i am looking into installing a highs amp in my s10 but kind lost to what wattage i need and how to wire everything.
everything is rockford fosgate i am running
****2 prime series 1"tweeters****
2 punch series 4x6's
2 punch 6.5s and
2 prime 6x9's in boxes
all along with my 2 rockford t2 12"s
just curious on how to calculate the ohms and what speakers to run to what channels! any help will be greatly appreciated i dont have a amp for the highs just yet everything is running off of the cd player (besides the newly added 6x9's
To start out with, I'd like to share an tip. Most full range car audio speakers are made at 4 ohms. Rare exceptions exist but are annotated by the manufacturer such as the Infinity Kappa Series. Fosgates are all 4 Ohms to the best of my knowledge and I own 4 sets of Punch components myself.
On the amplifier portion, if you intend to run all 4 sets of speakers from one amp then you will need a 4 channel amp that is stable at 2 ohms in stereo on all 4 channels. That shouldn't be a difficult task since most are anyway.
When you wire the speakers to the amp, you will need to run two speakers to each channel in Parallel. This will cut your impedance in half giving you the 2 ohms you need. You also need to examine the amp's rating to ensure that the wattage output at 2 Ohms is going to adequately feed both speakers without exceeding their RMS rating (i.e. 100 watts @ 2 Ohms RMS will give you 50 watts to each speaker). I've read recommendations for feeding speakers with between 30% and 80% of their RMS rating as a safe margin to shoot for.
Lastly, I recommend looking into your total wattage output between your subwoofers and this new amp you're considering installing. If you exceed the charging system's capacity then you may find yourself creating serious electrical issues. I recommend at least checking out the "Big 3" for charging systems and look into upgrading. Its not fun being stuck on the side of the road because your battery ground wire burns up from too much current draw.
I hope all of this helps!
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Nick C.