What about the distance between the sub vent and the back wall? Is there some "standard" that cam be followed or can you basically be 1/8" clear (or 1/4", or 1/2", etc.) from it?
I listen to a wide spectrum of music genres and while I notice my preffered sealed enclosures aren’t as strong with the deep bass of rap, I can’t sacrifice their accuracy with percussion in rock and other genres. Investing in better subs with appropiate amplification can compensate for the lower efficiency. Thanks for another great video.
I listen to EVERYTHING music wise, from hardcore rap to Bob Marley then Megadeth and other metal stuff, acoustic and much more.. I have been satisfied with crisp, slamming bass no matter what music I was listening to with the sub's ported very low. I would think sealed would sound a little better, but I think the low port tuning gives a little flatter curve so it sounds good and hits hard, least it sure seems to.. I am hoping to install my 7 band rear and 5 band front EQ which should really get it sounding clean as well.
Agreed 100%. The types of music I listen to don't require that big low blast. Nor do I really want that much output. The sealed box works well for me and thay is what I have in my car 90% of the time. I'm kind of an audio nut so I have tons of different amps and subs and I'm constantly buying stuff to add to the collection. From time to time I will throw a different box in the car and set it up for that enclosure and play with that for a couple weeks. I've noticed huge differences not only between Woofer sizes, but between enclosure sizes too, even though they're getting similar power. You should put whatever box you have space for, possibly choosing a Woofer that will work keat with your available space and also the type of music you listen to predominantly.
@@derekgardin1512 absolutely, although I am definitely an audiophile, almost snob at times, I also love the slamming, hard Hitting, low bass from some rap and some bass tunes etc .. but it has to sound good, and switch to Megadeth or whatever and sound just as it should too!!
@@derekgardin1512 Then I suggest you ditch a car audio subwoofer and get a dedicated woofer like the Peavey Black Widow or PRV MB series or Electro Voice woofers or any PA type woofer designed for concerts. They are ear splitting loud but not intended to be so loud under 35hz but for everything above that up to 5khz.
I'm 52 and from 1993 until 2015 I ran sealed. In 2015 I bought my first ported enclosure for two alpine type S. Man what a difference. Ported is the way to go IMO
Depends on what type of vehicle you're putting them in! Correctly ported gives stepped up decibel output in the lower frequency ranges but at the compromise of distortion & power handling. I've tried Alpine S-Series in a Chrysler minivan- Ported enclosures versus sealed enclosures and No if and buts about it a sealed enclosure clearly outperforms ported. larger Vehicles open up lower frequencies such as vans. And also the S-Series Alpine Subs just don't work as good in a ported box.. .
@@bobadingoYour opinion of sealed boxes outperforming ported boxes is funny lol. A sealed box will never ever in my eyes and alot of bass heads eyes beat a ported box. A properly tuned ported box will be way more efficient than any sealed box. Less power to make more boom.
@@thelegendarywasdgamer9724 the last word in your comment is exactly the results of a ported enclosure! we no longer worry about efficiency as amplifiers have plenty of power nowadays any audio file will clearly tell you what system sounds best but also tuning ported closure is next to an impossibility in an automobile, you don't just tune it to the driver! you tune it to vehicle cab volume and a lot of people don't know that, just the placement of a subwoofer makes a massive difference. the type of vehicle, it's ambient noise footprint, & various other parameters all go into tuning an enclosure for a particular vehicle remember We reproduce music in its original form and not to add Distortion and falsified frequency ranges.. .
For car bass, ported is always the way to go. Very few sealed applications will sound better or louder for bass reproduction in a car. I have one 10 ported right now that is just as loud as two 12s sealed so imagine the usable car area being saved. Sealed just doesn't make much sense anymore.
