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I have 2 kenwood amps hooked up to my audiobahn dual 4 ohm speakers.

I thought I had them wired in series *it had been a while since I wired em* but I have wired them in parellel and they are set for 2 ohms, should I wire them in series so they are on a 8 ohm load. Could that have been causing me to blow my amp fuses prematurely? What is the real difference for ohm loads?

What is the purpose of ohm, I know have heard higher is better, but never understood why.

 
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Be a little more specific.
What amps?
Are you saying you have 2 dual voice coil subs?

 
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It's possible. Wiring them in parallel makes the amp send twice as much current as wiring them in series. Current is what causes fuses to blow, so it's safer to wire in series but, if you amp can handle 2 ohms, you get more power w/ parallel.

I think the general plan is get an amp that can handle 2 ohms, wire in parallel and be careful with the gains.

Does that sound right?

I am assuming you are talking about wiring the speakers. Wiring amps in series or parallel can be/is dangerous and could damage them permanently.

 
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kenwood amps are not rated for 2 amps i'm pretty sure. so that could have been your problem.

 
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KAC-7202
960 Peak
460w X 1 at 4 ohms

the amp is said to be 2 ohm stable

This is hooked up to a
Audiobahn
Dual Voice Coil 8 ohm sub
400w RMS

 
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So, you have two of those amplifiers? I don't understand your setup. How many subs do you have, how many amplifiers do you have?

 
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Ok
I have

2 12'' Audiobahn Subs 400 RMS
2 KAC-7202 Kenwood Amps, 460w x 1 at 4 ohms

I have each sub wired to its own sub in a bandpass box, I just wanted to know if I should wire them to 8 instead of 2. From what I am reading the subs are getting 500+w each more then they are suppose to get, due to the fact I thought I wired em differently. I know I should up them to 8 ohm to save the speakers, just wondering how much of a difference it will make, unless I might be ok with 2 ohm loads on each sub?

 
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I have a KENWOOD MONOBLOCK AMP KAC-400M

Wired 4 12" Lightning Audio DVC 4ohm all parrallel
by using ohms law i was running my amp at 0.5ohms

that was two years ago, have a daughter now put two subs in storage.
running amp at 2ohms

And it still works.

 
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Well, just to start from the beginning, you should connect one sub to each amp individually.

When each sub has dual 8 ohm coils, you are limited to 16 ohms or 4 ohms.

Your ideal setup is to connect each coil in parallel, then bridge your ampligier to get 460x1 at 4 ohms. do this twice, once for each sub/amp.

 
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Rereading.. You must have gotten the 2/8 ohm possibilities from the possible external wiring. You really shouldn't be connecting your amplifiers together at all. I don't think those Kenwoods are made to be wired together like that, you really need to separate them.

If you are somehow connecting the outputs of the two amplifiers together, I think that might be where you get your fuses blowing.

 
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More info on the kenwood.

920W peak output @ 4 ohms, bridged


460W x 2 peak output @ 2 ohms


300W x 2 peak output @ 4 ohms


460W RMS (continuous), bridged


150W RMS (continuous) x 2 @ 4 ohms


230W RMS (continuous) x 2 @ 2 ohms

So I was thinking, in order to get the max use out of my subs/amps, could I go with this setup.

Subs wired in parellel.
Make the amp stereo mode *had it on mono, cus i was bridging* and hook Sub1 on both Left/Right, Sub2 on Left/Right
example


*********---- Sub1------*************-----Sub2-----
*********|***|***|***|*************|**|***|***|
*********|***|***|***|*************|**|***|***|
*********|***|***|***|*************|**|***|***|
*********|***|***|***|*************|**|***|***|
*******Left+Left-Right+Right-*********Left+Left-Right+Right-
************Amp1********************Amp2


Or send both Left's on Amp1/Amp2 to Sub1, and send both Right's on Amp1/2 to Sub2


*edit* fixed crappy diagram, the amps are hooked up to their OWN sub, not hooked together, they are 4 ohm DVC btw

