I've got one kicker 12" sub with 8 ohms and one alpine 12" sub with 4...


will this mess up the amp? I've heard yes because it will underload it ...and I've heard no because the magnet on the 8 ohm won't affect the amp just as the magnet from the 4 ohm won't either.


If that makes no sense, just let me know if I can do one 4 and one 8

4/6/2006 4:52:05 PM

Yes you can do this, it isn't ideal, but it will work.

Hope your amp is less than 4ohm stable bridged though.

4/6/2006 4:54:53 PM

it's a rockford fossgate 400 somethin' rather...does that give you any info?

4/6/2006 5:03:31 PM

put a 4 ohm resistor in series with the other 4, then put the 2 speakers in parallel, that'll match the impediance, but it will give each speaker half the power...

4/6/2006 6:15:05 PM

Did you seriously just suggest doing that?

4/6/2006 6:18:33 PM

hell no i wouldnt do it

4/6/2006 6:22:03 PM

don't do it. it'll more than likely damage the amp and sound like ass.

[Edited on April 6, 2006 at 7:37 PM. Reason : .]

4/6/2006 7:36:28 PM

are both subs single voice coil??

if so and you run them in parallel you'd end up with a 2.66 ohm load, but the problem would be that the 4ohm sub would simply recieve more power than the 8ohm sub

nonetheless, not a good idea

[Edited on April 6, 2006 at 8:54 PM. Reason : ]

4/6/2006 8:49:39 PM

It would work and provided your amp can drive a 2ohm load (bridged, 1ohm stable stereo) then as long as you are driving the 4ohm sub within its limits then all that will happen is you won't get the full output out of the 8ohm one, assuming they are similar in power handling.

If the 8 ohm can only handle 100 watts and the 4 ohm can handle 200, then it would actually work just fine.

4/6/2006 9:10:23 PM

I would not suggest running two different subs together anyway, no matter the ohm load. First and fore most I doubt this two subs are even close in their specs. I would just run one 12, and you'd be happy with that.

4/6/2006 11:19:36 PM

i would suggest hooking the wire comming off the negative terminal of the speaker into the left slot in an AC socket then slowly while wearing proper eye,hand,body,etc. protection slide the wire comming off the positive speaker terminal into the right slot(you may use the round hole to store a piece of spare wire if you like). Repeat for second speaker. Now apply a Digital Multimeter to each speaker to make sure that each read infinite ohms and your problem is solved. speakers have equal ohm loads now

otherwise in series amp+ to leftspeaker+,rightspeaker- to leftspekaer+,rightspeaker- to amp(if your not sure what series meant) = 8+4=12 ohms which will get the least performance out of the amp

as slaptit mentioned parallel will drop the ohm load to (8*4)/(8+4) = 2.66. This will be better for the amps performance being it is ideal to get the lowest load to the amp at which it is stable.

but pretty much listen to everyone when they say do not match these speakers. One is always going to outplay the other and it would be better off to just play one off the amp and if you blow that sub just put the other one in its place.

4/7/2006 1:25:02 AM

hey

thanks for everyone's help. I just got excited I guess. I'm going to return the 4 ohm sub and just run the amp to the one kicker competition sub.

I imagine it'll still sound pretty dope...I guess my next challenge will be to keep my license plate from rattling.

Again, thanks for the help.

4/7/2006 1:10:02 PM

^^ A/C power is actually an audio frequency signal, if an ugly one... that would probably shred the cone in most cases before it melted the voice coil...

4/7/2006 6:27:24 PM

^I have actually did this it just pops once and then you start smelling smoke and it either catches fire or blows a circuit breaker...

4/7/2006 7:24:45 PM

depends on the peak power handling of the driver I suppose... I don't play with anything that couldn't take at least a few seconds of such abuse

4/7/2006 7:42:53 PM

i guess your right, I wouldnt hook a speaker over $100 up to a light socket...im not that rich... yet

4/7/2006 11:25:40 PM

^^^^^ Just run some of the double sided sticky weather stripping stuff around the edge and across the middle that should do it, thats all i have and it works great so i know it would work on yours.

The A/C outlet trick is a very popular way of quickly ruining subs so u can send em back under warranty. A shop i used to help out at did it all the time to the diamond subs, prob like 50, untill they caught on.

[Edited on April 8, 2006 at 2:24 AM. Reason : k]

4/8/2006 2:22:18 AM