custom sub exclosure, need large sub amp (1 Viewer)

[TimDean]

First of all, let me make it clear that I am one of those bass-heads from the car audio world. I am just now getting involved in the world of home theaters, and I need some suggestions on a dedicated sub amp for my system.

I plan to use two 15's (Shocker SS 15's, 400rms each.. little subs in the car stereo world), slot ported, 50 square inches of port or so per sub, tuned low (25hz?). Plan on doing one sub on each side of the screen or corner of room. Im looking for a 500x2 stereo amp, or 1000x1 mono (RMS of course) or something of that nature. I know.. this is way way overkill, and its not a big room, 14x14x10, but this is what I want.
Do you guys have any suggestions?

All these home theater brands are new to me.. im used to the MTX/JLAudio/Rockford Fosgate/Digital Designs/Earthquake/Zapco/Hifonics/Pioneer/Extant/RE/Kicker/TREO/MMats/etc.. I dont know anything about HT. :frowning:

Enclosures will be made of 1.5" MDF, 4-6 cubes each, ported, and braced properly.

Ive seen that SVS sells some high powered sub amps, are these any good? 500x2 for about $500 i think?

The rest of the system comprises of:
Optoma H31 projector + 100" diag screen
Yamaha RX-V757 Receiver
7.1 Ascend Acoustics speakers
-CMT-340M Mains x2
-CMT-340C Center x1
-CMB-170 Surrounds x4


Any and all comments are very appreciated.. thanks!



The other side.......
1990 Ford Aerostar
6 shocker xtreme 15's
12 earthquake D2 amps
24,000 watts RMS total
10 8D's and 8 optima batteries
lots and lots of steel and mdf
164.3 db on the dash!

 

[Mark--M]

Home theater is a completely different world. Room gain with HT is nothing close cabin gain in a car and you can pretty much forget about seeing the SPL's your used to. Takes a lot of power just to reach moderate levels in a room. I tried a friends car sub (that sounded great, best SQ in a car sub i've heard, and decently loud) in my home theater and it sounded like crap. I was shocked at just how much difference there is.

Again because of the lack of cabin gain you have to tune HT subs much lower to get a flat response. Most people seem to keep the tunning in the 15-25 Hz range, the majority are very close to 20 but it really all depends on the driver and what type sound your looking for. What are the parameters on those drivers?

The parts express plate amps are very commonly used. Heres a link to the 500w model: http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showd...number=300-806 They also have a 1000w avaialable too.

One more thing. You might want to check out the Ascendant audio Avalanche 15. They are currently on clearance and are being sold off for $225. http://www.ascendantaudio.com/archiv...anche%2015.htm I just picked one up myself. I'm not familier with the shockers but I'm guessing there may be better choices available in terms of drivers for HT.

 

[TimDean]

Thanks for the reply. I understand the SPL levels will be nothing like what can be reached in a vehicle. With this home theater, I am not going for SPL... Its just that I have ALOT (25 or so) extra subs laying around that I would like to put to use, and if one of these will work ok with for HT, why not use it? They are all car audio subs, Earthquakes, DD's, Pioneer, MTX, Extants, shockers... and Ive always enjoyed the sound of the shockers in vehicle applications.. but as you said, HT is way different from car audio and nothing will sound the same. Im just looking for a big amp to drive whatever subs I end up using. I will tune the box to 20hz and if the shockers dont work out, I have multiple other 15's to try out.. Im trying to avoid buying any more subs at the moment...

I understand that each sub has different specs and thus likes to be used with certain sized enclosures/tunning/environment, but do you think 6 cubes air volume, 60" slot port (4"x15" x very very deep), and 20hz tunning is a good place to start? I have tons of space to work with....

