>When you cut the resistance in half, it's going to double the current. If y...
>ave 8 ohms across there. You can do this by wiring two 4-ohm speakers in ser
The resistor in series will work. However, a speaker's impedance is not
uniform - all dynamic speakers exhibit varying impedance over the frequency
range. And if it's a dual or triple-element speaker module, the phase
can get really squirrely near the crossover points. This is all to say
that two speaker systems in series is a bad idea. When considering a
resistor, keep in minf how much power it will have to dissipate - figure on
the full rated output of the power amp.
Chances are pretty good that the stock system will tolerate a 4 ohm
speaker just fine. You may get more distortion, but if you're looking
for louder volume, you want a power amp add on anyway.
If you do add a power amp, and you can't get line-level preamp outputs
from your front end, then you can drive the power amp from a coupling
network - have the stock front end drive a large (100 to 1000 ohm)
resistor that won't need to dissipate a lot of power, then series
connect one end of that resistor to another like value or higher
resistor, and a good quality (mylar film - not electrolytic or
ceramic) capacitor, and then to the preamp input of your power amp.
You may have to be careful about referencing the other end of the
input. The stock radio may not tolerate tying it to ground - check
with a DMM with the volume turned up to see if there's a substantial
voltage to ground from both stock speaker terminals -- chances are
there will be. You can either put another big resistor there, or
use another capacitor and connect it only to the power amp input.
Note that the power amp input may force you to reference to ground
due to the connector setup (RCA plugs usually use chassis ground for
one input terminal).
Jim
"Darkness can never last too long, when you laugh in his face."
- Danny Elfman, Oingo Boingo
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