isn't it bad for the sub and the amp if you underpower it?

 

Oh no, it's that dreaded question that seems to be argued on alot of the forums I go to. Some say it's bad, other's don't. My personal experience, it's not bad for the subs, it just dosn't push what it's meant to push. I guess it's bad because you spent all that money on a JL and only feed it half of what it wants, and it pushes only half what it can do. But some argue that their subs blew up because it was underpowered. I never had that problem though. And I had these subs for almost 10 years.

As far as me underpowering my subs, I honestly don't know what wattage is going though it. Whenever I go to a shop to ask, they're more in the salesman mode and trying to sell me ____ I don't want and they're not going to help me cause I didn't install it there, and more then likely I won't buy anything, so they lose time on me for nothing. I try different boards, but get many different answers. I get everything from 100 Watts RMS, to the full 300 Watts RMS.

Oh, and BTW, to answer your question on which is the best bang for the buck. My opinion is either the W3 or W6, more towards the W6. W3s would be good, but for myself, I would be constantly thinking upgrade knowing JL makes 2 types of subs higher the the W3s. W7s, while great is expensive, and the W1s is good if you don't want to spend a lot of money.

 

about the "underpowering" issue, technically, a 500x1@4ohm amp will only be pushing the 500 watts if the input voltage from the RCA's matches the gain voltage on the amp.... when you turn the HU volume down, the RCA voltage drops meaning the amp pushes out less watts.... so if underpowering your speakers would blow them, then turning the volume down would blow them, and we all know that's not true....

generally, people try to compensate for lack of power by turning up the gain on the amp, that's when the signal going to the subs is clipped (a square wave instead of a curved wave)... trying to push a square wave instead of a nice curved wave causes the sub to attempt to go from one spot (say xmax outward) directly to another spot (say xmax inward) without hitting any points in between like it should... this will cause subs to blow...

 

ahhh alright..i have a better idea of what's going on now. so pretty much nothing overpowering and nothing too underpowering then? sweet.

oh yeah and is mixing components bad?
example: jl sub w/ audiobahn amp?

 

as long as your impedance/power matches you should be fine...

 

oh. cuz i notice a lot of people go with same brand for everything. jl subs and amps. dunno why tho. so can someone tell me about the different fuses they use on their amps? and the different gauges of wires for their setup?

 

for power questions

http://mobile.jlaudio.com/products_s...php?page_id=35

 

is it just me or are the numbers and letters on the graph hard to read?!?

 

IMO it does look cleaner if the amps and subs match, but that doesn't neccesarily mean they are the best amps or the best subs to use for your application...

That's why they make components, This gives you the ability to pick and choose what is the best setup for your budget/sound.

I have 0 guage running to the rear in my car. For most applications it's over kill, The way I see it is this, If the amps can take 4 guage power/ground inputs run a step up as a power wire from the battery... in my case it's a 0/2 guage

I also see this as less money needed for labor to upgrade power wire later on...
If you even have the remote idea of putting in some heavy duty stuff in later on, save your self some time and aggravation by doing this step now.

general rule of thumb is 10 amps for every 100 watts...
and get the biggest size speaker wire you can fit, both in the car and at the speaker...

good luck