Stereo's 101 for DUMMIES

[HippoBoatamus]

I have never had any kind of stereo like what my new to me Tige has, and I am certainly not a stereo guy. So my efforts of reading both on the web in general and on this site I think are starting to make since. So I am asking here to make sure I understand before I waste any money.

My tower speakers are crackling and sound like crap, and will cut out from time to time. My amp is not hot by any means, so I am assuming it is the 2005 model speakers up there that are all rotted out and crap....

I have three amps, but the one pushing the tower speakers is this one. http://www.sonicelectronix.com/item_...e+Series-.html

It shows in the specs this....
RMS Power Output:
45 Watts x 6 Channels @ 4 Ohms
75 Watts x 6 Channels @ 2 Ohms
90 Watts x 3 Channels @ 8 Ohms (Bridged)
150 Watts x 3 Channels @ 4 Ohms (Bridged)

I know the difference between Peak and RMS, and 2 and 4 ohms now, but my question is that I am finding speakers with Peak anywhere from 300W - 500W, but RMS rated at 65W. My amp has one channel each to the tower speakers wired at 2ohms, so it is pushing 75W to each channel. (that is my guess based on specs)

Can I hook up a speaker with a 65W RMS max to these channels and just turn the gain down a little so as not to push the max 75W RMS? Is the extra 10W not enought to worry about? Is the extra 10W covered in the up to 300/500W max? Or of course, am I way off target and not understanding any of it?

What if I find some speakers rated 600W max and say 150W RMS, I don't have near enough RMS power for something like this in this configuration? I would have to wire up the two channels at 4ohms to get the 150W RMS max right?

[dogbert]

I'd PM philsailz or read his posts. He works for Kicker and has really supported us well when it comes to wiring stereos for our boats. Other guys who have contributed a lot have been chpthril & wetsounds1. Look for their posts and you will learn more about stereos and be able to put your own system in with no trouble. There are several 101 type threads already posted. Use the search feature

[yllw20]

always overpower your speaker than underpower.
-

[philwsailz]

A simple basic understanding can be achieved if you follow these basic rules:

For amps and speakers totally DISREGARD peak power ratings, and specs. Those are created by marketing, not engineering. we also call them WLS specs; i.e. When Lightning Strikes specs.

Try to find the CEA2006 power output spec for any amp. That power output is an industry standard, designed to give you a clear indication of what an amp will put into a single 4-ohm speaker. When you connect two speakers to that same amp channel, the power output increases, (sometimes doubles) giving you close to that same power, ( the 4-ohm CEA2006 spec'd power) into each speaker. Usually it is a little less though. For example a 2-ohm stable KICKER MX350.4 amp will deliver 90 watts into a 2-ohm load; two 4-ohm speakers in parallel as an example. IF you use a single 4-ohm speaker, you will deliver about 65 watts to that speaker.

A speaker on a slightly more powerful amp than designed for will last longer than a grossly underpowered speaker on a smaller amp.

There is no way to wire a single amp channel to operate at 2-ohms with a single 4-ohm speaker. The speaker presents the load to the amp, not vice - versa; the amp has nothing to do with it. If you have a single 4-ohm speaker on an amp channel, you will get that amp's 4-ohm output.

It is always best to purchase amps and speakers at the same time. Do your shopping based on CEA2006 amp output, and RMS speaker power handling. Pick the speakers you like, then pick an amp that has the RMS power output to match RMS speaker power handling. If you cannot find an amp at exactly the same RMS output as the speakers power handling, buy the next larger amp, not the next smaller amp.

Try to always buy as many amp channels as you buy speakers. Just because an amp is 2-ohm stable, is no reason to force your amp to operate into that load. If you have one amp channel for each 4-ohm speaker, the amp(s) will run cooler, run longer, sound better, and cause you less headaches. The exception will be subwoofers; digital subwoofer amps have less of an issue with being run at their rated impedance.


In your example, your 65 watt RMS speaker wired to a single amp channel can only get 45 watts.

For your last question, if you want to operate a 150 watt 4-ohm speaker with this amp, you will bridge a pair to get 150 watts. You can drive 3 speakers this way.

Zat help with the understanding? If not no problem, post up your questions, and I will try to answer. Tim at Wetsounds and Chpthril will have insight maybe too; they are both very knowledgeable.

Good luck and have fun!

Phil
Kicker

[chpthril]

Great explanation from Phil as usual


What are you looking to do? address the crackling speakers by making sure what you have is wire and set right, upgrade to new tower speakers and possible amp, replace the speakers in existing enclosures (cans)? How many tower speakers do you have on the tower now and what kind are they (mainly the speaker themselves). Sorry if I over looked, the $$$ are blurring my vision ?