Thanks again

 

[Greg_R]

Finding an amp to drive 1 ohm reliably may be difficult. I would suggest staying with 2 or 4 ohm loads. Pro amps are your best bang for the buck. Check out Crown or QSC amps... they are conservatively rated. If you want a plate amp, check out partsexpress.com... they have a nice selection of plate amps from 25W->1kW. You may also want to consider adding a parametric EQ to your sub system. QSC has a really nice integrated solution w. their amps but many people go the cheap route (Behringer).

 

[BlakeN]

Tim could you post the model number for the speakers your going to use or a link to the T/S perameters. I tried searching for shocker ss and didnt have much luck.

It sounds like you like to listen to you bass very loud so you want to make absolutly sure your sub isn't going to unload and bottom out at 22Hz.

 

[Mark--M]

I think 60" is too much. That would require the port to be 60 inches long! Ports get long in a hurry with this kind of tunning. At that lenght you get a port resonance at 117Hz which is not good either, very close to the crossover point. The flared precision ports keep the port noise down even with a much smaller area (which also reduces length). Or you could go with a smaller slot port.

Do you have the parameters for that sub? I really think you should look into this first. Most car subs really dont perform well at all in boxs that are tunned this low. Some SQ subs are ok but you really should check it out. Post the parameters here and somebody will help you out.

 

[Geoff L]

As mentoned car audio and home audio, on the sub side of things especialy, is quite different.

You may have a favorite sub driver that you would like to use, but it my indeed not be the best choice of YOUR available laying around car based woofers for an HT-sub..

Post the drivers you have available to use and (their TS-params) and people can give you much better idea of which Woofer/s might be better suited to getting closer to what you want for deep decent to excellent HT bass.

Also if you have a max box volume/size per sub allowable in the room, post that also. Some drivers might/could require a box 10 times or more the size of what it might need for the same FR response in car, and of course spl will be no where near that of in car regardless of power used in the HT subs....

Until we have driver models and TS-params for them, it just kinda of a crap shoot... A low FS=20's, or lower, and a Qts from .3's to .4's "usually will make for a better HT driver canidate.

Those Params, low Fs, Qts #'s, and it's Le are "certainly" not set in stone by any means for a vented HT encloser, but something to look at/for amoungst all your raw woofers.

Once you post some driver info, then people can help much better from that point on so you get what you want from your HT-sub/s and not waste your time building, which would suck. :frowning:
If you have that many drivers laying around, one or more is bound to work decent for HT vented, fingers crossed...

Regards
Geoff ¥

 

[TimDean]

Thank you everone for all comments!


These subs are made by a company named "Shocker Audio" in Ohio. It is a one-guy show, and his company was also known as "Atomic Thunder", but a name change was needed due to lawsuit... Company was created out of interest for SPL in the car audio world, and most of his subs are designed for that one purpose, SPL. Ported applications only, extremely large magnets, multiple spiders, 3" voice coils in any configuration (even OCTO-COILS! yes, 8 coils per sub), and a power ratings around 1500 watts RMS for most subs (3" voice coils can only take so much...) These subs are no longer in production, and im not even sure if the company is still in existance (I think he is mostly doing recones these days)
But anyways, these particular subs (SS model) weren't meant for SPL, they were designed more for daily driving use. They are cheap subs, retail is only $100 for the 15". Power ratings are 300 or 400 RMS per sub, i forget.

specs on the shocker SS 15" subs...

Dual 2 ohm coils, in series...
RE OHMS 3.63
LE MH 2.04
QM 11.14
QE .240
QT .240
XMAX MM 6.03
BL TM 19.55
EFF % 1.54
FS HZ 25.20
MMS GMS 160.20
CMS mm/N .2490
RMS NS/M 2.2770
VAS LTRS 240.10
SD SCM 823.70
EBP 104.5
SPL dB 93.9

 

[Mark--M]

I think I'd just look for another driver. Maybe sell a couple if you have lots and purchase another driver with the cash.

