Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Audio MECP Installer cert

So overloading a speaker is bad right, frenquency adjustmant has nothing to do with it or does it. I wasn't sure about this. Or would you say there is an allowable overload that speakers can handle. Is this why some speakers have a max power and rms rateing. To compinsate for the orer voltage conditions that may occur from amp output.

In this case some solutions(correct me if I'm wrong) for an over voltage issue would be choose a lower wattage amp or matched rms wattage amp w/same ohm level, switch speaker connection to series vs. parellal, use the correct size speaker wire awg, or install a passive crossover like what you said.

Speakers have thermal limits and phyical limits. The thermal portion deals with the voice coil. While the suspension (spider and surround) manage the physical portion. If you have 42V on a 4 ohm @ 1k on a sub, you will smoke the voice coil, but the suspension will never flex. If you have that same load at 20hz the suspension will break first.

You see by the speaker moving in and out, it cools itself. So it has to work within cerain frequencies. So the over load would need to be considered based on the frequency being played since the speaker's impedance changes with frequency too. The power rating listed is normally just a point of reference. Some are modest in rating others are a bit optimistic.

If you were over powering, you could turn down your amps level so that the system was better matched with other components. If the amp is bridged, run the speakers in stereo (cuts the power to them) Or I suppose you could Series them if you did have them in parallel, again this is just limiting the amp's output. The passive crossover is most often used for component sets.