Lots of ways you can go, and end up with a nice sounding, properly operating setup.

[Thomas Hohl]

These guys made my install a piece of cake (well relatively speaking) and it absolutely ROCKS!!!

So listen up!!!

[rpaxton]

Hey Phil,

I have two 10 inch subs that I want to power with a single channel mono amp. should I wire them in parallel or seriel?

Thanks in advance,

Rodg

[chpthril]

Hey Phil,

I have two 10 inch subs that I want to power with a single channel mono amp. should I wire them in parallel or seriel?

Thanks in advance,

Rodg

Depends on a couple of unknowns here, what subs do you have and are they single voice coils or dual voice coils. If DVC's, what impedance are the coils? And what amp do you have? If you dont have the amp yet, knowing the specs on the subs will help you choose the right amp.

[rpaxton]

Depends on a couple of unknowns here, what subs do you have and are they single voice coils or dual voice coils. If DVC's, what impedance are the coils? And what amp do you have? If you dont have the amp yet, knowing the specs on the subs will help you choose the right amp.

OOOPs!! My bad.

I am running two Polk MM1040UM ten inch subs. They are dual voice coils, 4 ohms, 350 watt rms and 700 max. I went with the Alpine PDX-1.600M amp on a recomendation from a friend. Currently the speakers are both wired into the single plug in parallel (I think - both positives are in the positive side and the negatives are both twisted together in the negative side). This gives me enough thump to vibrate the entrie boat, but I want to make sure that I don't damage any of the equipment.

This is one of my first true stereo builds and was done on a budget. I would have preferred wetsounds equipment, but......



Rodg

[chpthril]

Ok, looking at the specs and owners manual for that amp, I dont see a 1ohm spec, so my gut says it's only stable down to 2ohms, which is normal. This amp will deliver 600 watts rms at both 2 and 4 ohm loads, that would net you 300W's to each sub. A little light, but not bad.

With 2 4ohm DVC subs, you're only gonna get a 1ohm or 4 ohm load at the amp. Since the amp looks to only be stable at 2 and 4 ohms, you will need to wire them in such a way to get that 4 ohms. There's 2 ways o do it: Wire each sub coil in parallel, that = 2 2ohm speakers. Then wire the 2 subs in series to = 4ohm. Or, wire each sub in series, which = 2 8ohm speakers, then wire them together in parallel to = 4ohms at the amp.

Are these 2 subs going to share an enclosure, or be in seperate parts of the boat?

[rpaxton]

The two subs are both mounted under the dash board. I dont have them in boxes yet they are "free air" right now. They hit pretty hard as it is, but I want to put them in boxes.

As far as the wiring you lost me going from wiring the speakers in parallel and the subs in seriel (or vice versa). How is that accomplished? Also, I thought that if a speaker was rated at 4 ohms it needed to stay at 4 ohms to keep from damaging it, is that not correct?

Rodg

[HippoBoatamus]

Great explanation from Phil as usual


What are you looking to do? address the crackling speakers by making sure what you have is wire and set right, upgrade to new tower speakers and possible amp, replace the speakers in existing enclosures (cans)? How many tower speakers do you have on the tower now and what kind are they (mainly the speaker themselves). Sorry if I over looked, the $$$ are blurring my vision ?

Lots of ways you can go, and end up with a nice sounding, properly operating setup.

Ok, so I took all my newfound knowledge and crawled my butt into the storage area. I cut all the zip ties, labeled all the wires, and disconnected everything form the amps, except for my sub. It is on it's own amp and working well.

I plug in wires one at a time and have my kids tell me what speaker came on . I then re-label the wire with what speaker it is, and disconnect. In a few mins, I know what wire goes to what speaker.

Next I put four of my cabin speakers on my Clarion APX 480M. Two speakers in each channel. I adjust the gain for my sub and cabin speakers with volume one notch down from MAX, and it sounds good!
Man this is fun!

I then plug my two rear cabin speakers into one channel on my e6450 so they get alot more power than the other four. Radio back on, I adjust the gain for the channel that the two rear cabins are on, sounds even better!
I think I love this radio thing!

Now I disconnect the power cables for the Clarion amp, sub amp, and pull wires out of the e6450 for the rear cabins. I don't want to hear anything else while I am trying to fix the issue with my tower speakers.

