help me figure out this sound system.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

I am using 2 6x9's with a rating od 60wRMS/120WPeak and a pair of 6.5's with 50/100w rating. I am wanting to run these and a 10" sub in a sealed box off of a single 4 channel amp. what size amp should I look for?

would a 400 watt peak/ 280w RMS 4 channel amp be sufficient or would it be too much for the smaller speakers?

[gride300]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

look at the amp specs and make sure you're looking at rms not peak. some comapanies/sites won't put the rms or a label. unless i'm wrong, you would be better off getting a 5 channel amp with a dedicated sub channel. how much does your sub handle? jl audio makes very nice marine amps, kicker, clarion,WETSOUNDS etc. im sure someone else here can give you more straightforward advice.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

the amp I was looking at was a Memphis Audio and it was 280w RMS 400W peak. I dont have the specs of the sub just yet. Its at the house. I do know that it use to run two of them off of a 480w(peak) MA audio amp

[gride300]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

i personally don't like memphis stuff and where are these speaker's going? boat or car?

[TravisFling]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

Chris,
Here's the problem with that idea. The 6x9's and 6.5's will have different crossover points and different power needs, but it can be done, if you're not very picky. A 5 channel would be a great solution, but barring that, i would get that kicker 900 on the for sale page. I might get it myself, it's pretty bad. With a 4 channel you would want to get an amp that has seperate hi pass and lo pass for each set of channels, and seperate crossovers for each channel. that would allow you to run the four interior speakers off of two channels of the amp. Postive and negative from speakers 1n2 into pos and neg from channel 1, repeat for channel two, hi pass engaged, crossover at 80. (these are all four ohm speakers, eh?) and then bridge the sub onto channels 3 and 4, set to lo pass, crossover at 100. That would probably sound ok.. If it's 280, your getting 70 per channel, or 140 bridged. It should sound good, but I would adjust your gains down. It IS better to have an amp running at a lower gain setting, as it's easier on the amp. It's actually best to run the speakers in series, and give the amp a little more resistance so it's not 'spinning" so high. You'll be fine as I wrote it though. Hit me up if that doesn't make sense.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

this is for the boat, 89 ski nautique

Travis, that is how I was planning on running them. One problem I have is the sub i was going to use I dont have any information on. I know it is an 8 ohm but not sure the rms or peak w it draws. the setup I use to have it in was 2 of them in parallel if i remember corectly on a bridged amp that was about 175w rms

[EarmarkMarine]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

Chris,

Got to go along with Travis on the five-channel amplifier because the 6” x 9” and 6½” speakers are usually different efficiencies.

David E.M.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

how would I benefit from a 5 channel? does it allow seperate gain control for each or what? would a 5 channel be preferable to a 4 channel for the interior and a seperate 2 channel (bridgable) for the sub?

[gride300]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

you can adjust the frequency on each channel so you can adjust your 6x9's and other's to sound well together, and get more power for your sub and drop it to low pass 60-80hz a 4 and 2 channel will work, but thats more wire and a little more space taken up in the boat.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

true, but I have a 2 channel that I can use and I can get a 4 channel for about $125. looks like the 5 channels are running $350 and up

[gride300]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

if you have a two channel amp you can definitely run that bridged on your sub depending on the voice coil setup of the sub.

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

you lost me again. the one I have is an 8 ohm

[Mikeski]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

there are an infinite number of answers and opinions, some better some worse...

Here's mine:

e-bay or used Clarion APX480M full range speakers wire to the front channels, sub bridged to the rear channels. This is what I run in my truck and it works fine. Activate the crossover, set the sub at LP-80 and the full range at HP-100, lower if they can take it. should cost you less than $150. Another good cost effective option is a crossfire 4 channel amp, wired in the same configuration.

it's a tough economy, save your money for gas

[Chris4x4Gill2]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

Mike I like the way you think. I need all the gas money I can get.

[TravisFling]

RE: help me figure out this sound system.

Hey Chris,
The voicecoil/Ohm issue for the speaker is not nearly as complicated as you think. Some subs have 1 coil, so if they're 8 ohms, they're 8 ohms, which is fine. Some have a DVC or Dual Voice Coil, so they're like having two speakers in one. You would know which one you have by looking at the positive and negative connections. If there are 4 connectors on the speaker (two pos and two neg) then it's a dual voice coil and you would treat it as two speakers, meaning you could run it in series (amp pos to speaker pos, amp neg to speaker neg and another wire from speaker pos to speaker neg, taking your ohm load to 16 which is easier for your amp to run, but less power) or in parallel (speaker pos1 and speaker pos2 to amp pos, speaker neg1 and speaker neg2 to amp neg, which increases your resistance, or would take your ohm load to 4ohms, which would give you more power) or straight from channel 1 pos and neg to speaker pos and neg, channel two pos and neg to the other speaker pos and neg. If it's a single coil you can just run it pos and neg to amp pos and neg, or if you want to bridge the amp to get more power you would run speaker pos to amp channel 1 pos, and speaker neg to amp channel 2 neg, which would also result in a 4 ohm load. I hope that helps...