Thank you for such an informative experiment. Being a bass lover and had built numerous speakers and subs for past 20 yrs here in Singapore, I would like to share these observations: - MDF wood made enclosures needs much lesser bracing than plywood enclosures to sound equally good. - MDF Wood doesn't do well in wet, rain or outdoor conditions. - Sealed subs produced the least spectrum decay bass, typically less than 10ms aka 'tight' or 'defined' bass. Comparing to ported subs designs, bass seems much lesser. - Most ported subs are capable of producing more bass than enclosed subs. However, the bass has longer decay around 10-20ms. Which most folks deem bass as 'fuller' sounding. Seems like a little bass decay may not be such a bad thing . - passive radiator subs produced the most bass among the 3 types of enclosure but has the longest bass decay, usually 20ms & above. Some may find this type of bass undefined or 'boomy'. Still this type of subs are great for outdoor. Bass can be felt further than the other 2 types of subs. - Lastly, if space is limited, I like to used sealed subs with Apex Aural Exciter+Big Bottom. This is often used in P.A to extend the bass decay to sound fuller without increasing volume. Fav subs: Cerwin Vega 15" drivers, Das Audio PA 18" drivers and Magnum extra long throw 12" drivers, Eminence 15" drivers & Audax 8". Software used: Winspeakerz.
Thank you!!! …for mentioning passive radiators instead of ports. Some of the smartest and best sounding speakers ever made used P/Rs, and were moderate to relatively small enclosures. Ported cabinets unload the woofer below port tuning and let it flop in the wind, hence is that popping sound that we’ve all heard banging our ears at that point. And also, sealed or P/R enclosures have a much higher transient response or group delay which is why the fans of those boxes say they sound better. They get moving almost instantly, vs the ported and buried woofer designs taking forever to get going(and also stop stroking too, causing harmonic distortions). Loudness and feeling the kick are great when experienced together, no need to have to choose one or the other. That’s an old 80’s car audio myth.
I am a sound quality guy but love the deep bass also. I have a 2012 GMC Sierra and made a sealed enclosure for my Skar EVL-10 to fit under the front arm rest between my front seats. I am powering it with my Rockford Fosgate 1200-1D. I listen to literally everything music and this performs VERY VERY well!
This is a nice video to show how a acoustic suspension box can deliver different results depending on box volume. Also a great woofer to use. This is one of your best DIY!
IMO sealed, OB, or IB are the clear winners for sound quality _IF_ you use an appropriate driver. The trick is that the market is so heavily skewed toward tuned cabinets that the selection of such drivers is limited. For deep bass in a sealed enclosure you need both low fs and rather high Qts. That is to say the huge magnets that sell so well are contraindicated. The other thing that is often not considered is room or cabin gain. If f3 is significantly below the frequency where room gain starts you get a nasty bloom or bloat in bass output and then when the 4th order roll-off kicks in the bottom falls out. For some applications this is no big deal but for serious music listening it can be a problem. In a sealed enclosure the 2nd order roll-off is closer to the room gain boost curve so the final result is often more natural. I also think that in general (up to a point) you are better off getting your displacement from larger cone area than from excursion.
What you don't mention is that every car/truck will have what they call "cabin gain" which boosts the low frequencies so that in fact a very small box can sound very good in a specific vehicle. The best non boomy bass I ever had was an 8 inch woofer in a sealed box with a QTC of 1 and a FC of 60 Hz. It could easily play to 20 Hz and below in my Honda CRX. Using Mike Oldfield's The Songs of Distant Earth CD, the bass on the track Ascension sounded excellent and extended below even what my house subwoofer could play.
Nice video showing frequency comparisons. One thing to consider is that sealed enclosures generally produce less distortion below the box's resonant frequency than ported enclosures. Ported boxes don't provide driver damping below the enclosure's resonant frequency, allowing the driver to vibrate unhindered.
No question you're right that the properly designed ported enclosure is going to outperform the sealed at low frequency. However, the extreme difference shown on the graph looks more like the result of testing a driver that prefers a ported enclosure. I suspect it's a bit less dramatic when testing speakers that are specifically built for sealed applications. Also, you can EQ boost a sealed sub (within reason) all the way down to the lowest frequencies. You can't boost a ported sub below it's port tuning because it lacks the air suspension to dampen it's movement and it will likely be destroyed.
I haven't built a subwoofer box since 2001 but it was such a satisfying experience that just watching this video gave me a vicarious thrill. As soon as I upgrade vehicles and get my hands on about 3 or 4 thousand extra bucks (or a credit card offer with a 0% intro rate for a year) I'm gonna do it right like you did. Some of these new software tools (and old but improved ones like WinISD) can really make sound quality AND simultaneous ground pounding SPL a thing. I'm gonna invest time and money into sound deadening every damned rattle panel on whatever SUV/crossover I end up with. I SHALL ACCEPT NO RATTLES! My cat is this gigantic orange tabby who used to be a feral street thug who had a rattlesnake rattler installed on the tip of his tail to be more intimidating and I've always just accepted it, but no more!
