Sub wiring

[Thomas Buckley]

1-15in. 2 ohm svc sub with 2 12in. 4 ohm subs svc how do I get around 2 ohm load with all three

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[ThxOne Premium Member]

Suggestions so far have been - high powered 4 channel amp run as a 3 channel.

5 channel ran as a 3 channel.

 

[spokey9 5,000+ posts]

Mismatched subs like never really shine like they should wired together

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

1-15in. 2 ohm svc sub with 2 12in. 4 ohm subs svc how do I get around 2 ohm load with all three

2 Ohms final load is not viable with those subs. You can do 4 or 1 Ohm.

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

Mismatched subs like never really shine like they should wired together

I tried the mismatching for a few weeks. The results were pretty darn good. I used a 10" Digital Designs 3500 and a 12w7. I expected delay or cancellation but it did not happen. I think it worked good because the 10 is ported and the 12 is sealed. I assume since the 12 is sealed it had a faster return rate regardless of the cone being heavier.
I first had the 10 by itself and it plays deep with authority but seemed to lack a bit on the top end. When matched, the 12 covered to top end like it was supposed to be used as a set. I say, do not be afraid to experiment. You may end up with a pleasing outcome.

 

[spokey9 5,000+ posts]

I tried the mismatching for a few weeks. The results were pretty darn good. I used a 10" Digital Designs 3500 and a 12w7. I expected delay or cancellation but it did not happen. I think it worked good because the 10 is ported and the 12 is sealed. I assume since the 12 is sealed it had a faster return rate regardless of the cone being heavier.
I first had the 10 by itself and it plays deep with authority but seemed to lack a bit on the top end. When matched, the 12 covered to top end like it was supposed to be used as a set. I say, do not be afraid to experiment. You may end up with a pleasing outcome.

When you're wiring them all together on the same amp not all of them are being driven like they should...that's why I say that.

 

[Deiimos]

I would definitely do separate boxes or separate chambered box for mix match like this (the wiring gets weird, and sharing airspace gets weird). I would ponder a multi channel amp as mentioned, that's probably the best bet, or maybe a high current 1-ohm amp to just wire everything in parallel at 1-ohm and not even worry about it since it is a fairly basic setup. I use to do this as a teen with my home receivers. I had Crunch 4-ohm 15’s is separate sealed boxes on the floor, and 8-ohm Technics home tower 12” 3 way speakers on top of those. The 15’s added a lot more bass than just the Technics could do by themselves on the same receiver and the Technics still sounded fine.

If you have to have a 2 ohm load:
The pair of 12" subs is 2-ohm with the single 4 ohm coils in parallel.

Or, only use the 15 since it is 2 ohm single coil.

Adding the 15 with the 12's makes it 1-ohm if all parallel.

Only thing "close" to 2 ohm, you would have to wire the 12's in series to 8-ohm, and then parallel with the 15 for 1.6 ohm (which could blow your amp), and not sure how that will perform. The 15 and 12's will never share the power together well, the 15 will hog the power in this last scenario. I personally wouldn't bother with it, but if you can make it work, I guess have fun with it experimenting, I did a lot of this with subs / amps.



By the time I had a car I didn’t care enough to try to cram mix matched subs in and would only run matching subs or just one or the other. Well, actually me and my cousin built some crappy bandpass boxes for our 10's, I had two Jensen XS 10's, he had two MTX 3000 10's. We put those two boxes in a trunk of an 83 or 84 Mazda 626 that didn't run (well it ran but had other problems) my parents had sitting in the driveway and it hit much harder with both boxes than just one, but they were all low power 10's and single 4 coils, so was easy to get 4 ohm load, bumped the hell out of 69 Boyz 199Quad album.

 

[Popwarhomie 5,000+ posts]

Just don't....