3fe25 with a highpass @ +/- 200hz will not, ever, consume 80 watts. Unless you really want to BBQ it.
I've measured real life driver's consumption on a calibrated wattmeter and anything higher than 100hz is very frugal. You'll be amazed how loud it can be with only few watts on the midrange/high.
Subwoofers, on the other hand, they can get very power hungry for much much lower SPL output.
Educated guess here:
Pete's set-up will have a ratio of 100:2.
For the same SPL, subs 20-200hz will consume 100 watts while the 3fe25 alltogether will consume 2 watts.
xmax concerns relate to peak not RMS though.
The issue I'm imagining is you have music program with a kick drum, and a lot of 200-250Hz content in the kick. On the peaks it's going to sound nasty if the drivers can't move far enough. I'm not suggesting the drivers will fail, but that the reproduction of the kick drum will be severely compromised at higher volume levels. Faital rate their xmax at around 20% THD+N, and they rate the driver at 1.83mm.
I get that the lower bass registers will already be significantly higher than the upper bass and harmonics (I've not run the tests you have but have spent plenty of time watching music program on a spectrum analyser), but if the subwoofer is producing 130dB, which almost any 12" sub is capable of in a smallish room with solid walls, and the 3fe25's are expected to produce even 115dB to keep up with them, then they may well crap out significantly if the crossover is set at 200Hz.
It's a quality concern and performance issue not a driver damage one, and not one that would be encountered typically, but it's something to keep in mind depending on gear used (amps, processing, subs), and their expected applications, which we don't yet know exactly.
The issue I'm imagining is you have music program with a kick drum, and a lot of 200-250Hz content in the kick. On the peaks it's going to sound nasty if the drivers can't move far enough. I'm not suggesting the drivers will fail, but that the reproduction of the kick drum will be severely compromised at higher volume levels. Faital rate their xmax at around 20% THD+N, and they rate the driver at 1.83mm.
I get that the lower bass registers will already be significantly higher than the upper bass and harmonics (I've not run the tests you have but have spent plenty of time watching music program on a spectrum analyser), but if the subwoofer is producing 130dB, which almost any 12" sub is capable of in a smallish room with solid walls, and the 3fe25's are expected to produce even 115dB to keep up with them, then they may well crap out significantly if the crossover is set at 200Hz.
It's a quality concern and performance issue not a driver damage one, and not one that would be encountered typically, but it's something to keep in mind depending on gear used (amps, processing, subs), and their expected applications, which we don't yet know exactly.
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Going to build one into a seat actually, but I already tested it with several powered speakers. Sketched up the crossover with the dual 15 band eq made into the little Yorkville highly powerful mixer head I had laying around. Gave me at least 12 db per octave the way I had it gain structured (you can always trade headroom for noise he he) but I have several Behringer DCX2496s. I may start with one of those. I will have it all, including the class D power and eq and xover built into the sub/seat, when I am through. Imo the low end is the easy part, below Schroeder and the ear is not very sensitive to mild distortion down low. This is after all going to be a super light powrerful, quck to set up PA without the name B*** on it 😊
Exactly, and renember I already tested it with crap drivers and a Mackie 12" powered speaker crossed as sub. Damn near made it with the trio keys sax drums outside!
It was fine till the last set, then it was power compressing with light distortion, but the cheap dtivers held. I expect way better results with the Faitals.☺
As you make the box smaller and smaller you get a larger hump at cutoff. Looking at the sims i would suggest 2-2.5 liter per driver but you could get away with 1 llitre (about 1 dB of peaking). Much more and you are getting into underdamped territory. Remember that damping fill can increase the apparent volume of the box, i’d suggest 20% is practical.
dave
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An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
3FE25 - 4 ohms
As you see, not quite 91db below 1.5khz.
More between 82db and 86db in the 200hz-500hz region. But since it's a 3'' that can act as a tweeter, that's no surprise is it?
So i think that few solutions to fix that would be to find a subwoofer driver that can go higher (say 250-350hz) and with some EQing to help fill the weaker low-mid octave.
Jazz music you say?
Well, in my opinion that can hurt your music performance (that weaker low-mid)
electronic music, say IDM, Techno, etc... I'd say sub-sub + mid-hi (the typical ''smile'' curve) you'd be fine.
Jazz? Uhmm... If you already did some testing that are satisfactory, then good for you. But if you're looking for an optimal solution, maybe you should take care of that 200-500hz issue.
Just saying. Tryin' to help
Jazz? Uhmm... If you already did some testing that are satisfactory, then good for you. But if you're looking for an optimal solution, maybe you should take care of that 200-500hz issue.
Just saying. Tryin' to help
About the sub drivers, i'd say there is not much choice out there for that specific project.
I tried pretty much all interesting drivers available at Parts Express and nothing out of the ordinary comes to my mind...
Unless you want to completely forget the first octave (thus going the ''woofer'' way, opposed to the subwoofer way), what comes in mind is this:
Visaton TIW250XS
TIW 250 XS - 8 Ohm
Real subwoofer capacities, works very decently up to 300-400hz if not more, 89db, workable Qts, only downside i can think of is the price.
