amps for alpine type r

[Lexstang]

I am just bench racing kindof. I am planning things I want to do to my car and a system is one. I plan on 2 12" alpine type r's. They are 500w rms 1500 max. I think 4 ohm. I am trying to decide on an appropriate amp that has enough power but wont be the most expensive thing in my car. The whole ohm thing is what I don't understand when looking at specs since some speakers like jl's are available in differerent levels. Can anyone straighten me out without wasting a bunch of their time?

[cstreu1026]

The ohms are the resistance of the speakers. In the good old days you could by high end high current amps that put out more and more power as the Ohms dropped. Of course the also produced a lot of head and a 50 watt amp loaded down was enough to turn headlights into strobe lights. Anyway if you wire them in parrallel you will get a 2 ohm mono load which a lot of amps will fry with. a 2ohm mono load is the same as a 4 ohm stereo load (don't ask me how that all works). You will want to either run the subs in stereo )1 on each channel of a 2 channel amp) or wire them in parallel for a 2 ohm mono load. If you go with the latter you will likely have to buy a higher end amp. My suggestion would be to look at JL Audio's A series amps. They are lower priced than their slash series but still perform very well. If you want to spent a little more money their Slash series is very cool and you will get constant output despite the load or the voltage going into it. Oh yeah I forgot to mention that lower priced amps may not perform as advertised if you can't ensure that they are getting 14.5 volts since thats what voltage usually used for power ratings. More power in means more power out but not all charging systems can supply a constant 14.5V when the car is running and other accessories are in use.

[mach_u]

I had two MTX 500 Watt's running my 2 12" Alpine Type-R's. They sounded ridiculously loud! Believe me - they went all the way up to 11... :lol:

[PaulFiveOh]

My best friend possibly has the best system around....

It is to Alpine Type X's (only slightly better than a type r) on two MRV mono blocks 900w @ 2ohm and since the Type X's and R's are DVC, you can bridge them down to 1ohm essentially outputting 1800Watts to each sub or around 3600 Watts total.

Lets put it this way: He had to have a lexan back window put in.

[Lexstang]

I've looked at the jl and alpine amps. Would 2 subs sound better in stereo than in mono?
Would I be better off trying to find one amp to power both or 2 separate amps for each speaker? I would prefer to stick with alpine amps too but very few are exactly 500 or 1000 w rms. Wheres a $800 amp thats 1000w@4ohms only 1channel. So wouldn't that be like 1800@2ohms and be overpowering? I definatelt don't want to spend twice what the subs cost for the amp/s.

[Lexstang]

would I need one or two 500/1 jls?

[cstreu1026]

One 500/1 would more than put a smile on your face. Most bass is recorded in mono which is why most sub amps are mono amps.