Expert: Cleggsan - 9/15/2010

Question
i was wondering if it would be possible to run 4 speakers off of a cd player style stereo, that was designed (and came with) only 2 speakers. my idea is to take 2 left speakers, and 2 right speakers and twisting the copper wires together, since there are only 2 possitive, and 2 negative holes in the back of the cd player. do you think this would work?
thank you for your time.
Jordan.

Answer
It may or it may not. You did not give a model number which we use to obtain the technology of the design of the system.

Some amplifier designs are very sensitive to impedance loading. If you put two speakers in parallel it will cause the load impedance on the amplifier to go to half the impedance or  more.  For example, if the factory speakers coming with the set are 8 ohms and you connect another speaker of 8 ohms the new impedance to the amplifier is 4 ohms and that may cause damage to the amp.

But, then again, it may not. It may work find at low volume levels but when turned up to higher audio output levels it may crash the amp.

If it is a low cost or budget system chances are the danger is present.