On Sat, 3 Jan 2004 06:37:04 -0500, "Arny Krueger"
wrote:

"Scott Gardner" wrote in message

In the car stereo world, most aftermarket amps are 2-ohm stable into
stereo loads, even the inexpensive ones. This has been the case for
the last decade, at least. However, the standard for aftermarket car
stereo speakers is still four ohms. I'm talking about component sets
and coaxials, not subwoofers.

I would think that a speaker company could make a bundle offering a
line of 2-ohm component sets and coaxials. As a consumer with an
aftermarket amp, you could double your power by replacing your 4-ohm
speakers with 2-ohm speakers. Or, if you were building a system from
scratch, you could use a smaller amp to get the same power by going
with the lower-impedance speakers.

From an engineering standpoint, would 2-ohm speakers be any harder to
design or more expensive to build? Are there any other technical
drawbacks to designing a 2-ohm speaker?

There are no serious problems with making 2-ohm speakers, it's done all the
time, particularly for OEM car audio. Due to cost and EMI concerns,
automotive OEMs seriously want to avoid switchmode power supplies. So OEM
systems strongly tend to run off of battery power leaving low-impedance
speakers as an attractive way to build a high-powered system.

The problem is building the power amps to drive the 2-ohm speakers. It too
can be done, but it's not as cost-effective at the modest power levels used
in the mainstream. Then, there's always the problem with trying to change
the customary way of doing things in the mainstream.


But that's my point. Virtually all aftermarket car audio amplifiers
ARE designed to be stable into 2-ohm stereo loads, and have been for
quite a while now. The manufacturers did this originally to give the
consumer the option of bridging the amp into a 4-ohm mono load to
drive a subwoofer. Now, there are more and more monoblocks for
driving subwoofers in cars, so a higher percentage of two-channel amps
are now being used in stereo mode rather than being bridged.

Now we have a situation where the standard car audio amp is 2-ohm
capable for stereo loads, but the standard aftermarket speaker is
still 4 ohms. If it's not any harder for the aftermarket to make
2-ohm speakers, I think there are some significant benefits to using
them.

Scott Gardner