Great video explaining how the basics work. Please can you do this test again with all 3 boxes but now put in the fabric that fools the subwoofer into thinking it is in a bigger box. I see other comments about doing a ported one, which would be fun, but just adding some speaker fabric (don't know technical name) into it, how much does it increase the perceived volume. Since the boxes are already made, not much has to be changed.
Not only you explained it well, but you took the time to get a loan and purchase the mdf. 🤪. On a serious note, my single cab had the largest enclosure that would fit and it was still too small so I bought irrigation 3” pipe and cut it into several lengths ( tested all three to find the optimal one) to create a ported enclosure. I ran the pipe along the back wall of the cab and towards the passenger side. Ironically enough even though it sounded louder it still had the punchy tight bass of a sealed enclosure and I added another one. Tuning for a specific vehicle is monotonous and sometimes it sucks but it’s 💯 rewarding when you nail it!
I kerf and port every enclosure including the port. Haven’t met a sub that sounds cleaner in a sealed enclosure! I also am a fan of fit the sub to the vehicle because they don’t fit the car around the subs! Awesome video! Excellent job explaining the difference in enclosure size and why experienced builders don’t just guess!
I just watched a video a$80 Walmart subwoofer and he put 3000 watts through it, crazy how stuff has changed in 20 years since I was into stereo stuff. Now I am starting over, great info.
It is something that I had to learn in order to build speakers, that is what I find so fascinating about the hobby. It overlaps with so many other hobbies.
Yes, absolutely. I have learned a lot. Installing alone you get to play with electrical wires and connectors, solder, dismantling car interiors. If youre fabricating boxes; woodworking or fiberglass, possibly upholstery/paint or other finishing. All of these skills are valuable in so many other aspects of life. Props to you for diving into woodworking instead of buying prefab or having someone else do it.
Thank you for the great video. In winisd don't forget to encourage your viewers to look at group delay when comparing two models. The sealed enclosure will handly outperform most any ported design when judged on basis of a metric that quantifies transient response, but will need more drivers/excursion if it is to stack up to the ported design in steady state SPL. The casual listener is accustomed to late bass, but will prefer "tight" bass, all other things being equal, 100% of the time. Late bass isn't phase aligned well with the harmonics of the waveform being reproduced. Its the kid that always lags behind riding bikes around town. With complex numbers, like Winisd most certainly uses, there are at minimum two plots that define a response. Magnitude and phase. It is probably worth the small amount of time to play around with the parameters in the planning phase of a project, maybe sacrifice low end extension to give a better transient response, at a minimum know what the tradeoff is in simulation land.
Awesome video. It's rare to see a sub that performs so we'll sealed and ported, but I'm even more surprised by how much better the ported enclosure performs here.
Before you closed this video out, I was already thinking about how easy it would be to cut in holes for a passive radiator in each box and try this test again. Then seeing the graph line for the ported enclosure, I think this really needs doing. Hopefully you still have those 3 boxes laying around. I just bought an 8" JLW3 and I'm really tight on space in my '21 F150. I'm going go build a shallow, thin box, as wide as I can manage (I also need storage space) and I'm going to try a Kicker 8" passive radiator setup. I know it's not going to be ideal, but the differences in boxes seem small enough that it will still be great for what I need it for, pushing 250w RMS @ 4ohms. Box size will be roughly 10"x 6"x 24" with a bit of slope to follow the pitch of the seat bottom. But I'm hoping for the sweet (middle) spot between a sealed enclosure and a ported enclosure. I just don't have room for a 10" radiator, so 8" will have to do.
In my experience with a comprt 10 inch in .4 cubic feet. You don’t wanna underestimate the importance of getting/making a bigger box. After watching this video I’m am 99 percent sure my small box is the result of poor performance even in the higher frequencies. Think about it, you get a subwoofer. More than likely you want it for the low frequencies your door speakers can’t play. I’m more committed to going ported now haha. Also thanks for your videos they help a lot!
I did an experiment with a subwoofer in different enclosures: large sealed, small ported, large ported. The large ported sounds the best, and that's what I ended up using. I actually used to be a sealed enclosure purist until I built a proper ported box tuned for flat response.
