Stereo Help

[ckdollar]

I recently bought a new boat with a tower and want to put some speakers up there. I don't have 3k to drop on some wetsounds so I decided to go with some Kicker KMT6's from a suggestion on here.

I had a few amps already in the boat:
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-SNz25Ax9SmI/p_500MRPT220/Alpine-MRP-T220.html
http://www.retrevo.com/s/Bazooka-EL260-Car-Amplifiers-review-manual/id/7857ci852/t/1-2/

An Alpine MRP T220 and a Bazooka EL260. I know nothing about them other than they are older car amps and I don't think they are too pricey. There is also a Bazooka 8'' sub in there that sits in a big ass blue tube. I haven't pulled it out to see what it is exactly.

Anyway will those amps push the KMT6's or will I need to upgrade?

[Wakeboarder3780]

Step A) Figure out what the resistance in Ohms the speakers are, I didn't see them listed. The speakers say they can handle 150 watts RMS which is a decent amount for speaker cans.

Aside: Lets assume the speakers run at 8 ohms.

Step B) Figure out what your amps put out at 8 ohms and verify its less than 150watts RMS (we don't care about watts unless its RMS, RMS is *all that matters*).

Step C) Hook up speakers.


If you want more help track down the following information and I can link you to better products. The amps you have listed will likely not have as much power as you'd like but they'll of course *work*:

Impedance(resistance) of said speakers in ohms.

How many channels each of the above amps are and if they are bridgeable yes or no.

How many watts does each amp put out per channel at 8ohms?
How many watts does each amp put out bridged (one effective channel) at 8 ohms?

Get me that info and I'll tell you whats up.

[ckdollar]

haha so much information I have noooo idea about! I will try to piece some of that together.

what would you recommend as far as a new/better/cost effective amp goes?

[jjaszkow]

ckdollar, I think I can help piece some of that information together.
The KMT6 has a 4 ohm impedance, and is rated for 25 to 150 watts RMS power.

The MRP-T220 produces 50watts per channel RMS at 4 ohms.
The EL-260 produces 70watts per channel RMS at 4 ohms.

Either amp would drive those speakers. I don't know anything about the Bazooka amp other than the specifications that I stated above, so I can't comment on which one is the better amp (other than the speakers would be slightly louder due to the increased power).

If you want to drive those speakers to their full potential, I would reccomend looking for a quality amp that produces 150watts per channel RMS at 4 ohms. This is an example of one such amp (though there are certainly plenty of others out there that will do the job).

http://signature.crutchfield.com/s_500PDX2150/Alpine-PDX-2-150.html?showAll=N&tp=35757

[Wakeboarder3780]

if what jjaszkow posted is correct information, I pretty much agree with him. If you're looking for a cheap setup just to get them running then use what you've got. Of course if you want something ideal, you'll want a more powerful amp.

I don't necessarily agree with the amp proposed by jjaszkow, however, because it's a class D. While a class D amp is definitely more efficient, it's usually used for subs because the downside of class D is that they don't represent high frequencies very well due to the "on/off" nature of the amp.

I personally would go with a class A or AB amp if you're going for sound quality as I think the efficiency thing won't bother most people. (If you plan on sitting around a while without turning on the boat, just run two batteries).

If the efficiency thing bugs you go with class D, but I make it a point never to drive components or any speakers that need to spit out highs with a class D.

My $.02

[Wakeboarder3780]

My personal recommendation on an amp would be the JL Audio 300 slash 2 (300/2 or 300-2 when search online). It's a class A/B amp and delivers good power. I'm personally a fan of MTX, JL Audio, and alpine is decent too. Go with the big names if you want to do a "great job". Go with what you've got if you don't want to spend anything extra. Would you notice the difference? Sure if you heard them side by side.

