95Honda

From what I skimmed you got it for the most part. #1 Skin effect has minimal effect in the audio range #2 CCA doesn't do anything for skin effect at high frequency (if it were used there) because the wire isn't Litz construction... CCA is a much poorer performer than copper of equivalent AWG under all circumstances. #3 The ground is part of the overall circuit. It has the same current flowing as the positive lead, it's length isn't limited as long as you still have the overall desired DC resistance.

Meh. Dynamics are important, but that not important. The whole you need "XXXXX watts to hear a pin drop to an orchestra blah blah" is a pile of shit and a marketing gimmick... There is a reason the best sounding amplifiers in the world are usually less than 100 WPC, because they sound good, not because they have a ton of power. Same goes for high end speakers... If at any time you even approach a drivers limit, you are no longer in the SQ realm, period... Remember, car audio is 90% BS and 10% science, lol...

It will work fine. You don't even have to match the amps, it makes no difference really. They could even be playing different signals (you will loose output obviously) and it won't hurt a thing... Just set them as close as you can and don't worry about it. The only reason to match them is so they both run out of gas at the same time, that is really it...

The sound quality will be better with 400 watts vs. 1000 watts.

No

Impious... Always there to lay it out so it makes sense...

This isn't anything new. The same principles apply to power/isolation transformers. The main reason all the RF/EMI garbage (like the unfiltered Class D components) doesn't make it through a power/isolation transformer (like the woofer's voice coil) is due to the inductive component presenting high impedance to the unwanted signals. The high impedance doesn't let the current flow and therefor the signal make it through the transformer (voice coil). It also doesn't matter if it is a sine wave or some other type of signal, even pulses or a square wave, it has to do with how the inductance simply won't let the current flow...

I wouldn't worry too much about battery or too in the cab. There are millions of air-tight older Volkswagen beetles running around with batteries inside cab, none have every blown up...

I have no doubt the unfiltered HF garbage coming out of a class D amp causes issues, mostly distortion... But in a series circuit that has an inductor (voice coil) with any appreciable amount of inductance anywhere in the circuit, there won't be significant current flow (in the HF range) and therefore heat. Even if the HF is lower, even in the audio spectrum, it will have an insignificant amount of power compared to the intended output of the amplifier...

It is 100% elaborated in my 1st post. You have to look into AC circuit theory to go much further. In a nutshell, the voice coil acts as a resistor to current at higher frequencies, at the switching frequencies of class D amplifiers it is so much resistance that virtually no current actually flows... The only way you could burn up the leads from the switching frequencies would be if there was no voice coil in the circuit... This isn't the case with a subwoofer... It has a voice coil...

Cool. I just hope everyone now understands how any un-filtered HF output of a class D amp has no effect on leads as long as they are in a circuit that includes a subwoofer voice coil. It's just the facts...

Also, don't take my driver recommendation as gospel, it was simply to show you there are other options out there...

I 100% believe you. I don't think you may have done anything wrong. Like I said, you have an amp that can produce a 3Kw sine wave, and other waveforms up to possibly 6Kw... What normally happens is the lead fails in one spot and heat begins to build, it just gets worst from there... It can be a failure from the way the leads were sewn in/installed to a bad lead material, to over excursion of the sub to simply too much power. It just happens. All I am trying to get you to do is look objectively at your situation, and cut through the BS... Everything can be explained through simple circuit analysis, it isn't Voodoo, although some people would have you believe it...

They just don't go low enough for a 2-way with anything bigger than a 4"-5"... They are super directional and just plain sound bad 99% of the time. If you must use horn loading I would go with something like Morel CAT 378, high efficiency, high power handling and still goes low... They also sound good...

It has nothing to do with clipping. It has nothing to do with filtering either, the inductance of the voice coil prevents the higher frequencies from ever causing enough current flow to actually heat the leads. Don't believe me? Calculate the current flow through a 3-4 mh inductor (the voice coil) at the switching frequency of the amp at the maximum rail voltage... It is no more than a few watts, that doesn't heat up crap... (an amp that switches at 250K will see a load of 4.7Kohms into a 3mh voice coil at that frequency, this will equal 2 watts if the amplifier put that out at 100 VAC..., harmonics will be even lower) Hopefully this put the whole "microwave the leads" myth to rest... It has to do with the lead in your case having a failure in one place and the current is forced to flow through less effective cross-sectional area of conductor, increasing heat. As heat increases voltage drop and heat increases. It just keeps getting worse. You have a 3Kw amp, that is what burned up the leads...

Are they horn-loaded super-tweeters? If they are, sell them. They have absolutely no place in a car.

Cool thing about it is, if your connections (being in the back of your truck) get exposed to anything like humidity, heat, cold, smoke, etc the Noalox will keep them 100%... In addition to keeping any contact resistance from developing... We use it all the time on outdoor connections... Have pulled some apart that are 10 years old and the metal is nice and clean in the connection area...

Home Depot and Lowes has it...

Good call. Since you are going from Aluminum bar to copper connectors (I assume) make sure and dap a little Noalox between the metals...

They can probably give you some type of numbers, but SPL will only be relevant in your vehicle and they cannot accurately measure power... The moral of this whole story is, the RMS rating has nothing to do with pretty much anything. Just about every single person on this site (or any car audio site) who has blown a driver cannot tell you for sure how much power they were using, period. It is so subjective the information you get. Bottom line is, use your brain, don't overdrive the woofer and remember that the RMS rating has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with power requirements or output levels...

I would just hate to see you waste money where you could spend it other places to get much better performance gains...

It is based (mostly) on the enclosure, or the thermal limits of the driver, whatever comes first. It can be determined by modeling and/or ACCURATE and OBJECTIVE measurements with CALIBRATED ACCURATE test equipment...

Yes, thermal limit. And until you model your alignment, you, nor anyone else on the planet, can tell you what amount of power is required to full output, period. Your particular enclosure may have max output at 1500, 3000, 9000, or 10,000 watts (etc.), frequency dependent, you simple just don't know...

The dome material doesn't impart the sound characteristics you are talking about, that is an age old, 100% myth... The design of the tweeter, and most importantly how you install it, determine a HUGE majority of the sound you hear... Food for thought, some of the highest end speakers in the world ($100K+ per set) use titanium dome material and vented alignments... What does that tell you about what you constantly hear about those two items and sound quality? It is all subjective BS in car audio man....

I mean, you aren't underpowering the sub, there is no such thing. Don't confuse the RMS rating of the subwoofer with power requirement, how loud it will be or anything else. It has absolutely nothing to do with any of these things.