Powering up subs....

[war0827]

I just wanted to get some info. If i ended up picking up 12" pioneer subs (TS-W300R) and pioneer amp (GM-5000T). How many amps will I need for 2 subs?

Here are some specs:
12" pioneer sub: Continious power- 150 watts
Peak power- 600 watts
Impendence- 4 ohms

Pioneer amp: Continious power- 125 watts x 2 @ 4 ohms
Max power- 250 watts x 2 @ 4 ohms
number of channesl- 2

[WhiteRabbit]

that amp you got listed should do the job for powering your two subs.

i got 2 10-inch kenwoods max-600w 8 ohm, and im powering them with an mtx-road thunder 280w bridged x 1. so i just wired the subs in parallel to give them a 4 ohm load bridged into one channel, hits pretty good but of course itd be better if i had a more powerful amp. o well, the subs and amp just cost me $50, haha.

[grapefury]

here is a rule of thumb: it's much better to overpower than underpower.

underpowering it could ruin the speaker or sub.

[Stealth]

it should be fine but i would have went with better equipment

[WhiteRabbit]

Originally posted by grapefury
here is a rule of thumb: it's much better to overpower than underpower.

underpowering it could ruin the speaker or sub.

isnt that the other way around???

[Stealth]

grape is right.
as long as you dont turn it up past the rated power... if you overpower you have room for improvement too

[war0827]

i need to know if i should follow the continious watt's or the max watts

[da_horse]

continuous, max isnt a good guide to go along....

in all cases its the continuous ratings (RMS) that u want to look at

i think u may be able to bridge the amp and run the two subs at 2 ohm actually.....this is off the top of my head but i may be wrong....if i'm right...it'll be much better...if im wrong...whoops brainfart

[finese1]

Underpower is better than over power. But don't listen to me I blow subs all the time. I mean you can run a sub pass it's rms and it should be alright. But there will be a time when you will push the sub unexpectedly past it's peak and then it dead.

[Hamsterman]

no no no, overpower is better than underpower... many reasons, but yes as stealth said it gives room for improvements later, you will not reach distortion levels by maxing out your amp on your more powerful subs, and do to the fact that you will probably blow your other speakers, if you run you unit at max, you will most likely never overpower the sub... plus on a bigger amp- you can just turn down the gain and EQ so that you are in the power band on yours subs... you can't give an amp extra power, but you can take some away by turning down the EQ

also war... what kinda enclosure are you gonna have for 4 12's in your trunk... that takes a lot of space?

[war0827]

i'm not going to have 4-12" subs. What i have now is 2-12" premiers subs and I just picked up 2-10" subs to add to it with a 760 Watt max Pioneer amp to power up those 2-10"s. I'm thinking about changing my old 12" subs for new 12" subs, but the newer subs have like 100 watts more to the max power output. That's why i was asking, cuz, i didn't know whether i needed one or two amps for the new 12's. I'll probably be selling my old pair of 12's in the q-logic box i have.
I'll also be doing a custom enclosure in my trunk.

[rawdawg]

Having more available power than the woofer needs is better, musically speaking. Using it all at once is a bad idea. The idea is to set the gains on the amp so that the woofer is getting its manufacturer recommended wattage and still having enough juice left over for the musical peaks.

Grapefury, how does underpowering a woofer ruin it?

If I set my volume level to +5, it is barely audible. Clearly I am underpowering my sub but no damage occurs. Do you mean that if I have a low wattage amp and I goose my volume to get some bump in my truck, thereby clipping the signal, frying the voice coils, damaging the woofers, then that is a human problem, not a low power problem.

[finese1]

I have blown 4 subs already. I think got pretty decent idea. Right now i would rather be 100 watts under the subs rms than over. You are right about over powering the amp but your amp has a fuse your subs don't. I rather blow fuses than blow subs.

I mean having more availabe ok but using it in a responsible way. They way you guys sound like you are going beat the crap out the sub. Then i got to say underpowering is better.