Any car audio peoples in here? OT

[Young Ed]

I just bought a new stereo for the dakota. Its an Alpine CDA-105. Anyway current setup is a pioneer deck with a 2 channel amp powering all 4 speakers. This amp was my first experience with one and I should have bought a 4 channel. So for the past few years its been hooked up with 1 channel for the fronts and 1 for the rears. Now with the new stereo install I'm thinking its probably much better to let the amp power the 6x9s in the back and let the deck power the fronts. Of course the best would be to just upgrade to a 4channel but I don't want to afford that right now. Good idea to put 2 on the amp and 2 on the deck??

[michael.warshaw]

im into stereo , but dont know how to help you sorry .

[P-12 Tommy]

Yeah Ed! I did that with my '66 Charger I had. Hooked a 300 watt amp for the 6x9's in the back and run the fronts from the deck. Sounded great! Worked for me.

Tom

[Young Ed]

Good to know. Now I just gotta remember how I did this wiring the last time so I can redo it easily

[dparksie]

As a rule of thumb always push the most to the farthest away set. Besides having too much vibration in the front, if they are traditional dash mounts, is not recommended. It gives a nasty secondary sound. Never have figured why but it does. Also set your rear 6x9s with 1/4" shims. It helps direct the sound to your ears not the back window.

[Young Ed]

This is all in a 94 dakota reg cab. The fronts are in the doors pointed at my ankles. The 6x9s are behind the seat in boxes made ala me and point at the rears of the driver and passenger

[dparksie]

Oops. Sorry about wrong information. Question do your door speakers have woofers or subs? If not when you get a chance replace them with the same size speakers but ones with woofers. With the sound down low it is an ideal place for your bass sounds. Other than that sounds like you are on the right track.

My first truck I installed 4 6x9s acroos the rear head, standard cab, and a woofer and subwoofer in the doors running a 4 port 50's out of a Blau into a 400 amp booster with 12 track equalizer. Yeah I was much younger then.....

[Young Ed]

Its been a long time but I think the front ones might. They were referred to as I believe 2 way speakers and the rears are 4way. I always wanted to try and get a set of 6x9s into the door so all 4 matched

[Plymouthy Adams]

depends on the way the wattage was rated..is it peak power or RMS...and the rating also is dependent on the "impedence" they chose to rate the power...some companies actually will rate their output on as low as 2 ohms instead of the average 8 ohm and or 4 ohm speaker system..the lower the impedence the higher the rating in peak power..the rms, true measure really of the amps power to deliver continious output will more or not be closer to 1/3 that of the rated peak (using 8 ohm spkrs as the rule)..so say if the thing is 200 watt peak, at four speakers that will be 50 watt per channel...ie rated at 4 ohms...if you use the 8 ohm speakers you just dropped (halved due to twice the impedence) your power to 25 watts per channel but in reality if you are using RMS you are probably seeing no more than 8-15 true watts per channel on most car stereo unit with built in amplifier......so I hear...lol

Edited January 5, 2010 by Tim Adams

[Young Ed]

Tim 18w RMSx4 didnt see at what ohm

[Plymouthy Adams]

odd are that will be 4 ohms (specualation on my part), get your speakers arated at about 25 watts....if you go with 8 ohms the power is divided...the speakers wil require less pwoer rating...down to the 9 watts per channel whick is more in line for a built in amplifier for a car stereo

[Young Ed]

Ok I got out the manual and looked up the actual specs. You are right Tim. 18w per channel at 4ohm. The amp is 50w rms at 4ohm per channel. So if I have 2 speakers hooked to each channel does that split it to 25w rms per channel?

[BobT-47P15]

Ed, you oughta put a couple huge speaker boxes in the bed and add some 20 inch

rims with skinny tires......then drive around rattling everyone's windows. Might

require an even larger amp, however. The factory stereo that came in my 06

Caravan isn't too bad for what it is -- occasionally I crank it up and roll down the

windows on a warm day.

[Young Ed]

Like this Bob?

[dirty dan]

I received a boss 10" powered subwoofer (has a built in amp) for Christmas. I put in under the seat in my Ram 1500 quadcab. It's not for rattling the windows, but is does fill in the bass nicely and really gives the stereo a new full sound.

They're relatively inexpensive and I bet an 8" would fit nicely under the seat of that Dakota.

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=11968872&sourceid=1500000000000003142050&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=11968872

[P-12 Tommy]

Like this Bob?

I had a brand new '97 Dakota the same color(flame red)The factory stereo in it wasn't too bad.

[Young Ed]

The factory stereo was in mine for about 1day after I bought it from Dad. At first it was just a cd player change. The amp and speaker swap came later.

[Young Ed]

OK another idea. I can buy a second matching 2channel amp for $20 off ebay. Better yet?

[Young Ed]

Last update. Second amp was purchased and installed. New cd player with dual amps sounds awesome! At first it was so loud you could only turn it to 6 out of 35! Turned the gain down on both amps to almost the minimum and its crisp with some better control. I forgot to take a picture but imagine the second amp upside down where the cd changed is in the pic above. I'll have to try and snap a picture after work.

[P-12 Tommy]

Last update. Second amp was purchased and installed. New cd player with dual amps sounds awesome! At first it was so loud you could only turn it to 6 out of 35! Turned the gain down on both amps to almost the minimum and its crisp with some better control. I forgot to take a picture but imagine the second amp upside down where the cd changed is in the pic above. I'll have to try and snap a picture after work.

Boy I'd like to hear that!

[Young Ed]

I love it and the alpine radio is much nicer then the POS pioneer I had before. Funny the rest of the system is all pioneer and works great but that head unit was cheap.