advice needed- lightest, loudest, lowest sub

[eRiCdWoNg]

....this is gonna be quite a balance, and a hard one, but I'm gonna throw this one out. This is for a car, but its still a loudspeaker

This is what I need, I need an enclosure that will enclosure perhaps 2 15"s. The box will probably be ported for maximum output. Any recommendations on drivers that can take alot of wattage, and make alot of output but at the same time play very low.

I'm thinking fiberglass enclosure as its rather light and moldable and I've already started on it. Not sure what to make the baffle, but I'd like it to be as light as possible. I wonder if anybody has made a speaker enclosure out of carbon fiber ($$$!), I'm sure that would be strong and light.

Also on a seperate note, does anybody know if the servodrive mechanisms are available individually (I doubt it, but worth a try) cause I see some real good potential to be used in a car type enviroment with the servo drive motors instead of conventional magnets and coils.

[mikee12345]

loud low clean small? u want everything :P

For value for money-tempest
For expensive- Brahmas

dont chose the woofer size til u know u can fit the box required :P
The brahmas have less box requirement.
Check the respl.com for woofers...they really honk apparently/

Servo technologies-
see the Wireless world article i think it is
This has been discussed in the past-
its extremely tricky you have to know how to design it,using a little G meter thingie,>accelerometer< , with circuitry feedback loop to reduce distortion-however theres inherent lag..instability oscillations etc etc...

[eRiCdWoNg]

Originally posted by mikee12345
loud low clean small? u want everything :P

For value for money-tempest
For expensive- Brahmas

dont chose the woofer size til u know u can fit the box required :P
The brahmas have less box requirement.
Check the respl.com for woofers...they really honk apparently/

The box size is going to be 1.5 to 2.0 cubic foot per side (2 sides). So this should be a decent amount.

Im not sure if I wnat to go with the Adire series, I had their Tumult sub which was supposed to be the bomb but I did not find that so whatsoever, but thats an entire different thread. Anyway, I'm thinking of something more the lines of the DIY brands, not kicker, JL audio etc cause they're expensive.

[batdorf9]

i'm not sure what you've got in mind for the box, but i'm hoping it's some sort of sandwich composite. I'd do perhaps fiberglass or graphite or aluminum skins on some sort of core, either honeycomb or foam. aircraft spruce or wicks are decent diy composite suppliers. i imagine you can also buy pre-maid panels from somewhere. i've seen them at mcmaster-carr for sure, but they're probably available other places as well.

i guess all this seems a bit dopey if you're going to toss 2 30 lb drivers in it though. and on top of that you toss it into a 3000 lb car. ???

- Robert

[eRiCdWoNg]

Well my current box of 2 15s is in the neighborhood of 80 lbs and I can notice a difference in the handling and acceleration and braking of my car. I guess I forgot to mention the sub should be light too.

I wish I could build a labhorn in my car, however it would be heavy as balls unless I could make it out of some sort of space age polymer. I think I'll try to limit the weight to 50 lbs net, if thats at all possible.

[batdorf9]

what sort of budget are you working with here?

[eRiCdWoNg]

Well of course best bang for the buck, Id say $400-500 on drivers. I'm thinking about using 2 12" Dayton DVC subs (the close out ones) from partsexpress, or an alternative Eclipse DVC aluminum series woofers.

Unfortunately I checked the weight of the above woofers, I dunno about the Eclipse but the Dayton is 32 lbs a piece heh. I also read that the labhorns dont work that well in a car audio enviroment.

[batdorf9]

a single one of the 15" would make more sense to me as the motor is the heavy part. with two 12's you've got two heavy motors. with a single 15, you've got one heavy motor and 1.5x the surface area of 2 12's. Fs seems a bit high on (these right?) closouts for a home sub. not sure about in a car though.

how about an adire tumult 15? 34mm xmax and around $500.

tumult link


- Robert

[eRiCdWoNg]

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshow...number=299-665

Yes I think Im going to go with a single 15 in a 3.0 or so cubic ft vented enclosure. Itll be 1/2 the weight (almost) which also means 1/2 the cost and Ill just use my existing amplifier without buying a 2nd one.

I always thought 2 12s' surface area is larger then a single 15 but I calculated that using 12 and 15, not the actual effective piston diameter. Hmm.

I think 34 may be appropriate for a car mostly to avoid that typical 30-50 hz bump of car audio.

Im tossed up between that driver and this JBL driver http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshow...number=299-750

However I think the close out model would be better cause my amp works best in a bridged 2 ohm load and will put out about 1000 watts that the woofer is rated to handle.

BTW, I used to have a Tumult. Hated that thing. I tried like 4 different enclosures with it, with 3 different audio systems and it wouldnt play loud at all, nor did it integrate well to anything either. It was so inefficient I even took my Crown Macro-Tech 5000VZ amplifier to drive it and it sure didnt have the 3" excursion it claimed.

[sunil]

Buy the best 12" you can afford. Design a closed box with a Q of 1, which would keep the size small. Then use a "Linkwitz Transform" & get the Q to 0.707 & the "fs" to what you think you're listening space can handle without added room problems.