6 component speakers, 4 channel amp/how to wire them?

[verb1999]

My amp is an HCCA 150r. The ratings are as follows:

High current section:

25 watts x 2 @ 4 OHMS

50 watts x 2 @ 2 OHMS

100 watts x 2 @ 1 OHM

200 watts x 2 @ 0.5 OHM

100 watts x 1 @ 4 OHMS

200 watts x 1 @ 2 OHMS

400 watts x 1 @ 1 OHM

High voltage section:

50 watts x 2 @ 4 OHMS

100 watts x 2 @ 2 OHMS

200 watts x 2 @ 1 OHM

200 watts x 1 @ 4 OHMS

400 watts x 1 @ 2 OHMS

My friend and have dabbled in car audio, but would say we're still at novice leves. We were trying to decifer how to hook up these speakers:

http://mobile.bostonacoustics.com/car/car_product.aspx?category_id=14&family_id=94&product_id=293 (in the front)

and

http://mobile.bostonacoustics.com/car/car_product.aspx?category_id=14&family_id=21&product_id=91 (in the rear)

We were thinking the 746's to the high voltage section, and the SL60 set to the high current section. But we were confusing ourselves trying to figure out in what fashion to hook them up (parellel?), and how many watts it'd give us. Obviously we want to install them in a manner that'll give us the most watts out of the amp. What do you guys think? Thanks a lot in advance to any responses.

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[timaishu 10+ year member]

I have no idea what you are talking about referring to high current and high voltage sections. You are over thinking this.

Its quite simple.

Your amp is a 4 channel right? Therefore it will have speaker outputs for the front and rear speakers.

For the SL60's, you need to wire the the crossovers to the front left and right channels of the amp. From the crossovers you will wire in your midrange and tweeter.

For the rears, just wire in each individual speaker to the the rear left and right speaker outputs on the amp.

 

[verb1999]

I have no idea what you are talking about referring to high current and high voltage sections.

That's the way Orion marketed/advertised this amp, and it's also what it says in the manual. The high voltage section (front 2 channels) was supposed to be for components, the high current (rear two channels) for a sub/subs. But I'm only doing a 6 speaker component install with the amp instead.

 

[macq32 10+ year member]

^what he said

The components in front/tweeter are both wired to your crossover which is hooked to your front channels on the amp. the other 2 go for the rear

 

[verb1999]

How many watts are my speakers getting?

 

[IDSkoT 5,000+ posts]

This thing pulls 80 amps? Jesus Christ.

What I would do is run your fronts from the rear channel, and run the rears from your front channel. That way you front speakers are louder.

Or if you wanted to get the most out of your amp, you could run all 4 speakers in series to get them down to 2 Ohms. This might cause distortion, though. Just something to mull over.

HOLY SHIT! THAT THING CAN DO .5 STABLE!

JESUS THAT'S AN AMP!

Anyway, the amp isn't really that powerful. It's a beast, but it's not powerful.

I didn't really look at your comps, to be honest, but most comps take about 100RMS to get decently loud.

Most head units will give out 25-50W RMS which kind of makes this amp pointless unless you start to wire your speakers down to achieve a lower resistance.

EDIT:: Where are the speakers going?

 

[helotaxi 5,000+ posts]

Not familiar with the HCCA 150R I see. It was designed as a full system single amp back in the IASCA days where you were placed in your competition class based on the 4 ohm rated power of your amplifiers. The front channels on that amp are the 50x2 channels. The "high voltage" section if you will; essentially a 250SX. The idea was that you would run a set of components or two off those channels and send them 50w per side. You didn't need the low impedance stability so that part of the amp wasn't as overbuilt. The 25x2, or "high current" section, was basically a HCCA 225, stable to .5 ohms stereo, 1 ohm mono. This section was meant to drive the subs and into a low impedance could deliver more power than the front channels. A fairly common competition setup with that amp was something like a pair or two of MB Quart components and a trio of JL Audio W6 subs.

Are you planning on running a sub? Can you sub setup be wired to 1 ohm and would 400w be enough for it? If the answer is "no" to any of that, sell that amp and get one that better suits your needs. You're wasting its potential just trying to run your front speakers off of it. To get the most out of it, you'd want to run both sets of speakers in parallel off the front (50x2) channels with an attenuator (resistor or L-pad) on the rear speakers and then use the rear channels to run an efficient sub setup at 1 ohm.

 

[verb1999]

No sub at the moment. I am keeping that idea in mind though for a future project maybe for next spring. For now I am just doing this component install.

The Boston SL60's in the front (both 6.5's and tweeters), and the 746's in the back for rear fill. A few suggested don't even use the 746's, but I have them already from my last set up, so I'd like to at least try it & if I don't like it I'll take them out.

So do I still want to run all 6 speakers paralleled off of the front? Is that what you're explaining, helotaxi?

 

[helotaxi 5,000+ posts]

The 4 drivers of the component set are effectively one pair of speakers once you use the crossovers.

Again, if you think that you want more than 400w to the sub, you'll want a different amp. You can probably sell that amp for enough to buy a pair of amps or at least come close.