Audiobahn Subwoofer

[fel0n]

I just bought 2 audiobahn speakers and a dual box. they were 200 dollar speakers but they dont even sound good at all. i have them hooked up to a home stereo wit alot of power. could that be the reason if they are car speakers? or am i doing something else wrong?

 

fZ

[Bigairee]

I think a crossover would be required.

[fel0n]

whats a crossover and what do they do?

[dogboystoy]

First of all,, All home systems are 8 ohm speakers and amps etc.. Car systems are 4 ohms. If you dont match the impedance (ohms) the system will sound crappy and you would blow your new speakers. Look on the magnet part of the speaker , if it is for a car it should say 4 ohms. if it is for a house it should say 8 ohms. I am not sure about competition series sytems for cars but i would bet they are still 4 ohms.

BTW: a crossover, splits the different tones. You would hook up tweeters to the high range, Mids to the mid range, and Subs to the low range. This device puts the appropriate tone to the correct speaker (assuming you have it hooked up correctly). if these new speakers you have are subs then you will definitely need a crossover to make sure that the low tones are the only ones going to these speakers. Otherwise they will sound like crap. Even a cheap pair of 6X9's will sound good if they are hooked up properly to a crossover. Also you will need an amp to run from the crossover to the big speakers.

If you dont know that much about audio systems, I suggest you have it installed. This will ensure that you system will be the best it can be. And then you wont damage it.

[boonman]

I am not positive, but your speakers may be dual voice coils. In which case, you could wire the coils on each speaker in series, and get an 8 ohm load shown to the receiver. if not, and they are Single Voice coil, than you can just wire both speakers in series and be all set. However, you would only be able to run one chanel, either Left or Right to the box. if the speakers are DVC, than you can use both channels. A crossover, as Stoy explained, seperates the sound frequencies. Subwoofers typically handle anywhere from about 20-120 Hz, and you need to feed it only those signals. home speaker boxes, (that you would buy in the store) are internally crossed over. This is why you don't hear the soft muffled garbage that you are now hearing from your car speakers from a home speaker setup.

[itsmyforte]

it does not matter what the DCR value is given on a subwoofer. impedance changes with frequency. a home amplifier will work on car subs just as car amps will work with home subs. just match the impedance value with the output power at that given impedance rating. however given most car amps are of low quality they do tend to work better at lower DCR values. car amps are flawed by their power supplies, they are normally all made the same no matter what company makes them because they all use PWM supplies. audiobahn is not a hi-fi product, however they much like all the other manufacturers pretty much make the same stuff all in china within the same 10 factories. i work for a high end speaker and electronics company and have a background in speaker design and amplifier technoligies. IMO its better to have a high sensitive woofer wtih lots of BL. its a known fact that any woofer can not make high spl's without one of two things. A. long excursion smaller cone or B large cone shorter excursion. its a trade off one must decide depending on the application. its hard to make high spl without a large enclosure because the suspension of the woofer needs to have the correct amount of compliance in the box as its suspesion. problem is speaker manufacturers lie about their theil/small parameters, and publish specs based on one woofer they chose. their tolerances on voice coil placement in the gap is usually poor. these are things that plague a good speaer from a bad one.

 

if after you read this and don't understand a word i said thats fine becuase i wouldn't expect you to. if i could test every woofer out there i could tell you who is good and who isn't, but i can't. i am forunate enough that i can design a woofer and have it built to my specifications for my particular application. i can however suggest to you a few choices i would pick for an off the shelf woofer that most can afford. Kove, Stryke, Eclipse Ti, Peerless XLS, Dayton titanic, those are some that i would recommend.

 

if anyone would like some more information i may be able to help you out by choosing some amplifier loosly based on the specs according to what woofers you have or are going to buy. I am by no means an authority on speakers or electronics but since i work in the industry and have a degree in electronics i do have pretty good knowlege of some aspects, and I am a huge music fan so i have had many speakers and amps over the years.

 

whatever you choose or already own can sound good if its setup properly.