Im in the middle of buying all the components to put my first system together. I have a pair of 10" 2+2 ohm type R's. They are rated for 300 watts rms but I was wondering how much more I could out into it without hurting the sub. I will most likely have a sealed enclousure and I was originally planning to put 500 watts to each sub....is this too much for it to continuosly handle?

 

i run a pair of 12" type r's as well, although they're the 4+4ohm version . I run a rated 800w to mine. From my listening they don't seem like they could do much more with more wattage.

That being said, it doesn't hurt to have a lil leeway with you amp. You can always just have your gains a lil lower.

I've smelt burning voice coils outta mine a time or two, although im not sure whether thats simply over-powering them or possibly sending a bit of a clipped signal that caused that.

 

In a small sealed enclosure you are prolly looking to feed them between 350 - 400 a piece. And as stated, start with the gains down and turn them up til you get where ya want.

 

Would they run pretty loud if I did just send 300 rms to each?

 

yes they would.

 

Aight I guess Ill just give that a try then if im not satisfied ill just put some more power to them.

 

you'll find out when they quite working

 

Power ratings are there for a reason. The only reason to hook up an amp that makes more power than you need would be to run the amp below it's potential, in order to reduce the strain on your amp as well as lower the noise levels in your system (some people call this "headroom"). But if you actually run a full 500 watts to a 300 watt sub, you could be asking for trouble.

The confusing thing about car audio is that you could hook up a 1000-watt amp to your 300-watt sub, but you really have no way of knowing whether your amp is actually making full power, unless the amp has a power meter of some sort. This could lead to the illusion that your sub can handle 1000 watts, when in reality your amp is set to produce only 250 watts. Many people don't seem to understand this concept...