I have a12" rockford phosgate sub in my truck powered by a 400watt amp?

Question

i have my amp bridged so i it gets more power, however my sub distorts a little at reasonable volumes and phosgate is a pretty good name. i feel like it should be hitting a bit harder and not distorting at all. if i purchased a 1000watt amp, would it solve the problem? or will it make no difference?

Answer 1

If the sub is distorting at high volumes, a new amp won't really fix it. Setting the gains properly, however, will.

The right way to set gains.

Find the Bridged RMS power of your amplifier.

Do the math to calculate the target voltage you need in order to adjust properly with your DMM.

square root(wattage * speaker load) = voltage

Example: For 200 watts rms at 4 ohms. 200 X 4= 800 and the square root of 800 is 28.28. That would be your target voltage if you were running 200 watts rms at 4 ohms.

Play a 60 Hz or 50 Hz 0dB sine wave, and turn your HU up to just below clipping, which should be about 3/4 - 7/8 of the way up. Set your DMM to Volts AC, and measure across the amplifier's speaker output terminals while the speakers are disconnected. Turn to gain up until you get to your calculated Volts AC.

You can get your test tones here: http://www.soundbuggy.com/Eric/Test%20To...

Ensure that you burn them to a standard CD, not MP3 disc.

Answer 2

Set your gains right and you will be fine.