I have 3 types of 10" subwoofers in my listening room. 1. a downfiring powered subwoofer. 2. a Kerf Subwoofer and 3. a Sealed subwoofer. I am using Revel 10" drivers in all of them. To my personal taste, the best sound in the Sealed subwoofer, I just have it because a good friend gave it to me, after over 35 years of buying and building subwoofers, I can tell you that my last subwoofer ( the sealed one ) that I modified, is, by far, the best in sound performance, took me all these years to find out. Really worth to have sealed subwoofers, BUT they tend to be bigger than the others and need at least 30% more power.
Best system I ever had in a vehicle was an SQ box sealed for 4 12s on 4000 watts, could play everything extremely accurately with insane output and hit lower than a ported SQ box I also had that was tuned to 30hz
@@Luminous.Dynamics phoenix gold elite series subs with phoenix gold elite.1 amp wired to .5ohm with elite series door speakers and tweeters as well with 2 more amps.
Had 2 kicker 10’s in small truck enclosure- sounds great but thru the years it was time to buy new ones- Bought the same kicker 10’s but in a big ported kicker box- same 600rms on 600rms kicker amp Holy shhh what a difference- If u buying subs get the biggest box u can for that sub- and get an epicenter
Great video!!! This makes so much sense. I have a ported box for my subwoofers and I would never use a sealed box for them because the difference in output is huge. However, for the midbasses in my doors, sealed would be perfect. It won't take a lot of space and since they are running from 80 hz to 800 hz, I don't need to worry about it getting low. But for subwoofers, I would 100% use ported enclosures.
@@DIYAudioGuy It was, that is why I subscribed to your channel. There is a tremendous amount of things I can learn from you so that I can keep improving my car audio system. Cheers!!!!!
A friend of mine back in the 90’s had a new Chevy standard cab. He had two 10’s in a box that took up the space behind the seat. Even moved the seat forward but was still small for two 10’s. He went to a stereo shop to see about adding two more 10’s I kept telling him it’s to small for the two he had now. He had to put a big amp just to make it sound decent
I put my threaded inserts in from the bottom of baffle and use longer screws to avoid the head of inserts not being flush. You can thread screws from either end of the inserts so it works great because if you need to take screws out when you turn screws counter clockwise since they are threaded through the non head end of insert it doesn't loosen insert but tries to tighten it
What about a somewhat shallow box but big spacing around the speaker.. I’m looking at using a 15 in a shallow mounting but the space around the speaker is almost infinite.. and sealed. But possibly can be ported.
Putting a subwoofer with lots of linear excursion and high power handling/mechanical resilience in a small (sealed) enclosure is common and useful, as long as you achieve your desired target function by utilising a DSP/EQ or something akin. This principle is widely known as "Under Resonance Principle Subwoofer", short URPS. It works totally fine if you know what you're doing.... With cheap DSPs and cheap powerful amps, the size of sealed enclosures doesn't really matter anymore. It does matter if you're trying to manipulate your speaker with its enclosure only...but who does that anyway?
Does the DSP have to stay connected all the time? Like a miniDSP? I want good base for Jazz music. Do you recommend a good 10" or 12" and sealed I assume? Is there a specific driver you can recommend?
I am 54 and in 2015 I cut the bed of my truck to the cab and I have ran a 4th order blowthru with 4 18s. I just put a new to me 2020 deck in the dash and it is even louder and cleaner than before
One thing I do notice is that nearly all sub boxes are made from raw mdf. I’m a trade cnc machinist with 25 years experience and when you put raw mdf onto a machine you can feel the vacuum pressure through the mdf. Raw mdf is even used as a sacrificial sheet on nesting machines. When I make my sub boxes I use melamine board or use a quality paint sealer inside the box. You probably can’t hear the difference but I bet air will be getting pushed and pulled through raw mdf on sealed boxes
True (I make speakers). It breathes primarily thru the surface layer of spongy material. Same is true for damping materials. So - more important to seal the inside of enclosure than the outside
This doesn't actually happen. This was a popular demonstration a couple of decades ago as a constant vacuum can indeed pull air through MDF. A woofer, however, is not a constant vacuum - it is cycling 20-80 times a second. The change from vacuum to pressure is too fast for the air to move through the wood.
