A focal/alpine/other 12 subwoofer for sealed enclousre at home?

[shlomo]

Hi,
Is there an reason to as to NOT but a car subwoofer and use it in a sealed box for home use?

Has anyone done that before?
Thank you,

[nephylum]

Originally Posted by shlomo

Hi,
Is there an reason to as to NOT but a car subwoofer and use it in a sealed box for home use?

Has anyone done that before?
Thank you,

no... car subs have been used too many times to count in ht. if you already own the sub, then use it. if not, buy a ht sub. end of debate

[chris661]

I'd like to point out that the OP asked for a reason.

Generally speaking, car-based subwoofers are of very low efficiency, meaning they're require a lot of power to do much. Adding more power heats the voice coil(s), leading to power compression, and eventual thermal failure of the driver. The 1000w power ratings count for little here: imagine a electrical heater. They'll also dissipate around 1000w.
Speakers, generally, are very inefficient, with <1% being fairly common for most drivers. So, given 1% efficiency (comes out around 91dB, I seem to remember), of your 1000w of subwoofer power handling, it needs to get rid of 990w of heat.

Something of higher efficiency is usually prefered, as everything is given an easier time.

Another thought: car subs will be designed with intent towards a car-based environment, where there's loads of cabin gain available. This means the response needn't be flat at all: the car fills it in for you!! With this in mind, a driver intended for use in the car won't usually be suitable for in-house use, as rooms provide different interactions (ie, less gain at low frequencies).

Chris

[Cal Weldon]

Combine what both of them said

1) Yes you can do it but it's not the best idea.
2) If you already own it, ok, otherwise buy a hi-fi driver.

[shlomo]

First, thank you all for the prompt reply. The reason I was asking was because of a local sale for Focal 12 car sub-woofer drivers (50% discount) . So to answer your question, no, I do not own one but its very tempting to buy one. And inferring from your answers, what would be a good 12 sub-woofer driver intended mostly for home use (mostly listening to music and not rather HT use). The focal is an eye candy

[chris661]

I suppose that, given plenty of power and some eq, you could get it working.

Best bet would be to download winISD (or some other bass response modelling software), put the driver's parameters in, see what comes out. Be prepared to compromise on box size vs low frequency output.