Ruby Build and speaker wiring questions

[Michael Allen]

I made a Ruby amp today and I hooked it up to 2 computer speakers like the ones in the Ruby project posted the other day, and one 3 inch TV speaker. I like it a lot but it's super quiet. I'm wondering about the speaker wiring. All of them are wired in series. The computer speakers are 4 ohm but I don't know about the TV speaker. Anyway, is there a proper way of wiring them that will give more volume?

I plan on constructing a small Tweed-ish case tomorrow!

[yano]

If you wire in series, the resistance adds up, and the higher resistance for a driver on an amp the less power it gives up, generally.

[Michael Allen]

Is there a way I can determine the wattage of a speaker? I've tried looking up spec sheets on these speakers but I can't find anything.

[Peter Snowberg]

With small speakers made for big production runs the chances of finding data is pretty slim. I would just assume that things are "close" and leave it at that. I wouldn't try that same tactic with a situation involving any real power though.

On the wiring, check your TV speaker with a meter. I wouldn't be surprised if it's a high resistance speaker. While 8 ohms is the "standard", I've seen lots of 32 ohm speakers in similar environments. Try to use any series/parallel speaker combination you can to get the resulting value to be as close to 8 ohms as you can for maximum output power.

Take care,
-Peter

[Michael Allen]

So 8Ohm is nominal? The cab on my Sovtek is 16. Does the ohm rating affect the frequency response?

Thanks all,

[Peter Snowberg]

The resistance of the speakers won't affect the frequency response, but giving the 386 a 8 ohm load will keep it happy. If you go lower than 8 you will have a little more power, but the 386 won't be too happy about that.

Take care,
-Peter