DCC Impulses Column - 3
heat in the amplifier. This added heat can damage or destroy
the decoder, depending upon the amplifier design.
Higher impedance (say 16 ohms) will reduce the load on the
amplifier, but the amplifier may not be able to push as much
power into the lower load: 3/4 watt into 16 ohms would be
a common result. Generally, higher impedance loads are not
harmful to the decoder; you just reach a point where the
diminished audio power isn't compensated by the increased
efficiency of adding more speakers.
I recommend checking with the decoder manufacturer before
you contemplate any impedance other than the rated load, be
it a single value or a range
of loads.
Heat
Be aware, as we make
smaller and more power-
ful (both electrically and
feature-wise) decoders,
heat generated inside the
decoders becomes more
of an issue. How the heat
will get out of the decoder
should be a design cri-
terion in every installa-
tion. With small sound
decoders, it becomes very
important. If you are con-
templating pushing the
envelope on load imped-
3: TSU-750 Micro Tsunami,
showing flat side where the in-
ternal heat sink is located. This
should be attached to a metal
surface to remove heat from
the decoder.
3
MRH-Jan 2014
