Overpowering Speakers?

gti303
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Hi,

I have a set of Focal 165CVX's rated at I think 70 or 80W RMS...but I am currently going to run 150W to it. My friend told me he doesn't even look at the RMS rating usually...as long as I don't go nuts I can't blow them...is he correct? I just want to make sure before I start installing everything...

Thanks!

Eric

 
well the Volume knob is you main power controller //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif. Come on when you put the volume to 3 or 5 you are not giving them 150 Watts what the hell. Only possible way is if u max out the gains.... but anyways u would realize that the speakers are disorting badly.... And also when you set your gains according to 0 db signal lets say ... i dont belive there is one song recorded at that level anyhow so... to me the best thing to set gains is by ear...

 
Just use some common sense really. The real key is to listen out for distortion, and be gently with the amp gain.

I would suggest you listen to a song that you know extremely well, down to the strike of each insturment, and listen for any unusual changes. If it sounds bad, or funny, turn it down.

 
Just use some common sense really. The real key is to listen out for distortion, and be gently with the amp gain.
I would suggest you listen to a song that you know extremely well, down to the strike of each insturment, and listen for any unusual changes. If it sounds bad, or funny, turn it down.
pretty much.

 
Hi guys I just ordered a Hertz EP4 amp which gives 60W x 4 at 4ohms, and 95W x 4 at 2ohms. Also I ordered some focal 130CVX coaxials for the front. Now I thought I would buy some cheap shit 5x7 coaxials to fit in the rear of my car (ford focus) so I could turn the power IC in the headunit off and run all speakers off my 4 channel amp. I just bought some GTO8627 5X7's but I have just realised they are 60W at 2ohms. So do you think it would be ok to run them at 95W as long as I keep the gains down?

 
In my opinion there's alot of misinformation out there about the importance of matching rms ratings geared towards newbies buying cheap chain store equipment with low limits who would otherwise end up playing with more power than they know how to safely deliver. The easiest thing for the store to tell them to make sure they don't keep returning blown speakers is to match rms ratings as closely as possible.

Power ratings are arrived at using conditions completely different from what happens when you play music. The RMS rating of a speaker and the rms rating of an amp mean almost nothing when making these decisions if you take into account the fact that you can control an amplifier's power delivery and that a speaker never sees, nor does an amp deliver, ANY amount of power for more than a second or two while playing a song. No matter how much power you're running, at any given point a speaker may be seeing as few as 5-10 watts, or maybe up to half your amp's max rating at higher volumes. If you crank it regularly you may see your amp's rated output for occasional bursts during your music. Or if you tune your gain text book style and never go to your max undistorted volume and keep it there you will probably NEVER see all of the power an amp is rated for.

As long as it's clean power overheated voicecoils are not a likely problem, overdriving the speaker will probably be the bigger issue. I'd set the gains textbook style then start listening with high volume and backing off accordingly. You may find the mechanical limits of the speaker are such that you can deliver every bit of that 150 watts or you may need to back off slightly on the gain. But there's people out there running 2-3 times a speaker's rms rating and not having a problem. It's all in buying good speakers with high limits, listening for your system's limits and making gain adjustments.

It is not any relationship between rms ratings that kills a speaker, it's what the user does with the controls. And more power is usually better. It gets you more volume during normal listening and cleaner peaks without having to overlap gains and cheat yourself out of some undistorted volume just to get your music to play loud enough at a reasonable volume level. I plan to run amps making AT LEAST double my driver's rms ratings in my next setup.

 
I run my comps around 200-250rms a peice. And I have yet to have any problem with them. Actualy sound amazing with alot of power. Been doing it for months. And have had the comps for about 2 and a half years(have had 3 different amps on them before my current one).

Ive had more problems with my current amp overheating then anything. Has happened 4 times so far. Probably going to get another one soon. One for each set of comps. Not adding any power just more efficient and will have less heat issues if I run at 4 ohms per channel. They are suppose to be stable at 2 ohms but obviously cant handle full range frequencies.

 
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