SETTING LIMITERS FOR COMPRESSION DRIVERS

[kachilala]

Hi, guys.

I have a DCX2496 which I use to power a biamp speaker setup (woofer/1" compression driver). When i tried to set the limiter on my amplifier output to 25v, to limit the Compression drivers to about the 80w RMS they are rated for, I find that they are underpowered. I.e. from Experience, I can tell that they can run much louder. Am I doing something wrong? Should I be limiting them based on their peak Power rating? Pls, any help would be much appreciated.

[Zack Brock]

What ohms are the compression drivers at and are you wiring in parallel or series to the amp with more than one speaker cabinet?

[kachilala]

It is rated at 80wRMS, 8 ohms. I run two units off one side of a peavey cs1000x

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

Be sure to set the limiter using a signal within the tweeter passband.

[kachilala]

I would love to do that, Bill, but I don't have access to an RMS meter, and I assume my measurements will be inaccurate ~1kHz. Right? Also, If I set a clip limiter to limit power to the RMS power rating of the driver, does that mean that it will never hit its peak operating potential?

[Bill Fitzmaurice]

I would love to do that, Bill, but I don't have access to an RMS meter, and I assume my measurements will be inaccurate ~1kHz. Right? Also, If I set a clip limiter to limit power to the RMS power rating of the driver, does that mean that it will never hit its peak operating potential?

Without a meter there's no way of knowing what the voltage is that your amp is putting out. Clip limiters are useful to be sure that you're keeping the signal clean, but they won't tell you how much voltage is going to your drivers. That makes them better than nothing but less than optimal.

[lazyman]

I would love to do that, Bill, but I don't have access to an RMS meter, and I assume my measurements will be inaccurate ~1kHz. Right? Also, If I set a clip limiter to limit power to the RMS power rating of the driver, does that mean that it will never hit its peak operating potential?

I have done some test. I connected multimeter to output of mixing board, and play sine tones with different frequencies, same amplitude. Surprisingly, bot my analog and digital multimeter are capable to some 16 kHz (after that seems to drop in response, but digital more rapidly), and these are some radio shack ones. So try with some test tones at different frequencies just to see response.