Shiva-54l sealed vs 85l vented (1 Viewer)

[Dean-P]

I currently have a 54l sealed shiva but would like to see if I could get something better in terms of loudness.
I like the sealed for music but during movies I would like it a bit louder if possible.
I'm looking at the 85l vented (but could be swayed if bigger is louder!) and plan on making it in a sonotube.

2 questions:

1- Will it be louder?
2- Is a sonotube better than a box? and why if so?

Buying a Tempest is out of the question as money talks...

Thanks Dean

 

[Mike SJ]

cant you just upgrade your sub amp?

 

[ThomasW]

There is no sonic difference between a tube and a box.

If you want more output using the same driver and amp, the box needs to be MUCH bigger, and even then the difference won't be huge.

 

[Dean-P]

But won't the vented go louder down longer?

I know you (ThomasW) said that I should have gone with a 250w vice 150w I chose, so if I upgrade the amp with the 250w and make a 95L vented, it would go louder?

From what I've read from others, they only turn their gain up about 1/4 to 1/2(250w) while I have mine at about 3/4(150w) so I assume the driver is what I would want to upgrade instead??
Without getting a new driver or amp, would it be asssumed that is all I'm going to get out of this Shiva??

 

[Mike SJ]

Dean, do you have an SPL meter? like how loud do you normally listen to stuff at, when does it sound too loud, and from those answers, how loud do you want your stereo to go?

 

[ThomasW]

Oops my bad, missed the 'vented' part. Yes going vented will play louder, a couple of db or so. There will also be more low output depending on the port tuning.

Shiva is rated to 650 watts total, it can handle quite a bit of power. So if you upgrade the amp and go 95L vented, it will play quite bit louder.

 

[Wayne Ernst]

This might be kind of hard as the poster indicated that his budget was small - and could not even go with a Tempest driver.

 

[TimForman]

Or you could do something like this or
this

 

[Dean-P]

Thanks for the help guys!
I'll start planning for a vented sub, either the 85 or 95 depending on the final size and try to upgrade the amp to a 250w.

Questions now:

If, in the meantime I use my current amp, it has a 6db bass boost at about 35hz. Do I need to disable this?
Secondly, do I need some sort of filter? Adire recommends this in their plans...
Here is a link to my amp .

Edit:I tried some calculations using WinISD using the Adire plans and the ports show up as way longer than what Adire recommends(including the extra 5" fro non flared ports)The 85L with a 3" port shows, tuned to 20hz, comes up as 34".
I would like to make the 95L with a 4" straight pipe but WinISD shows a 44.4" vice Adire's plans of 17" corrected using straight pipe.
What's up here? Is WinISD out to lunch?

 

[Dean-P]

bump!

 

[ThomasW]

Yes

Just use the Adire plans, they are optimized for the best performance

 

[Dean-P]

Thank you ThomasW

 

[TimForman]

Some of the modeling programs are better than others but all of them provide a direction to go, not the destination.