Most cost-effective solution i can think of is:
JL audio 12WXv2
Car Audio - Subwoofer Drivers - WXv2
Highest efficiency driver from JL's line up (smaller VC), low Fs, lightweight, decent xmax, extremely cheap (bought a lot for 75$ea.) and as always from JL audio the power handling is underrated. Just don't expect the 300hz+ performance as the TIW250XS or as a real PA woofer. But bass-wise, very solid.
I tried pretty much all interesting drivers available at Parts Express and nothing out of the ordinary comes to my mind...
Unless you want to completely forget the first octave (thus going the ''woofer'' way, opposed to the subwoofer way), what comes in mind is this:
Visaton TIW250XS
TIW 250 XS - 8 Ohm
Real subwoofer capacities, works very decently up to 300-400hz if not more, 89db, workable Qts, only downside i can think of is the price.
Most cost-effective solution i can think of is:
JL audio 12WXv2
Car Audio - Subwoofer Drivers - WXv2
Highest efficiency driver from JL's line up (smaller VC), low Fs, lightweight, decent xmax, extremely cheap (bought a lot for 75$ea.) and as always from JL audio the power handling is underrated. Just don't expect the 300hz+ performance as the TIW250XS or as a real PA woofer. But bass-wise, very solid.
The car audio woofer is unsuitable for use outdoors though. It starts to exceed xmax at about 116dB at around 50Hz with 500w input. You can make it go louder by tuning it higher or cutting the low end, but according to the specs you probably don't want to feed it much more than that anyway.
The other issue is that it needs a ridiculously long port - it sims flattest with a tuning around 20Hz, above that it gets very peaky. If you tune it to 40Hz in a 40 litre box, it gets a loud peak (120dB at 60Hz), but it's still only 114dB at 300Hz.
The Visaton is also going to suffer from headroom issues outdoors. It's just not efficient enough for PA use, and it won't take enough power either (it says 'max 300w', although that sounds conservative).
The 12" Mackie sub by contrast will be producing peaks of at least 125dB in halfspace.
To get close to that you're usually better off with a PA woofer, but that doesn't mean you absolutely need to sacrifice the lower registers. You could still achieve a very solid 50Hz response with something like this: P-Audio E12-350N 12" 350W 8 Ohm Neodymium Loudspeaker Driver from P-Audio PS94.15 IN STOCK (6 Aug 2017) in a 60 litre vented enclosure.
Like the Faital, the limitation with the P Audio woofer is excursion, but they use a
conservative measurement at their rated 4.4mm. If you use the method Faital employs, the number is 6.4mm, and in a live band sub-bass scenario you could probably get away with the occasional 7.5mm peak without too much eye-rolling.
In the box I modelled (60 litres tuned to 57.5Hz), the excursion peak with the P Audio centres around 85Hz, with a wide trough between 50 and 75Hz, so despite being -3dB at 52Hz (which is still a very respectable bass response unfiltered), you have significant headroom available to boost that region.
With a 1000W amp input and some careful EQ settings, you could achieve 122.5dB at 53Hz with 6.4mm excursion, and almost flat from there upwards, peaking at 124dB or so.
The woofer is ultra-light at 3kg so that fits the portable requirement. The response plots indicate it plays very well up high. It shouldn't run into any show-stopping issues with 300-350Hz, and could still be crossed lower where suitable as suggested.
The other issue is that it needs a ridiculously long port - it sims flattest with a tuning around 20Hz, above that it gets very peaky. If you tune it to 40Hz in a 40 litre box, it gets a loud peak (120dB at 60Hz), but it's still only 114dB at 300Hz.
The Visaton is also going to suffer from headroom issues outdoors. It's just not efficient enough for PA use, and it won't take enough power either (it says 'max 300w', although that sounds conservative).
The 12" Mackie sub by contrast will be producing peaks of at least 125dB in halfspace.
To get close to that you're usually better off with a PA woofer, but that doesn't mean you absolutely need to sacrifice the lower registers. You could still achieve a very solid 50Hz response with something like this: P-Audio E12-350N 12" 350W 8 Ohm Neodymium Loudspeaker Driver from P-Audio PS94.15 IN STOCK (6 Aug 2017) in a 60 litre vented enclosure.
Like the Faital, the limitation with the P Audio woofer is excursion, but they use a
conservative measurement at their rated 4.4mm. If you use the method Faital employs, the number is 6.4mm, and in a live band sub-bass scenario you could probably get away with the occasional 7.5mm peak without too much eye-rolling.
In the box I modelled (60 litres tuned to 57.5Hz), the excursion peak with the P Audio centres around 85Hz, with a wide trough between 50 and 75Hz, so despite being -3dB at 52Hz (which is still a very respectable bass response unfiltered), you have significant headroom available to boost that region.
With a 1000W amp input and some careful EQ settings, you could achieve 122.5dB at 53Hz with 6.4mm excursion, and almost flat from there upwards, peaking at 124dB or so.