Awesome information 👍 I learned this the hard way . Had 4 10s in sealed enclosure only 2 ft3 total. Sounded great above 45hz but just fell off hard after that . It sounded much better with only 2 10s in the same air space. Then I moved along to ported enclosures tuned low with big port area. Soooo much better 😎
I get a lot of people asking for advice on under-seat truck enclosures. Now I can just link them to this video and hopefully they will stop trying to cram 4 12's under the back seat of a truck.
I have Sundown SA12 v2"s CRAMMED into a box under my seat in my silverado extended cab, it was a down firing box, I put 1 1/8 mdf to block the bottom hole and cut holes in the top and then added 1" spacers AND had to grind the mdf to fit the magnet. It dose hit hard but I wonder if it would hit harder with shallow subs or just sound way cleaner. I'm going for as much feelable bass as possible, I'm obnoxious lol
Excellent video 👍 One question I have though is... How did they sound? Especially at the point where they were all equal in level. Was the smaller box quicker and tighter sounding is my point. If so, then the lower frequencies could really be potentially EQed if the speaker is playing a lot under its capability. Also a much more efficient bass driver could be used and rolled off if matching with mids / trebles if volume was an issue under the seat / wheel well etc. An excellent video 👍 I was looking at using a larger bass driver in a much too small box with a full range drive for home audio as an idea.. speed accuracy, control, phase and response time are what I am interested in. Rarely do I like the sound of vented inclosures.
That's a good question, I didn't really hook them up and do a listening test. I suppose I need to pop them in my truck and see how they sound with cabin gain.
@@DIYAudioGuy Yes, I would have also liked to have seen what the in-vehicle low-end extension and overall response of each size enclosure was with the added transfer function or "cabin gain" of your truck. I would have also like to have seen the response of the small and medium size enclosures compared to the next larger enclosure with the small & medium boxes stuffed with 75% Polyfill. The loose Polyfill stuffing (or lamb's wool, fiberglass batting, etc.) can effectively make the box act as if it were up to ~20% larger. The polyfill works by converting the vibrational energy of the subwoofer to low level heat. There is an article with tests and charts from the March/April 1995 issue of Car Stereo Review magazine by Tom Nuissane. Search for "Glasswolf, Tom Nuissane, Make a small box act like a larger one with polyester fiberfill". So if you are stuck with using a smaller than ideal sealed box for your subwoofer, you'll probably benefit from adding some Polyfill stuffing to the enclosure.
Hey! I don't know if you've done this yet - and it involves quite a bit more expense and time - but I would like to see a comparison of a 6", 8", and 10" woofer (as close to identical as possible except for size) in the same boxes you have there. I am particularly interested in the sound quality as a subwoofer with the same passive 3-way system that is an inexpensive bookshelf size. There are about a hundred iterations of possible combinations here - and for many of those you would just vary the low end on the paired speaker. I'd also like to see the effect of adding a port in both speakers in multiple locations (that wouldn't be hard.) You've got a million views here - I'll bet you didn't expect that. How about a repeat? (I'll check your text.)
Ported is good if you don't like good bass. All cheap home subwoofers use ported designs. The better expensive ones are sealed. Do you think JL Audio would make a $12,000 subwoofer sealed if ported had better sound? Ported subs are out of phase at a certain frequency, and sealed enclosures handle more power. The only real benefit of ported designs is getting more output with less power, so manufacturers can save money using cheaper amps.
All 3 sealed boxes can produce the same results with EQ/transform, but the small box needs more power to do it and may begin to stretch the limits of the thermal power handling of the voice coil if driven hard. A vented enclosure will have to quite a bit larger than sealed for a woofer like this to handle the air displacement without chuffing noise (the port itself will likely have to consume more space by itself than one of the smaller sealed boxes). You could put a pair of these subs into a sealed box the size of the single-driver vented box and achieve similar results with EQ/transform. Or... do what I did and put the UM-10 in a bass horn enclosure. ~25-80hz with ~95dB@2.83V sensitivity.