I put my two tower speakers in the e6450M. One channel each. Radio comes on, and the crackling is gone! Man I ROCK! Then I hear a snap, crackle, pop, and the right tower speaker blows.
Man now this radio thing SUCKS! LOL

I then realized that I have no idea what speakers are in the tower cans. So for all I know I just put 150W to a 65W speaker. So I turn the gain way down so the Left speaker is putting out some tunes. I plug it all in and I can live with this for the time being.

Now I am saving for some WS 60's.

[chpthril]

The two subs are both mounted under the dash board. I dont have them in boxes yet they are "free air" right now. They hit pretty hard as it is, but I want to put them in boxes.

As far as the wiring you lost me going from wiring the speakers in parallel and the subs in series (or vice versa). How is that accomplished? Also, I thought that if a speaker was rated at 4 ohms it needed to stay at 4 ohms to keep from damaging it, is that not correct?

Rodg

Ok, so the 2 subs are sharing the same space behind them, correct? If so, you will see a world of improvement just by separating them. Basically, giving each sub it's own enclosure of proper size, on the back side.

Speaker = sub, they are the same thing basically when talking load and wiring. Look at it this way, each sub has 2 separately wired voice coils, kinda like 2 speakers in 1 sub. Each individual coil has a 4 ohms impedance (resistance). So, each sub can be wire either in parallel or series to end up with a different load. when 2 loads are wired in parallel, it halves the impedance, when 2 loads are wired in series, it doubles the impedance.

The "load" (speaker impedance) that is placed on the amp, what it "sees", determines the output, typically. So, two 4ohm coils wired in parallel = a 2ohm speaker, when wired in series with another 2 ohm speaker, it will = 4 ohm. Or, take 2 4ohm coils and wire them in series = 8ohm. Wire it with another in parallel, it = 4ohm. Here's an illustration I borrowed from the12volt.com

[philwsailz]

Chp is on the case.

Good explanation as usual...

The two subs are both mounted under the dash board. I dont have them in boxes yet they are "free air" right now. They hit pretty hard as it is, but I want to put them in boxes.

As far as the wiring you lost me going from wiring the speakers in parallel and the subs in seriel (or vice versa). How is that accomplished? Also, I thought that if a speaker was rated at 4 ohms it needed to stay at 4 ohms to keep from damaging it, is that not correct?

Rodg

Ok, so the 2 subs are sharing the same space behind them, correct? If so, you will see a world of improvement just by separating them. Basically, giving each sub it's own enclosure of proper size, on the back side.

Speaker = sub, they are the same thing basically when talking load and wiring. Look at it this way, each sub has 2 separately wired voice coils, kinda like 2 speakers in 1 sub. Each individual coil has a 4 ohms impedance (resistance). So, each sub can be wire either in parallel or series to end up with a different load. when 2 loads are wired in parallel, it halves the impedance, when 2 loads are wired in series, it doubles the impedance.

The "load" (speaker impedance) that is placed on the amp, what it "sees", determines the output, typically. So, two 4ohm coils wired in parallel = a 2ohm speaker, when wired in series with another 2 ohm speaker, it will = 4 ohm. Or, take 2 4ohm coils and wire them in series = 8ohm. Wire it with another in parallel, it = 4ohm. Here's an illustration I borrowed from the12volt.com

[rpaxton]

Ok, so the 2 subs are sharing the same space behind them, correct? If so, you will see a world of improvement just by separating them. Basically, giving each sub it's own enclosure of proper size, on the back side.

Speaker = sub, they are the same thing basically when talking load and wiring. Look at it this way, each sub has 2 separately wired voice coils, kinda like 2 speakers in 1 sub. Each individual coil has a 4 ohms impedance (resistance). So, each sub can be wire either in parallel or series to end up with a different load. when 2 loads are wired in parallel, it halves the impedance, when 2 loads are wired in series, it doubles the impedance.

The "load" (speaker impedance) that is placed on the amp, what it "sees", determines the output, typically. So, two 4ohm coils wired in parallel = a 2ohm speaker, when wired in series with another 2 ohm speaker, it will = 4 ohm. Or, take 2 4ohm coils and wire them in series = 8ohm. Wire it with another in parallel, it = 4ohm. Here's an illustration I borrowed from the12volt.com

Sweet!

That is how I have them wired currently, however my speakers do not have two positive and negative terminal connections on them (only one set of pos and neg). I suspect that Polk wired the voice coils together and only has one set of terminals for each speaker. Or did I get the wrong subs and these are only single coil?????

Thanks for all of your help!!! Your explinations really do rock!