The other thing to note is I think both of your amps are 2 channel. I also think you're only running 2 speakers right? If both of those amps are bridgeable at 4 ohms you will likely be pushing double the power at half the channels thus:

The MRP-T220 produces 50watts per channel (for 2 channels) RMS at 4 ohms.
The EL-260 produces 70watts per channel (for 2 channels) RMS at 4 ohms.

Would become:
The MRP-T220 produces 50watts per channel (for 1 channel) RMS at 4 ohms.
The EL-260 produces 70watts per channel (for 1 channel) RMS at 4 ohms.

Thus each amp would drive one speaker box. For the differing powers if there are gain(think of it as power) modifiers on the stronger amp you can just turn the gain down EQUALLY FOR BOTH CHANNELS until they sound about the same "loudness".

Hope this helps. If you want more info just ask. I can help you wire up your system if you feed me accurate info.

[jjaszkow]

Wakeboarder3780, great suggestion on using each individual amp to drive the individual channels. The Alpine is rated to produce 140 watts RMS bridged, and the Bazooka is rated to produce 190 watts RMS, so they would be able to drive the speakers well in that configuration (assuming that the gains are balanced properly).

Neither amp should have the gain set to maximum. I would reccomend setting the gain properly on the smaller amp first, and then introduce the larger amp and match the output to the smaller amp.

Regarding the Class A and Class A/B versus class D, I agree with this for MOST class D amps, especially the lower end class D amps. There have been some improvments in the past few years to address some of the issues with class D amps (such as switching speed) that have greatly improved sound quality. The Alpine PDX amp uses some of this technology (B&O ICEPower). The quality of that particular amp is better than your typical class D amp, but I agree that a high end A or A/B amplifier would be a better choice for sound Q.

I generally put a bit more focus on efficiency for Marine audio applications, hence my reccomendation for ckdollar's use. Another option would be to consider a class H amp, however those generally run a bit more money. Arc Audio and Wetsounds both put out a quality class H product.

[Bambamski]

I know nothing about stereo's

this is why I hire someone to install the stereo and make sure it works.

My new system is going to look like this.
Bought a new deck. It's the Kenwood 700u marine deck. It's like of cool as it as the flip down face, but instead of a cd player it has to plug in cords for ipods to plug into. You just plug the Ipod in and place the ipod inside the deck. The menu on the the deck will be able to scoll though all of the menus of the ipod and select all my playlists. I also bought the matching remote for the drivers console which has a large display screen so I can also scroll through the playlists just like I'm using my ipod touch.

I'm leaving the current Amps in place and adding a couple of new ones. I have a 200 watt kicker mono amp for my sub. I had a 350 watt kicker four channel amp for my four speakers in the boat.

I bought a wetsounds Threesome set up with the WS 420 eq. With the Eq I can fade the speakers to how I want them as well as use the Mic to talk to the rider through the tower speakers. Should be very cool.

For the amp, I was thinking either the SYN 6 amp from wet sounds or getting a couple of different amps to power the threesome. My stereo guy suggested I get two Alpine amps, I believe they'll both be 4 channel 150 watt per channel amps to power the tower speakers.

That's going to be my set up. I only have one batter at the momement so I'm probably going to have a second battery wired into the system and I'll go down to Costco today and get a couple of blue tops.

[mala1967]

I also just got the KMT6's. I also have a set of DIY cans that came with my tower. I got the Pyle PLMR440. It is 4 channel and will more than power all 4 cans. The best part is it was only $140.00.

# Maximum Power 1200 Watts
# RMS Power 150 Watts x 4 @ 4 Ohms
# Power & Protection LED
# Line & Speaker Level Inputs
# Bridgeable Trimode Operation
# Variable Gain Controls
# Variable Low Pass Crossovers Fixed High Pass Crossovers
# 0-+18dB Variable Bass Boost
# Input Voltage Sensitivity Selectors
# PCB with Conformal Coating
# Waterproof Hardwired Input/Output & Speaker Cables
# Balanced Microphone Input
# Remote Subwoofer Control
# Signal-to-noise Ratio: better than 102 dB