what does a crossover do?

Question

i was just wondering if i need one. in my car i have 2 4"x6" and 2 3.5" jbl speakers wired into my cars system, but i also have 2 mutant 6"x9"s and 2 mutant 5" the mutant stuff is powerd my a mutant 300 watt amp. i also have another mutant amp, a MTPK12-A that is just sitting in my living room till my 15" mutant xxx sub turns up. would i need a crossover for my 6"x9"s and my 5" speakers?

Answer 1

A crossover allows a certain range of frequencies to pass to a speaker or set of speakers. For mids and highs you'd want to block bass to reduce distortion. Likewise when you get your sub, you'll want to have the LPF (low pass filter) on the amp turned on and set just below the highest frequency of the sub.

For instance if the sub is 20-200Hz, then the LPF would be set around 170Hz.

Check the other speakers frequency response to determine what crossover settings you'd need. From there it's all a matter of taste of what sounds good to you.

Answer 2

Think of a crossover as a filter that removes certain frequency ranges from the audio signal. A high-pass crossover filters out bass; a low-pass crossover filters out high frequencies. (low-pass = low frequencies pass). A crossover might be useful to remove low frequencies that your smaller speakers can't handle; your 4x6, 3.5" and 5" speakers aren't able to handle a lot of bass, so removing the bass will make them sound better and protect them from damage.

Crossover information: http://www.bcae1.com/xovrslop.htm

Answer 3

for me a separte crossover clears out the speakers especially the inside speakers. for me i have a amp for bass a amp for the inside speakers. the crossover sends bass to the bass amp and highs to the inside amp. the built in crossover don't do much you can barley tell a difference. the best ones i use are clarion 3way and kicker 3way. Good luck