I searched through the archives and found some very usefull information from Daved on bridgeing an amp to run DVC subs. Here is the thread:
http://63.99.108.81/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?az=read_count&om=218&forum=DCForumID18

I have a 300 watt Pioneer 2-channel amp powering a 10" Kicker DVC Sub in a bandpass box that can handle 600 watts. My amp can be bridged to make 600 watts. I understand how to set my sub up to run at 8 ohms, but I don't know how to bridge an amp. Can anyone be help me out?

TIA

Simple connect the positive speaker lead to (+) on the left channel and the negative speaker lead to (-) on the right channel or vise vera. I think Pioneers are labeled so take a look at the speaker terminals on the amp and you'll get the idea.

sd_eclipse is right, + of one - of the other channel. I would use some thick speaker wire, the thickest you can find. The better the signal, the better the bass! And solder the speaker wire to the speaker terminals, better connection and you never have to worry about it coming off.

Thanks for the info guys. Oh, and I am diggin' that Black/White theme you have on your car, looks good IMO.

Later

Thanks, I think you and I are the ONLY 2 people on this board that like it, at least I am not alone.
*Shamu alert!!!

Lol! Hey man it's your car, if you like it, that's all that's important.

Yep thats pretty much it for bridging. But ohms has a play in bridging also. So sometimes you have to be careful. It all depends on the amp's rated power, and the speaker's ohms. I'm assuming your pioneer amp is 300Wx2@ 4 ohm, and your DVC sub is 4 ohm each coil. Now you can bridge your amp to make that 600W into 1 single channel, but now the amp can only see a 2ohm load max. Any lower will damage it eventually. So lets say you wire you sub in parallel(each coil's pos and neg wired on top of eachother), now you have a 2 ohm load. YOU CAN'T wire this to the single bridged output of your amp, because now the amp is "seeing" a 1 ohm load! Many people don't realize this, but when you combine(bridge) two channels on any amplifier, the amp will now see HALF of the load put upon it! So if you think about it, with having a DVC sub(assuming 4 ohm coils anyway), you can only run the amp in stero(one of each channel to each coil). Now you could wire the sub in SERIES to get a total of 8 ohm, and then you could bridge the amp to the sub. You have a 8 ohm load, and the amp will see half of that which is 4 ohm total, totally safe for that amp. But either way you look at it, the sub will see the same amount of power regardless of running it stero to each coil, or bridging it to a series wired sub, because the amp won't put out 600 watts @ 4 ohm bridged, only at 2 ohm bridged. I hope this makes sense, but if not, let me know and maybe i can go into more detail..

Thanks for the detailed explaination. This stuff is really starting to make sense. You really know your stuff! Do you have any recomendations on a sub that I could use to get the maximum potential from my amp??


TIA!

Make sure if you use that kicker sub that you wire the VC's in series. I doubt that pioneer amp can handle a 2ohm mono load (which is what you get if you wired the 2 VC's in parallel).
If you want to maximize that amp, get a SVC 4ohm sub and bridge the amp to it. That'll give you 600W to it at a 4ohm mono load which should be safe for it.

Or if you want more noise than one sub can give you, get two 8ohm subs(rare, but you can find them) and wire them bridged in parallel. Or even three 6ohm subs non-bridged in parallel. There's way too many combos really. How many speakers you want?

I think I will just stick to 1 10" sub with a decent ammout of power. I used to have 2 12's and they took up too much room, plus our cars rattle a lot!

Thanks

Yep, I wasn't too sure about what the pioneer's could handle ohm wise, but it depends on how many subs you want. It seems you want only 1, so get either a single voice coil sub that is 8 ohmn and bridge your amp to that, or get a DVC with 4 ohm coils and series wire it to get 8 ohm. YOU CAN'T bridge your amp to 1 4 ohm sub, because now the amp will see a 2 ohm mono load, which i don't think it can handle, so best bet is to use a DVC, and wire each channel to each coil of the sub. Just check your amp's spec sheet, and see how low of an impedance(ohms) it can go. I believe most pioneer's rate their amps at 4 ohm bridged...