Speaker wiring

Willy6

AK Subscriber
Subscriber
Like most two channel amplifiers my amp can play two sets of speakers if I turn the selector knob to A&B.My question is will it hurt anything if I wire a third speaker with the positive lead connected to the positive side of one speaker and the negative lead connected to the negative side of the other speaker? I've already done it and it sounds great and my amp doesn't heat up or anything...
 
So you're running three speakers on each side (Left & Right)? I think it will all come down to resistance. If the three speakers on each side are still within the acceptable load range for your amplifier it should be good. However, if the math isn't quite right you might have a low volume playground that turns into output driver death at higher volume (higher load).

I'm leery of it, but don't see why it couldn't be done with the above provisos. But I've always been a bit weak on resistance math, so I usually just stick with the standard set up.
This little tutorial seems very informative, though. http://cie-wc.edu/Series_Parallel_9_14.pdf
 
Like most two channel amplifiers my amp can play two sets of speakers if I turn the selector knob to A&B.My question is will it hurt anything if I wire a third speaker with the positive lead connected to the positive side of one speaker and the negative lead connected to the negative side of the other speaker? I've already done it and it sounds great and my amp doesn't heat up or anything...
That's the thing, sometimes they blow up immediately and sometimes they blow up after a while. In your case it didn't blow up immediately. :rolleyes:
 
So you're running three speakers on each side (Left & Right)? I think it will all come down to resistance. If the three speakers on each side are still within the acceptable load range for your amplifier it should be good. However, if the math isn't quite right you might have a low volume playground that turns into output driver death at higher volume (higher load).

I'm leery of it, but don't see why it couldn't be done with the above provisos. But I've always been a bit weak on resistance math, so I usually just stick with the standard set up.
This little tutorial seems very informative, though. http://cie-wc.edu/Series_Parallel_9_14.pdf
I guess if the A&B speakers are bridged then it's no different then wired parallel..
 
I guess if the A&B speakers are bridged then it's no different then wired parallel..

Umm... Perhaps I'm not understanding your setup. The way I read your OP, you have four speakers hooked up as standard, then ran an additional wire from the positive post of one speaker and the negative post of another speaker to a third. I think that is kind of a modified Series/Parallel wiring. There's an example of that in the link.

I don't know about your particular amp, but most of mine that have four speaker hook-ups are actually just a left and right that split before the back panel. Therefore, in such case, hooking them up in true series/parrallel from only one output each side might make it easier to calculate what you're actually accomplishing in terms of resistance and wattage.
 
Umm... Perhaps I'm not understanding your setup. The way I read your OP, you have four speakers hooked up as standard, then ran an additional wire from the positive post of one speaker and the negative post of another speaker to a third. I think that is kind of a modified Series/Parallel wiring. There's an example of that in the link.

I don't know about your particular amp, but most of mine that have four speaker hook-ups are actually just a left and right that split before the back panel. Therefore, in such case, hooking them up in true series/parrallel from only one output each side might make it easier to calculate what you're actually accomplishing in terms of resistance and wattage.
Ok just picture one side with two speakers one to sp A and one to spB then add a 3rd speaker with its positive to sp A's positive and it's negative to speaker b's negative
 
20170919_213143.jpg Here's a pic.. top speaker positive wire go's to bottom left speaker positive then top speakers neg go's to bottom right speaker negative..
 
Wait... what?....

I have to go back and re-read this one.

I don't understand how the 3rd speaker is working.. I'm probably over thinking it..

What you should do is meetwr the resistance of each speaker combo, just make sure you don't go below the resistance stated on the amp..
 
You are powering 2 channels, and also trying to "bridge amp" a third speaker across already implemented circuits. Basically you are creating a wierd mono speker short circuit something.

Do not do that. It will not only sound terrible, it will kill your amp sooner than later.

Just because you can plug something in doesn't mean its a good idea. A frend had something like this going on, one channel died so he simply hooked up all 5 speakers / sattelite mix to one channel, random.

Worked great - for a week.
 
What's being done here is connecting the third speakers in parallel. The amp's A and B connections are usually a parallel arrangement internally. So 2 pairs of 8 ohm speakers would present a 4 ohm load to the amp if played at the same time. Adding this third speaker would further reduce the impedance to under 4 ohms. If any of those speakers are, say, 4 ohms already, then the amp would see less than 4 ohms before adding in the third speaker. You're putting quite a load on the amp. Less impedance is harder to drive, and that amp is pretty old.

As long as you keep it to moderate levels, and the amp doesn't heat up, it should be okay. Klipsch tend to be really sensitive to begin with, which would help. Personally I don't see the point in doing this, however. It will mess with the sound staging/imaging. I've played 2 sets of speakers at once in my set up and it doesn't sound as good as a single pair. A third pair would further muddy the imaging.
 
I can't see the value in connecting that other speaker, 2+2 should be ok, or keeping it simple with one speaker per channel will/should sound a lot better IMO.
 
Am I reading this correctly? This is your current setup signal path / connection diagram as I understand it?

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