What would happen in this situation?

[DjDan101 10+ year member]

I know that some amps aren't 1 ohm stable and wiring them that way can make them overheat, but what would happen if you were running it at a low power, say 40-50%, but it was wired at 1 ohm?

Example: An amp puts out 600 watts at 2 ohm, but you need 750. Logic would dictate that it would potentially put out 1200 watts at 1 ohm, but you turned it down really far so that it only does 750. Would the amp still overheat?

This is just a thought I had, and I'm still pretty new to the slightly advanced parts of car audio, so I thought I'd use the thought as a learning experience.

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[garychoffmann 10+ year member]

Depends on the amp.

 

[DjDan101 10+ year member]

Depends on the amp.

The one that I was looking at that sparked this was this one

JBL Grand Touring Series GTO601.1 II Mono subwoofer amplifier 580 watts RMS X 1 at 2 ohms at Crutchfield.com

 

[jco1385 5,000+ posts]

Heat, blown fuses and magic smoke will happen. Why not buy a 1 ohm stable amp if you are buying? What sub are you driving?

 

[Massive spl]

Buy a 1ohm stable amp

 

[DjDan101 10+ year member]

You guys misunderstand, I have had this amp for a while and I'm running it at 2, I was just curious. In the future, I'll always buy a 1 ohm stable, but this was just a learning experience lol.

 

[jco1385 5,000+ posts]

When you drop the resistance, you up the amperage. Amps = heat. You'll reach the max load of your fuses (or thermal limit) before you reach your target wattage and either keep popping fuses or toast the amp.

 

[DjDan101 10+ year member]

Thank you, that's the explanation I needed.

 

[will3 10+ year member]

Short answer is it is a bad idea, but impedance is not linear, so wired @ 1ohm DCR on a 2ohm stable amplifier at extreme low volume or even up to 30-40% may never yield an issue, but knowing that limit is the issue and just in general is a bad idea unless you have a lot of experience with amplifiers

 

[adulbrich 5,000+ posts]

Yeah, don't. When you wire to lower impedances, more current is allowed to flow. Voltage output doesn't change. Most mainstream "2 ohm" amps are not designed to handle a lot of current. They're more designed for a higher voltage to drive higher impedances