The woofer is ultra-light at 3kg so that fits the portable requirement. The response plots indicate it plays very well up high. It shouldn't run into any show-stopping issues with 300-350Hz, and could still be crossed lower where suitable as suggested.
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sorry i misunderstood, i didnt know it was to be used outdoor! My bad.
Yeah, forget about my sub's recommendations above as 1st octave for outdoor is a total waste. That being said, we're not talking ''subwoofer'' but really ''woofer'' here. That is another story completely.
Jazz, outdoor... Yeah, you need something that will hit hard starting 45-60hz, anything less would be a waste.
Good news is: now you're looking for a type of driver that can deliver a solid 200-500hz!
Yeah, forget about my sub's recommendations above as 1st octave for outdoor is a total waste. That being said, we're not talking ''subwoofer'' but really ''woofer'' here. That is another story completely.
Jazz, outdoor... Yeah, you need something that will hit hard starting 45-60hz, anything less would be a waste.
Good news is: now you're looking for a type of driver that can deliver a solid 200-500hz!
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Ok, now we are getting somewhere.
What is called ''subwoofer'' by PA people are in fact woofers.
and what is called ''subwoofer'' by HiFi people are called woofers by HT people...
So we're looking for a SPL cruising speed around 50-80hz...
The Mackie DLM12S is also massive! 60x60x72cm. Probably not portable enough.
The OP suggested a portable sub or even something like a chair (sit on sub?) I guessed about 60 litres internal as that would be approx 90 litres external or about 56 x 40 x 40 - Kind of 'chair' size.
I just noticed The P Audio E12-350N suggests a frequency range starting at 60Hz which indicates it may run into some distortion issues if played lower than that, but it's just an example of the sort of options that are out there. Personally I would chance it for a -3dB of 53Hz, as it ticks many other boxes.
If you were willing to spend significantly more (twice as much basically), or settle for a heavier ferrite magnet, then the options for PA drivers open up massively.
It's always going to be a trade-off with various factors, and some will need to be sacrificed to boost the others: Sound quality, loudness, portability, affordability, bass extension, etc.
Some factors like sound quality, distortion, and bass extension will limit enjoyability, but other factors like price, portability and loudness limit potential application, and it's these which I find most concerning. Most listeners at gigs just aren't that critical, but when the volume isn't there, everyone notices.
A friend had a system that was 104.5dB efficient in the bass region and used a 250 Watt amplifier, so it was producing about 128dB peaks at 65Hz, so that's not far off your typical Mackie powered sub output. That had a pair of 15" bass drivers, and we played several bands through it, but it was really only enough for a few dozen people when used outdoors, and that was mostly on concrete. On grass it would struggle even more.
Honestly I think most of the gigs could have been improved by a few dB more from the subs, so I think every dB that can be squeezed out of the bass is going to be appreciated.
The OP suggested a portable sub or even something like a chair (sit on sub?
) I guessed about 60 litres internal as that would be approx 90 litres external or about 56 x 40 x 40 - Kind of 'chair' size.I just noticed The P Audio E12-350N suggests a frequency range starting at 60Hz which indicates it may run into some distortion issues if played lower than that, but it's just an example of the sort of options that are out there. Personally I would chance it for a -3dB of 53Hz, as it ticks many other boxes.
If you were willing to spend significantly more (twice as much basically), or settle for a heavier ferrite magnet, then the options for PA drivers open up massively.
It's always going to be a trade-off with various factors, and some will need to be sacrificed to boost the others: Sound quality, loudness, portability, affordability, bass extension, etc.
Some factors like sound quality, distortion, and bass extension will limit enjoyability, but other factors like price, portability and loudness limit potential application, and it's these which I find most concerning. Most listeners at gigs just aren't that critical, but when the volume isn't there, everyone notices.
A friend had a system that was 104.5dB efficient in the bass region and used a 250 Watt amplifier, so it was producing about 128dB peaks at 65Hz, so that's not far off your typical Mackie powered sub output. That had a pair of 15" bass drivers, and we played several bands through it, but it was really only enough for a few dozen people when used outdoors, and that was mostly on concrete. On grass it would struggle even more.
Honestly I think most of the gigs could have been improved by a few dB more from the subs, so I think every dB that can be squeezed out of the bass is going to be appreciated.
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Hemisphere
It's always going to be a trade-off with various factors, and some will need to be sacrificed to boost the others: Sound quality, loudness, portability, affordability, bass extension, etc.
Yes, absolutely.
Portability in mind = Neo motor (more expensive)
Loudness = reduced or cancelled first octave 20-40hz
Sound quality = not overly stressed driver (bigger, more expensive)
It's always going to be a trade-off with various factors, and some will need to be sacrificed to boost the others: Sound quality, loudness, portability, affordability, bass extension, etc.
Yes, absolutely.
Portability in mind = Neo motor (more expensive)
Loudness = reduced or cancelled first octave 20-40hz
Sound quality = not overly stressed driver (bigger, more expensive)
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