Originally posted by 97teg
I really think you have enough power. The 800 is the rms right not max? If you want cleaner bass might want to look at getting a new pair of speakers. If you just want louder bass id say ported only problem is the box would probably be huge for two 15's ported. I would not suggest just throwing them in any box. It needs to be built just for your speakers and ported boxes are very finicky about measurements that are off. Sealed you can be off a fair amount before it affects anything but ported has to be basically dead on. My suggestion is try ported first then if you still don't like it look for new subs. One of my old friends had two xlc 10s off an mtx in his ranger and is was pretty loud i used an xlc 10 in my ht for a while and had it for a bit in my car. Probably not the cleanst though. The only other thing i can think of is that maybe your speakers are not wired to get the most out of the amp. How many ohms are the subs and how is it wired together?
My friend originally had this Rockford Punch 800.2 amp running in stereo mode up to these Rockford Punch XLC 15's; it seemed they didnt kick hard enough for me, so he did the following: he ran the sub's speaker wires coming out of the rear of the sub enclosure in "parallel" and then wired them to the amp in bridged mono form---he said this would get maximum power output from the amp. Since I am dealing with two subs, not one, he needed to run them in parallel, and then wired them bridged at the amp. What he did was this: took the positive speaker wires from the rear of the sub enclosure and tied them together, then did the same with the negatives, and then took those combined wires and fed them into ONE postive terminal on the amp and ONE negative terminal on the amp; he said this was running the two subs in parallel and then bridging the amp, and this would get maximum power...first of all, does this sound right? I watched him put everything in---and it all looked right when he was doing it; all speakers are in phase, etc. Would this be the best way to get maximum power from an amp into two subs?
Now, according to Rockford's specs, the 800.2 is supposed to put out 800 watts RMS in bridged mono, as I have it running---should that be what my subs are seeing, approximately? Is that 800 just going total to the two subs and being split between them, in theory? I KNOW this number is VERY, VERY approximate because I am running all this off of my stock battery, altenator, etc, plus I have an RCA converter between it all, which robs the power. So I realize this is all approximate; but let's say I am supposed to be getting 800 watts -- wouldnt 800 be enough to be heard outside of the vehicle? Why isn't anyone really looking when I pull into my office parking lot, for instance? (I ask other folks I work with, who have car audio systems in their rides if they heard me pull in with my 15's cranking, and they say no---this doesnt make sense). Are Rockford's XLCs really THAT bad?
Now, in order to really get s**it cranking, I need to bring up my head unit's volume to half way on the display, and perhaps one tick beyond that---at this level, with the bass turned up on the head unit's bass knob, the boom is SERIOUS---everything is rattling and shaking and coming to pieces....but the sound just doesnt wanna escape out of the vehicle with my windows halfway open on each side of the coupe. Why is this? Is it that the subs are trapped in the trunk with nowhere for the bass to go? Would stepping up to an aftermarket head unit change anything? I really dont think so, in a setup like mine. Im looking for balls-out SPL outlaw bass, not SQ. That's why I bought 15's.