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Fitted some speakers in the camper van last night, the wiring was done years ago by someone else so I have no way of knowing which is positive or negative.
2 way kenwood things
is there a test I can do using a multimeter on the wiring ?
is the sound quality even going to change ?
thanks in advance
Shirley if you did that all sound would be sucked into them 😆
If you've added more speakers to an existing system and wired the +- the wrong way around you should notice that it doesn't sound quite right when a the speakers are on at the same time ( bass sounding hollow is the most obvious symptom ) .
If this is the case just swap round the +- on the new speakers, job done.
If you aren't sure on the sound just play with the faders on the stero to listen to all the speakers on their own and then all together.
It won't cause any harm physically, it just harms the sound
It does matter.
If it's a stereo set up then you could end up with R & L out of phase. This'll affect stereo staging and volume.
You can test it pretty easily using a meter. One way would be to disconnect the wires at the amp and speaker ends and just test the conductivity of one of the conductors. You could use a test recording instead, but conductivity will be more definitive.
Should have said connected to the fronts as there weren't any only the wiring which is connected to a new Sony head unit the wiring at the unit is a different colour at the speakers ! Shoddy workmanship not by me! I guess rewiring is a solution but don't really want to start dragging wiringing around an old bus !
Does this help any ??
I was thinking turn on stereo and multi meter at the end of each speaker wire ???
Just turn it on, if you're happy with the sound quality leave it there. I'm assuming you've got rear speakers fitted already.
The multimeter test across the speaker will tell you nothing. You could do a 'bell test ' with a multi meter but the time it would take to do the test you'd be faster swapping the wires round on the new speakers and seeing if it sounds better or worse
If you get some music on with some decent base the if the speaker is wired correctly the speaker will kick out if it's wrong way round if will pull into its self.
Andy
Even cheap speaker wire has a tracer, which is either a ridge or a small stripe. Look carefully.
As above, if they're out of phase it'll sound weird. Bass especially sounds strange. Hard to describe but it kind of sounds like the bass is coming out of each individual speaker separately rather than coming from a central point inbetween.
Phase can be used for good effect to if your car has a weird speaker layout or it's hard to get a good sound stage.
I used to run my subs out of phase which often made them sound much more part of the system instead of a big speaker sitting in the boot.
Worth starting with everything in the correct phase first though.
Wire it up, stick something on fairly bassy (turn up the bass on the head unit if needed) and get your head roughly equidistant from the speakers. The bass will sound really weak and the sound generally goes a bit thin and tinny if it's out of phase. If you aren't sure, swap them round a few times (so long as access isn't a pain, I suppose).
A mate of mine bought a really expensive Micromega stereo years ago and was extolling the virtues of it.
I went round and had a listen and it sounded pretty dreadful to me. It was way worse than my stereo that had cost about a 1/10 of the price. I asked him if I could have a fiddle with it, checked the speaker phase and put it the right way round.
He was gobsmacked! He'd been listening to it like that for a month and thought had been really impressed with it! Just goes to show what spending a lot money does to your perception!
Just goes to show what spending a lot money does to your perception!
Hence the whole market for people spending more than 50p a metre on speaker cable.....
Multimeter, measure the resistance between the wires and the bodywork. -ve will be close to zero, +ve will be a higher resistance.
Generally less important to get them the right way round than it is to have them both wired in the same fashion (otherwise they're out of phase - one is 'pushing' whilst the other is 'pulling' and you get a noise-cancelling effect), though I'd expect some speakers would be fussier than others.
Coogs has it.
He'd been listening to it like that for a month and thought had been really impressed with it!
Maybe the ionized directional gold cables were compensating for it?
and get your head roughly equidistant from the speakers
...which never happens in a car as you're always sat to one side!
I have no doubt it's important in a living room but I'd be surprised if it made any difference at all in a small, funny shaped, acoustically rubbish vehicle shaped space.
The music will play backwards.