Speakers Wired in Series Versus in Parallel

Hi OS, No, the other forum where I've been on this topic is a forum that is dedicated to my car's make and model... talk about people who love their cars, right? I was actually getting info from two guys on that forum... one guy on a thread who was more technical (the guy who posted that formula) and then another guy who's past post about wiring his speakers in series I had read who answered me on private message a few times. Here are a couple quotes from messages to me from the guy who's post I read that was about when he ran a set of car speakers in series with a set that was directly wired to his head unit... QUOTE: "I don't have that car any more, but never had an issue. I think the series way supposedly makes them less loud if I'm not mistaken, but you are sitting up front next to them and the rears are way in back anyway. Any mild mismatch is easily adjusted with the fader on the receiver. We ran them with head unit power, using a small amp for a subwoofer only. Never had issues with volume."

Our set up used an aftermarket head unit. It is a long time ago but I am certain we bypassed any factory amp and used only the head unit power.

It didn't matter that the resistance increased, because we had 4 speakers up front now instead of just 2. The volume was fine." UNQUOTE What I figure I'll do is to first wire it the way I first planned, just bypassing the dash speakers and wiring directly to the door speakers, and see how that sounds once the new door speakers are actually mounted in the doors, then I'll get a new pair of dash speakers and wire those and the door speakers in series and try to compare how those sound with the potential loss of volume balanced out with the fader. So, all these forum posts will be my homage to ohmage, and I'll say "Oooohhhhmmmm" after hearing so much about ohms.    :^) Thanks, numinumi

Well, there's no supposedly about the series addition making them less loud, but that is subject to qualification. For a given volume control setting - and for the amp's max output power - the electrical power for both speakers (ie, combined) will be less than for the single speaker as previously discussed. However loudness is related to position and distance... Fader adjustment is often required to keep the balance after volume changes (whether from lower power or added speakers or volume control adjustments). Acceptable depends on the user and the system. My "cheap" HUs couldn't handle loud without being distorted so I would not have added more speaker. My usual Alpines are fine as is but doubling speaker resistance could reduce its max volume unacceptably, but I'm into thrash & hardcore and sometimes (therefore?) at its higher volumes. For "low volume" users - whether externally amped or not - there is usually enough reserve to compensate for higher speaker resistance. And I forgot to say before, yes - I like your ohm pun!