Clipping = ?

[PhatTonyDeMarco 5,000+ posts]

Okay so my speaker is clipping. I know this means I am giving it too much power, but does it also mean that my speaker is now blown?

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[Beat_Dominator 5,000+ posts]

Clipping will eventually blow a speaker, you can clip em, just don't keep doing it.

 

[chubby 10+ year member]

no. if you blew the speaker because of clipping it means your speaker is now blown. lol

 

[PhatTonyDeMarco 5,000+ posts]

Okay, thanks. I wasnt doing it for a long time, it was working fine for about 15 minutes, then I went into work, came out, and it was clipping... Gain adjustment I gues.....

 

[jacko 10+ year member]

okay lets start the rumor mill that clipping blows speakers again... wahoo...

 

[PV Audio 5,000+ posts]

dude, stop passing aroud false information. underpowering speakers blows them.

 

[jacko 10+ year member]

lol be careful what you say a lot of ppl might take it for truth around here. ;-)

To clarify: niether underpowering nor clipping can blow a speaker. btw if you underpower a speaker and push the amp too far this will cause the amp to send a clipped signal to the speaker. You can underpower a speaker however much you want, just don't push the amp into clipping, a clipped signal sent to a speaker will just sit there and burn the voice coil, it won't blow the speaker. make sense?

 

[PV Audio 5,000+ posts]

lol be careful what you say a lot of ppl might take it for truth around here. ;-)

it eez teh truth!

 

[Decipha 10+ year member]

clipping a sub can and will blow it just remember to set your gains accordingly and when you hear distortion turn your radio down

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

Speakers don't clip. Subs don't clip. Why does everyone say "I was clipping my speaker", or "clipping a sub"?? You can't clip a sub!! And you can't clip a speaker!!

You clip the amplifier driving the speaker!!

Semantics?? Maybe. But to say it any other way simply isn't accurate.

[/rant]

 

[BassAddictJ 5,000+ posts]

so if a clipped signal burns voice coils over time you're sayingthat DOESNT blow a sub....i'm lost.....cause i clipped the crap ou tof my orion 1200d on my xxx15 and it F'ed up my sub (also poor box design i think is a contributing factor).

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

so if a clipped signal burns voice coils over time you're sayingthat DOESNT blow a sub

Who you are talking to, me??

What I said is that you don't "clip a speaker", or "clip a sub". You clip the amplifier driving the sub, which in turn sends a clipped signal to the sub. But you can't "clip a sub", you clip the amplifier.

Sorry, it's a pet peeve of mine..........

Also, No....a clipped signal in and of itself does not hurt a speaker. Send a 250w clipped signal to your XXX, and it will faithfully play it all day long with no damage at all.

The clipping is not what damages the sub/speaker, it's the excess power created by the clipped signal. Only time a clipped signal will damage a speaker is if the power of the clipped signal is beyond what the speaker/sub can handle.

 

[RandyJ 10+ year member]

Very true squeak. The reason a clipped signal is bad is because of the distortion, and the peak in power it will create, which can overheat coils if they are already being pushed to thier limits.

Someone mentioned a clipped wave is a sine wave, which is false.

The way you create a clipped signal is by trying to push something too far when its already pushing as much as it can. For example, boosting a a band to max on an eq, turning on the loud function, turning on the bass boost to an extreme lvl, setting gains too high. This causes the wave to reach its peak and when that happens, the wave flatlines, which is known as clipping.

If yall are still confused or feel there is something you do not know, speak up and we can help. There are many threads about this on SD that help a bit. I know because I made them.

 

[JimJ 5,000+ posts]

If you see it once on an o'scope, it becomes instantly obvious...looking at the waveform really gets the point across.

underpowering speakers blows them.

d00d, yeah...my 1.8w amp could blow speakers if I left them in the same room together.

 

[PV Audio 5,000+ posts]

d00d, yeah...my 1.8w amp could blow speakers if I left them in the same room together.

//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/eek.gif.771b7a90cf45cabdc554ff1121c21c4a.gif i was feeding mine TWO watts, and it lasted 10 minutes!