*edit2* spelling

*edit3* Btw I was thinking this will work because it will send 2 signals of 230w at 2ohms, therefore making the power going to it 460w x 2 ohms *sinces ohms are based on where its coming from and going, a combined signal does not add to the ohm ratings, i believe, correct me if wrong*

 
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bump

 
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bumpy

 
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You might be overpowering the subs because, no offense, they are crappy and probably can't take a lot of power over what they say they can. Not to mention, the Kenwood very well might not like to see a 2ohm to it bridged. I know it says it is two ohm stable, but it might not like that 2ohm bridged. I don't mean to offend you at all, but it seems as though you are going to more trouble to get an answer out of us than it would be for you to simply take a half hour and wire it up the other way and see. Anyway, I'm glad to try and help.

So, we've got 4ohm, not 8ohm DVC AudioBahhhhhhns. We've got 2, count em', 2 kenwood two channels. Personally, I would try it wiring the VC in series for an 8ohm load and bridging each amp to each sub. If that didn't work, I'd try parelleling the VCs and running both subs off one amp, stereo mode, just to see if I had any problems- it'll probably sound like **** though.

 
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See, the problem is, you don't have an ideal configuration. 2, 2 channel amps and 4 ohm subs, just aren't a great combo when you are using audiobarn and kenwood. You would have been better off with 1 or 2 mono amps to drive the subs. Like 2 8ohm DVCs and one mono amp. Parellel the VCs and get a 4ohm load ea. driver. Then parellel the speakers to the mono amp and get a nice, mono, 2ohm signal. You wanna try to avoid running subs in stereo. If you do get the subs running right off their own kenwoods, you should take extra care to make sure those amps are set identically! The last thing you want is two subs, each marching to thier own drummer.

 
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well a mono block is suspected at run 2 ohms. I was just looking at the model and did not research it to see if it handled 2 ohms.

Now it states :
# Power output at 2 ohms: 230 watts x 2 (1 kHz, 0.8% THD)
# Power output at 4 ohms, bridged: 460 watts x 1 (1 kHz, 0.8% THD)

so depending on how the subs are wired will matter if its the cause of your problem or not. It can handle 2ohms stable but thats in stereo from what I read on websites. Also you can daisy chain these amps together but I woudl not recommend it on those subs because they are not stout enough to handle that amount of power.

 
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If you read my post a little while ago, it explained about the 2ohm stability.

 
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I did read it but its only 2 ohms stable in stereo mode not bridged according to what I was reading.

 
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oh, I wasn't coming down on you or anything, I was just reinforcing the opinion by saying I had said something similar.

the Kenwood very well might not like to see a 2ohm to it bridged. I know it says it is two ohm stable, but it might not like that 2ohm bridged

 
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ok, I wired for 8, I can now pound harder with the subs now * I don't understand since now I 4x the resistance as before * , the only problem was a couple of the screw holes were stripped on the right sub allowing it to move, so I just got back *after "test" drive* and replaced them with bigger screws. I am gonna test em again later on, just to make sure they aren't moving.

Thanks alot guys



I had planned on trying to wire it at 8 today anyway I just wanted as much feedback as I could get.

 
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running at 8 ohms sucks but until you get some subs that can handle more power I think thats the way to go. you could run them stereo with left and right on each voice coil with the LPF on but thats just an idea to see how much more you can get out of it.

 
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Thats what I was thinking, They have dual lugs, so they have 4 +- connections
12
34
setup like that, Can I hook up left channel to 1,3 and right channel to 2,4
Therefore giving 230 to each voice coil at 2 ohms, effectively making it 460 at 2 ohms to the sub in general?

 
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Well, I screwed down the other sub, hooked up everything, well when I first went out, I came to realize one of the subs had a bad voice coil *its like a metal shaky sound inside the amp*, well i blew it *big surprise* thats why I had it wired in parellel before. Now the SINGLE sub hits harder then I could go with my old DUAL amps or with the kenwoods with the subs wired in parellel *I would pop fuses after to loud*. So I did see an improvement, even if I lost a sub, rather sad isn't it? lol