2 way speaker impedance

Thread Starter

PaPiャSly

Joined Dec 25, 2022
47
I dont really understand impedence but when i checked my 2 way speaker specs,
It showed that it has 4 ohm 6in woofer and a 8 ohm 2in tweeter and when i checked the wirings it was a parallel setup which if im correct means the impedence would be somewhere in the range of 2+ ohms.
Now my concern is my amplifier is only rated for 4-8 ohms speakers and i might be damaging it even of there's no sound quality distortion at max vol
 

MisterBill2

Joined Jan 23, 2018
18,176
The answer is not as simple as resistors in parallel. The two speakers are not in parallel, they are separated by the crossover circuits. The inputs to the crossover networks are in parallel, which is rather different. Each crossover network is designed to pass a band of frequencies thru to the speaker it is for, and to present a higher impedance to other frequency bands. So for any particular frequency, each speaker is in series with a effective resistance that is frequency dependent. And the intention is that the frequency ranges of the crossover outputs do not overlap.
In addition to that relationship, the effective resistance of the crossover circuit is never zero.
So the actual impedance seen by the amplifier is much more complex, and a bit greater, than the two ohms that simple resistor math implies.
Your speaker specifications should also give the system input impedance , which is probably 8 ohms. THAT is what your amplifier is seeing, if the crossovers are of a reasonable quality manufacture.
 

Thread Starter

PaPiャSly

Joined Dec 25, 2022
47
The answer is not as simple as resistors in parallel. The two speakers are not in parallel, they are separated by the crossover circuits. The inputs to the crossover networks are in parallel, which is rather different. Each crossover network is designed to pass a band of frequencies thru to the speaker it is for, and to present a higher impedance to other frequency bands. So for any particular frequency, each speaker is in series with a effective resistance that is frequency dependent. And the intention is that the frequency ranges of the crossover outputs do not overlap.
In addition to that relationship, the effective resistance of the crossover circuit is never zero.
So the actual impedance seen by the amplifier is much more complex, and a bit greater, than the two ohms that simple resistor math implies.
Your speaker specifications should also give the system input impedance , which is probably 8 ohms. THAT is what your amplifier is seeing, if the crossovers are of a reasonable quality manufacture.
Thanks a lot for this reply
 

Audioguru again

Joined Oct 21, 2019
6,674
A full-range speaker can play many instruments at the same time and still have its single-frequency impedance because the frequency waveforms add together, they do not multiply.
Then with a crossover, the amplifier does not know if there is a single speaker or a woofer, midrange and tweeter.

With a crossover and a woofer, midrange and tweeter on a 60W amplifier, one of the speakers can draw 60W but if all three are playing 20W each then the amplifier will produce clipping if the total power exceeds 60W.
That is why some audio systems use a separate amplifier and filters for each speaker band.
 
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