the loss. I would send him back the amp at my expense and he would refund me half.

Is that too much for me to ask under these circumstances?