How is a 300W RMS amp isn't going to push an 800W RMS Sub?

Question

In the question that was asked on 8/29 "Where is my bang" The asker "egoodkiss" said his 6X9's had as much bass as his 800W RMS Pioneer sub that was hooked up to a 300W RMS amp.. Our stereo God and respected leader, SPARKY said and I quote " If your pushing 300 watts RMS into 800 watt RMS subs, well there's your problem"

HEY GOD, ARE U KIDDING ME????

I had been designing and selling systems that half the time, consisted of 200-300W RMS amps running single 600-1000W RMS subs for 15 years and NOT ONCE seen the Subs suffer, blow or had as much bass as any 6X9's ever made!!!!. In fact, according to JL Audio techs at various seminars, a JL 12W7 sub inside a ported box powered by a JL 250/1 amp will be heard bumping from down the street. Not to mention me personal success stories I've had with this setup.

Any objections?

Sparky has brought to my attention a couple of grammatical errors he found in my question.. I see now what he was focusing on.

When I said that I've never seen a sub make as much bass as any 6X9's ever made, I said it wrong. Here's what I meant to say: An 800W 12" sub powered by a 300W amp, in a proper setup and at full potential, should vibrate the **** out of any pair of 6X9's ever made.

Sparky hates to admit that he was wrong. The asker CLEARLY stated that his bass was as much as his 6X9's and could not "feel" it. The asker knew he should get a whole lot of bass from his setup. Sparks said "300W going into an 800W sub is the problem" Nevertheless, Sparky stands by his answer still..

Then to cover up his mistake, he diverted the readers' attention by writing a bunch of technical crap so UNRELATED to the question I asked... Go Figure!

And, Professor Sparky: Everyone makes grammatical mistakes once in a while. So, sue me next time I do that. Thank you!

Answer 1

Slacker34 is right. It seems in the last 5 years and especially on this answers site people are all tied up in wattage. 800watts this 1200 watts that. Yikes. 50w to 75w per channel for mids and tweets from a good amp (eg u get what you pay for that's why some cost more). 150 to 200w (rms) per sub is plenty, especially if the amp can deliver a lot of current on demand. The dynamic power or the maximum current an amp can deliver for a short spike is far more important then claims of 1200watts.

A sub rated at 800w RMS is most likely dissipating 700 watts off as heat.

About car audio myths: it won't damage a sub under powering it. IF you run an amp to clipping there is a small chance of damage but only if the amp is poorly designed. Most clipping amps have distortions in the higher frequency's, subs really can't respond to them and really don't affect them. Besides if you run your amp to clipping you're and idiot. Go to college take electronics as your major then design and build you own amps and electronic cross overs and you'll understand.

Answer 2

Well, slacker (whiner), I never said "damage" would occur. I said it was a problem since the asker asked "where's my bang?".

Pushing 300 watts RMS into an 800 watt RMS sub is nothing more than running the subs at less than half the power rated. Less power, less bang. Underpowering a sub won't hurt it, if this were true, then merely turning down my volume would cause damage.

It all boils down to the amount of air that's pushed or SPL. Sure four 6X9's can push more air than a 12" sub because the surface area of the combined 6X9's is more than the 12". However, I NEVER said "a" 6x9 thumps more than a sub.

All your doing is putting words in my mouth and making you look like a fool.

There are ONLY three things that will damage a sub:

1. Exceeding thermal limits.
2. Exceeding Mechanical limits.
3. Material degradation.

I can drive speakers with a 100% clipped square wave signal all day long with no problems as long as the thermal and mechanical limits of the speaker are not exceeded.

I can feed a speaker 100% distortion all day long with no damage as long as the thermal and mechanical limits of the speaker are not exceeded.

I can exceed the thermal and/or mechanical limits of a speaker and watch it fail in short order.

These are electrical and physical truths and anything else is a myth. PERIOD.

GOD has spoken!!!!

Answer 3

There will be no problem running an 800wrms sub with a 300 watt amp. It just won't get as loud as if the person were using an 800, 1000, or 1200 watt amp. (double the wattage, or driver count to add 3 db). Also, the amp will not really have any headroom.

The reason people say it's moe dangerous to underpower a sub than to overpower it is because most people want screaming loud bass, so they turn on crap like bass boost, crank the amp gains all the way up, and then turn their cd player up to full. This causes the amp to clip and in turn, can easily cause the sub to blow with enough time.

The thing with overpowering is that when you do, you have to turn the gains down, so it's not like you're actually sending the sub 1000 watts. In doing so, however, you leave the amp plenty of headroom for dynamic peaks and transients that can use large amounts of power for short periods. (I know people can say that regular amps do this also with their "max" output, but it's not the same.)

So anyway, bottom line is that there's no problem underpowering an sub as long as you're realistic and know that you're not going to win any SPL competitions with it. Keep the volume at a moderate level and you'll be fine. I'm not a basshead personally, but I've "underpowered" by subs for years and with regular music at regular volumes, I've never had a problem with it.

...and is your amp is dissipating 700/800 watts off as heat, then you have a really crappy, inefficient amp.

Answer 4

i dont think that any 6x9 would be louder then a 12w7. but if he has, oh lets just say a sony 800 watt sub, and his 6x9's hit harder, i can almost see the. especially if he had like pioneer rev series 6x9's. those thigs can really hit, for a 6x9. thats about the only way i can see that happening. that and the sony is in a box 2x bigger then its suppose to be in. so i guess its possible, but not very likely.

Answer 5

you're overlooking some thing: each and each Kenwood sub is 4 ohms, so in case you have 2 of them, connecting them to the amp in parallel will consequence in a 2-ohm load. you're able to desire to look at the two-ohm skill rankings of the amplifiers, not the 4-ohm rankings. you're able to have a lots greater ordinary time finding a mono amp rated for 800 watts at 2 ohms than 800 watts at 4 ohms.

Answer 6

300w Amp

Answer 7

under powering a sub is just as bad as over powering a sub and all car audio techs know this. period. oh yeah, you cry a lot to. quit your bitchin and just help these people with thier car audio questions.