I looked at those specs in Unibox and it dont look good at all. Assuming that box (6ft,20Hz) it looks like your going to be down almost 8dB at 20Hz from 80Hz. And its only going to take about 100w before you hit Xmax!

 

[Geoff L]

Yup, not a good choice by any means for a HT driver.

What else do you have.

That SS-Shocker with limted Xmax and PE your really stuck on just what you can build and do for them. I'd sell them off and pick up something different (this assuming no other drivers you have will work for HT), which we don't know yet. If your other drivers are primaraly "spl based subs", more than likely they won't work well for (smooth & deep HT response), again certainly not set in stone.

What Pioneer and Earthquake subs do you have and their Params, heck save time, post all driver models/sizes and their TS-params you have. Even basic params are better than nothing if thats all you have.

The SS-Shockers you listed are just not a very good choice at this point and most likely you would be quite disappointed with them quickly for HT use, (regargless of alignment)....
Not to say you can't use them, but quite sure you will wish you would have went a different way, (driver) once you finished them.

I do remember Shocker Audio, simmed all their drivers quite sometime back and only one, (can't remember model#) was somewhat "HT-useable", but for less money there were much better suited (HT) drivers out their.. The different Shocker lines of drivers were mostly suited nicely for spl car audio, but almost all drivers were just not designed for HT use..

Cheers
Geoff ¥

 

[TimDean]

Well since money is not an issue, I will go ahead and buy actual HT subs, so if you can recommend some good 15" or 18" HT subs that do well with 500watts RMS per sub, I'd like to hear about them. I can do up to $300 or so per sub (driver only)...?? Suggestions for amplifiers are welcome also..

Subs:
Ascendant Audio Avalanche 15" Dual 2ohm $300
Ascendant Audio Avalanche 18" Dual 2ohm $400

Amps:
500w RMS x 1 @ 4ohm Parts Express $250
1000w RMS x 1 @ 4ohm Parts Express $360
500w RMS x 2 @ 4ohm SVS Subs $460

I tried to post links but apparently I am not responsible enough for that yet.

 

[Mark--M]

If you want a fairly high output sub I dont know of anything out there better for the money then the Avalanche 15. They are actually on sale right now for $225. They went on clearance a few weeks ago, stock is probably getting low now. Their phone number is on their website, better give them a call soon.

I ordered the Avalanche 15 and plan to use the 1000w PE amp. But I havent even received the driver yet so I certainly cant say for sure how it sounds. But from what i've read in various forums it should be good. Hope so anyway.

 

[Brad E]

Tim, if money isn't an issue then go for the Avalanche 18's. I've heard nothing but good things about them.

I picked up 2 Atlas 15's myself (only got 1 running so far) and they are impressive to say the least.

Download this program WinISD Pro

Enter the T/S paramaters in it along with your box size (minus bracing, ports and driver volume) and it will give you a good idea of what to expect.

Another thing to look at is an infinite baffle. I don't know what your setup is like, but it's something to consider.
Cult of the Infinitely Baffled

 

[Geoff L]

Just some more stuff you might want to look at/into.

The first & 2nd links down aways are Kyles, owner of Acoustic-Visions, and he sells a many number of CO's products. Super nice guy is Kyle, and a very nice place/site to see a number of drivers amoungst many other things. He also dose awesome speaker & sub work if one decides to have a sub designed and built to your specifications by him.

Look around a bit at Kyles site as there is much to see, not just drivers, but Amps, Pr's, raw cabinets, finished cabs, prefab kits, raw flat & finished MDF kits, PP-Flared ports, cables, even pic's of customer subs, etc.

Other places to check out are Parts Express, Adire Audio, and Acoustic Elegance/AE formally Stryke. Many of these companies drivers can be bought threw Kyle at AV--> www.Acoustic-Visions.com or directly from AE and PE...

