What's the closest I can get to a 4 ohm load using 3 single coil, 6 ohm drivers?

[The Paulinator]

Anybody have a good wiring scheme for that?

[getafix]

how about 2 speakers in series then they are parallel to the remaining speaker

[Cloth Ears]

Hey The Paulinator,

I did a little bit of playing around with various ways of wiring up some cheap drivers I picked up (from Dick Smith, I think).

getafix gave you the wiring to get a 4ohm load: 2 drivers in series wired in parallel with one driver gives a 4ohm load.

What I found is that when I was driving these 3 drivers (or in my case 6 - I had 2 sets of 3 wired in parallel for an 8ohm load) was that the 'single' driver was working twice as hard as the 2 drivers in series. This was only an observation - not measured - but it was fairly easy to hear that one was louder and the 'finger on the cone' test showed more excursion.

I just figured that with half the resistance of the series pair that more current was flowing. Anyone know if this is so? Or was I imagining it?

[Cloth Ears]

Woops - make that "I had 2 sets of 3 wired in series for an 8ohm load"...

[sreten]

Originally posted by Cloth Ears
Hey The Paulinator,

I did a little bit of playing around with various ways of wiring up some cheap drivers I picked up (from Dick Smith, I think).

getafix gave you the wiring to get a 4ohm load: 2 drivers in series wired in parallel with one driver gives a 4ohm load.

What I found is that when I was driving these 3 drivers (or in my case 6 - I had 2 sets of 3 wired in parallel for an 8ohm load) was that the 'single' driver was working twice as hard as the 2 drivers in series. This was only an observation - not measured - but it was fairly easy to hear that one was louder and the 'finger on the cone' test showed more excursion.

I just figured that with half the resistance of the series pair that more current was flowing. Anyone know if this is so? Or was I imagining it?

Ermm.................

Not quite, the single driver is working 4 times
as hard as each driver that is wired in series.

For a set of six 6 ohm drivers, 6-6||6-6||6-6,
three sets of two series in parallel for 4 ohms.

For three 6 ohm drivers the best choice is adding
another driver and wiring series / parallel 6ohms,
or just use two for 3ohms.

sreten.

[azira]

Originally posted by sreten

For three 6 ohm drivers the best choice is adding
another driver and wiring series / parallel 6ohms,
or just use two for 3ohms.

sreten.

Or a favorite sreten style answer.....

Wire 2 in parallel for 3-ohms and use the 3rd for a .33 so you can correct for some BS.

[sreten]

Originally posted by azira

Or a favorite sreten style answer.....
Wire 2 in parallel for 3-ohms and use the 3rd for a .33 so you can correct for some BS.

Yes, but that will give you 2 ohms in the bass, 3 ohm midrange.

The two parallel 6 ohms could be wired as a 0.5 way for BSC.
This would be 3 ohm in the bass, 6 ohm in the midrange.
For three drivers :
The same can be achieved by using two drivers for bass and crossing
over to the other driver for midrange at ~ the baffle step frequency.

The 0.33 way would give 3.5 dB of BSC and be presumably MTMM.

sreten.

[The Paulinator]

Actually, I have access to 6 of these, so I might do that instead. Although I hope my 120 watt RMS sub amp will handle all of those OK.

[The Paulinator]

Actually, will the average sub plate amp handle a 3 ohm load at all?

[markp]

Originally posted by The Paulinator
Actually, will the average sub plate amp handle a 3 ohm load at all?

A halfway decent one will handle 3 ohms.