Need help with wiring configuration for car amplifier

[wallyworld]

Hi, maybe there is a simple answer to this, maybe not... Anyways, what's the proper/best way for wiring two 5" speakers and one subwoofer to a 2 channel amplifier? Pic is attached. Is this the right method?

[BobA]

Looking at the manual for the amp it is meant to be run stereo or mono but not a combination of both.  When you bridge the amp for a mono output I do not think you can still get the stereo.  Just my opinion after a quick look at the manual and wiring diagrams.

BobA

[wallyworld]

Thanks for the help and input, Bob.  I was afraid of something like that being the case.  With my limited knowledge, I've tried to do a little research, and I guess there is something called a "tri-mode crossover" that you can use for a setup like this.  Perhaps that is a solution?  Or does the amplifier have to be compatible with that somehow?

I've put in an email to Fusion Car Audio, but they haven't gotten back to me, and their attention to emails seems to have really dropped recently.

[thajenius]

This would depend mostly on the Amplifiers design. Some amps will only do two channel (no mono bridge) some will do only one or the other, and some will do both simultaniously. Your best bet is to read the manual, or if your brave, just try it out. Your main concern is going to be the overal impedence in the amp. There are crossovers that would channel bass to subs and mid/highs to the woofers and tweeters. For the cost of the crossover, you may as well just buy an additional amp for the drivers and use your amp for the  Sub. I bought a decent 2 channel (100watts RMS/chan @ 4ohm) amp from buy.com for $30 shipped and works great in one of my jukebox projects.

[Chris]

I'm kind of in a similar boat... I have the amp and subwoofer from a cheap CA speaker set in my cab; the speakers themselves were replaced with 100 watt 4 ohm car speakers.  I have a Radio Shack 40W (20w/channel) amp that I wanted to add to the system, but I can't quite figure out how to do it.  Of course I can hardly hear the sub in it anyway... maybe I should just change it to a 2-channel system.

[wallyworld]

Thanks again for all the input.  Really appreciated.

At this point, here's what I've decided:
- Tri-mode crossovers are too rare and expensive to bother with.  Really defeating the purpose here of making this effort somewhat reasonable expense-wise and time-wise.
- I bought the subwoofer enclosure and amp in a pack, so that's how I got stuck with the 2-channel amp.
- I recently bought a Roadmaster VRA4.0 amplifier at Fry's for $40 for another project.  However, the amp is probably perfect for my needs here as it will actually support two stereo speakers and a sub (recommended on this page - http://www.virtualrealitysoundlabs.com/beforepurchasing.html).  So I will try that amp, and probably sell the other.