But, "Adire Audio" now sells drivers to their dealers only, Kyle & others, so no longer can one buy direct from Adire.
Improved Adire product woofer lines are just about to be released from them.
IMO, very nice drivers certainly, (Shiva, Tempest, Koda, Tumult) but the new rumored dealer pricing is not what it used to be when buying direct the same size driver.

Rumors are certainly flying around about this, so till ACTUAL real dealer listed pricing is up and drivers are shipping, who knows real pricing on the drivers. Also most of Adires driver lines have been upgraded (better parts, bigger X-max, cast basket & Smaller and Larger drivers in the same line) are now going to be available very soon.

You can see quite a number of different size and brands of drivers (most Co's mentioned above) at Kyles site
Here:
http://www.acoustic-visions.com/~aco.../by_size.shtml

Stryke/AE, is just now releasing their AV-line again, 2nd generation (just beautiful high performance-drivers)

and they can be seen
Here:
www.aespeakers.com/products.php

Parts Express has a number of nice low to higher end drivers, many seen at Kyles site, that can be bought from him or direct from PE. PE also carries a number of "other brands" besides their own. See what they have if you like
Here:
www.PartsExpress.com

There are naturaly a number of other drivers out their that work nicely & of course the already mentioned excellent ~{Ascendant Audio}~ woofs.! Most likely the (best for the buck) drivers "available currently"...
This especialy if you get in on the (close out 12" 15" & 18" Atlas and Avalanche) pricing..

GR Research has an excellent 12" Driver PR kit available. You build the box, (1.8 to 2.4-ft^3), a great value for your bucks. 150.00 + ship for all, driver/Pr's.
"I belive"... :b
A number of reviews with pic's of this sub kit can be found if you do a google search. www.AudioCircle.com has a guy or 2 that has built a couple of these and loves them.. Pic's if you can find his posts their...

Guess In the end:
******************
The driver or divers you may choose to use, regardless, will obviously be based on what your going to do with them and any other constraints & or wants you may need/have. Just throwing out some of the stuff thats out their. There are other drivers/brands that work for HT for sure, but these are probably the most popular woofers DIY'ers use for typical box or sono tube subs, Sealed and or Vented.

PE has Plate Amps and some Pro Power Heads that you might also look at. You might like to check out Adire Audios amps at Kyles site. Also, www.RythmikAudio.com both selling amps from 250 to 1200-watts of Plate power. Some having extra goodies on them, like built in Pari-eq, damping selection, and selectable SS filter..

Nandy and Behringer-(sp) both are popular Pro Power Head brands "for HT SUB Woofer use" (lots'a power on the cheap).. Far better amps than their pricing would indicate, when talking powering subwoofers ONLY. The specific model #s for each brand escape me at the moment. Most purchase these amps online from pro audio sites.

More Drivers:
**************
You can also check out some "TC-Sounds" drivers at:
www.OAudio.com
www.SoundSplinter.com

Enjoy your time researching all your HT-subwoofer goodies..!

Also try/play with Unibox for simming, I prefer it to Winz.

Regards
Geoff ¥
Edit: Fixed bad link..:b
It's late and yah screw crap up now and then...

 

[TimDean]

I'm going to try out the Ascendant Avalanche 18's... x2 Going to place the order tomorrow (hopefully they still have some 18's available, if not I will do 15's) I will keep everyone updated on how they work out, and I may be back if I have any questions. You guys have been great! (this place is like the termpro of the HT world, and thats a good thing )

FYI.. the Adire Audio subs are popular among car audio fans too.. so if anyone has some of these, they are universal subs And same goes for winISD...

Thanks again,

 

[Brad E]

Take a look at the "hair trick" vids on this page.
http://www.woofervids.com/thumbnails.php?album=77

They are vids of the Avalanche 15's in action. Just think what the 18's would be like.

 

[TimDean]

nice videos... but its nothing new to me.. :p)
my van does the "hair trick", but it also does the "windshield spider trick", lol but it gets expensive :frowning:

 

[Brad E]

Now that would make a good video.