Questionhello i was just wondering wht size amp i would need because i purchased 4 12" kicker subs with 800watt peak and 400 watt RMS per sub so that is 1600 watt RMS total and 3200 watt peak total what size and type of amp would be needed probably something:
A)4 channel amp with 400 watt X4 output ?? i have no idea what to get or where i would find it and i am on a fixed budget so can you just lead me in the right direction?
AnswerSpeaker power ratings are pretty much from the fiction department. The marketing and advertising people find, through market research, that published power figures are one of the things that consumers relate to and use as a purchasing guide. However, the standards for measuring power are very nebulous and most companies have their own rating methods rather than us a published standard. So, we find that ratings are not very realistic or meaningful in the scientific sense. They might give you a general idea but not an engineering idea.
Further, the actual bass acoustic power output is greatly, I mean greatly, a function of the enclosure it is mounted in.
(A side note, even though the majority of manufacturers marketing department know better, they use the term RMS power. There is no such term; it is technically incorrect and has no scientific meaning. What they really mean is continuous average power. Peak power ratings are also quite meaningless without an explanation of how they conducted their test.)
Next comes the fallacy of power amps. Most non-technical people would say if the power is doubled it will sound twice as loud. This is not so. In fact, doubling the power, say from 500w to 1000w will increase the sound pressure level by 3db. In test after test and listening panels we find that it takes about 2 to 3 db for most humans to recognize a change in level. And when asked to motion when it has doubled in subjective loudness most humans will settle on around 9db to 10db. Therefore, to double the sound pressure or loudness you must essentially get 10db more power. It takes 10 times the power to do that. So, if I have a 500w amp and want to double the sound pressure it will take 5,000w to do it!@#@@!...
So, don't get so excited about goosing the subs with so much electrical power. You won't hear much difference between a 1000 and 2000 watts. Better to spend the same amount of money on a really good amp than one with less quality and more power - if you follow what I mean.
In fact, for bass amps you will probably get better, more solid and gut throbbing bass by spending a little less on the amp and add a power capacitor to each amp that you intend on installing. The power caps will strengthen the bass performance nicely and take a load off the battery and alternator - or at least smooth it out. A good power cap will run around $100 to $150.
If you run really heavy duty, big power amps you may need more battery power anyway - and high output alternator in the car. So, think about that also. Amps putting out 1600w, for example, will need to draw at least 140 amps of the car electrical system - no small chore! (Interestingly, the super power show cars nearly always demo their cars with 110v power supplies running off a nearby power outlet box. Otherwise the car battery would be dead in minutes without running the engine continuously to keep the charge up!)
Maybe these ideas will give you something to make your plans more concrete and end up with a really exciting system.
The kickers are pretty good subs. Make sure you get the impedances properly matched to the amps you finally select.
Best wishes,
c
