The amp is what you make it.

 

yeah but if you wired a L/R amp as the L to the front speakers and R to the rear speakers, adjusting balance and the whole stereo affect could make a weird time in that truck.

 

...........

 

Also, the fact that the front and rear speakers are different is critical. If the fronts were paralleled to each other and the same with the rears, besides having the stereo effect front and back instead of left and right, the different sound from the 2 channels would be awful to listen to.

 

man, i wouldnt recommend trying to run a whole system on a two channel amp, some compenents will steal power from others as current always chooses the easiest path. so in other words, if ur speakers have less impedence (resistance) they will get most of the power and steal it from the sub. now ppl who make amps say this doesnt happen this way, but if u were to test it you would see this happen as i have tried it. this can even happen in 4 channel amps, best bet is to run 2 diff amps

Matt

 

In this situation, as long as the "main speakers" have passive crossovers, and the sub is crossed over properly, there is no robbing of anything in the way of power. IF the amp is capable of simultaneous stereo/bridged use, which this one is. It's because of the way the amp can operate in this mode. There are 2 completely separate things going on when an amp is used this way. It must be done correctly, however, or someone will be in the market for a new amp. And, like I mentioned previously, this is not an ideal way to power this set up. I agree with Matt, buy another amp.

 

Thanks for all the information everyone. To be honest, I only understood about 10% of what was said. I know diesels, not Ohms or crossovers. In fact, I'm a little more lost now than I was before!

So let me clarify what I think I gather from these discussions.

1. I am going to mount the Sony 1000w amp either under a rear seat or on the back wall of the cab. I will then wire 2 10" subs to this amp. This amp will connect directly to the Alpine HU.

2. I am going to get a small 4-channel amp and mount it to the rear of the cab as well. I will then wire the 4 speakers in the truck to this small amp. This will also connect to the Alpine HU.

Sound right so far? Man, and I thought Calculus was tough! car audio is a pain in the a**!

Thanks again evryone.

 

yes, much better

Matt

 

voodoo, When you break it down, it's not that complicated, if you think about each function individually. There are 2 things your amp needs from your HU. First, an unamplified signal to amplify. This is sent through RCA cables in 99.9% of cases. Second, a turn on lead that turns the amp on when the HU is on. There are other ways to do that, but a remote turn on from the HU is by far the best and most common way. The next 2 things your amp needs are voltage for the power supply and a VERY good ground. The voltage is supplied directly from the battery's positive post to the amp by a fused power wire of an appropriate gauge for the wattage of your system. The fuse needs to be the correct size for the system and should be as close to the battery as possible. A ground will be directly from the amp to the vehicle chassis as close to the amp as possible with the same gauge wire as the power lead. Connect speakers with appropriate speaker wire and you're good to go. Adding a second amp usually involves using distribution blocks to divide the power connection to the separate amps. Same with the ground. You can also run a separate power wire from the battery to each amp, but there's hardly any point to that, especially for a daily driver. There are variations of these, but keep it as simple as you can and it will cut down on problems. In other words, don't add crap you really don't need. Go to this site and read everything you can; www.bcae1.com

 

as for the other terms. Ohms is a measure of the resistance of any electrical item. Most car speakers are rated at 4 ohms, and most if not all amps can easily power 4 ohm speakers. By changing wiring or buying other speakers, you can lower the resistance to 2ohms, allowing more power to travel, but this is only done when the amp or HU can safely run at 2 ohms.
As for crossovers, they filter the frequencies sent to speakers. On your amp you probably have a crossover selector. Mine has low-full-high. On low, it sends only lower frequencies (for subs). On high it only sends high frequencies. And on full it sends the full range for speakers wired into it (example, big 6"x9"s in the back).
Hope you can feel a little smarter now!

 

The only problem I saw from this is money. Buying another amp costs money and adding a little bit of wiring for it does too. But other than that LP and RP nailed it on the head. Good luck with your system, and I hope you're a little more edumakated (haha) from readin this.

 

I have one last question regarding the 2 channel amp and subs. Is it possible (or advantageous) to have a "switch" to power on the amp and subs when I want them on? The reason I ask is occassionaly I would probably want that amp to be off so it wouldn't be drawing from the battery.

It's not a huge problem since diesels come with dual batteries, but was wondering about it.

Thanks again for all the help.

 

Yea it's possible, quite practical as well. I had mine on a switch when I was just running my subs off an amp so I could "turn off" the bass whenever I wanted. Just have a little toggle switch, but the downside is if your amp doesn't have the soft turn-on then you'll hear a loud thump whenever the amp kicks on.