Ported is always more efficient and much louder bass. Whether its oval port or rectangular the sound is the most reinforcement of the bass frequencies. Passive radiator, band pass and sealed boxes do not have the high decibel reinforcement of the bass frequencies as ported. With ported you essentially double the maximum watts handling of your speaker, regarding the bass. With a ported box, your speaker cone excursion is far less, cleaner less distorted bass, and the bass is double the decibels, of any box design. The only issue is the ported box can sound boomy. You will need a tuned box with proper insulation to cut down on a boomy sound.
Sealed enclosures have a much better impulse response, and thus perform better especially when it comes to percussion. It tends to feel "tighter" and more accurate. If you just want lots of low end, sure go for the ported. But generally speaking, the sealed enclosure will feel more musical, which will ultimately sound and feel better.
I personally dont know too much about building boxes but, what if you were to preset the walls and woofer in the box and outline the underside where the breathing hole is and cut it out, would it help?
Thanks for the video! It's like you knew exactly what I wanted to see. I've always thought it would be fun to build a few boxes and compare them. **(Sorry for the wall of text lol, it makes sense in my head but as I type it, it might get a bit disorganized and lose a bit of my intended meanings)** One thing to touch on is the sealed box for the UM10 (and just about any sub) is when comparing these sealed enclosures, it's good to keep an eye on cone excursion. I bought the sealed kit for my UM10 so the box was 1.5 cubic feet. Technically 1.5 cubic feet and a 1 cubic foot box would perform identically. Only difference is efficiency of the bigger box would add a dB or so to the sensitivity around 20Hz. Which personally to me is insignificant and almost pointless. If you look at cone excursion for them, I'll look at 20Hz for this example, the cone excursion for the 1cuft box is touching xmax on 500w. While it takes 400w to reach xmax on the 1.5cuft box. So while you can get an extra 1dB on 100w less power, in reality that extra output you'll likely never hear. And you gain more the lower it plays, but this sub isn't going to do that well under 20Hz, and the cone excursion rises fast in the 1.5cuft box to the point it physically can't perform better than the 1cuft box under 20Hz. I know you didn't go bigger than a 0.85cuft box in the video. But in the end the 0.85cuft box after looking at it in WinISD is probably the biggest box you need for the UM10 sealed. Because any bigger won't really give you any big additional improvements due to xmax limits on rated power. Which you basically already shown in the video with the small vs medium showing a much smaller difference. Touching on the ported part. You've already seen my PR box for my UM10 but it basically acts like ported and going from sealed to that new (not new these days but you get what I mean) box it was like a whole new sub. Blew my mind with the low end I got out of it the first time I played it. Sound quality didn't get worse. IMO it sounds 10x better being able to cover a wider bandwidth. Anyway, sorry for the rambling lol. Thanks again for the entertaining video!
@@DIYAudioGuy awesome I use this method on almost all my enclosures even though they are ported i cover every wall with a layer except the entire port length area I don’t. From what I hear it gives the enclosure more range and just a better sound musically. Also seem to have some db gain as well. Can’t wait to see what the numbers are.
Threaded insert hack … if you install the threaded insert from the rear of the baffle (before assembly if you can) it will prevent you form having to countersink. The lip of the threaded insert also allows you to mount heavier subwoofers vertically inverted by sandwiching the baffle. Center hole punch highly encourage as mentioned before.
I am not a big fan of threaded inserts or T-Nuts. They are not worth the trouble for most builds. I only used them this time because I planned to repeatedly remove and replace the subwoofer.
@@DIYAudioGuy I got the notice that you did not care of the hardware when i watched the video, I just posted the detail for other subscribers/community members. Good demonstration, Thanks for the post!
Sealed sounds better across a large frequency range. Ported is substantially louder at the tuning frequency. It is what it is. One thing no one ever mentions is that you need a stronger box for ported. They build way more internal pressure than sealed. Another thing to consider is that sealed boxes make the speaker easier to blow with frequencies below tuning. Generally not a big problem with low tuned boxes, but if you're running a turntable, microphone(s), or showing movies, you can intruduce inaudible subsonic frequencies that can absolutely blow your speaker. Sounds below box tuning frequency will make the driver absolutely lose control of itself. And distortion is what usually blows speakers. Moral of the story is, if you run ported boxes, use a high pass crossover at the tuning frequency or slightly above it. Even a basic FMOD is excellent, cheap insurance for ported boxes. My ported subs are tuned to 30hz and i run a 40hz higg pass FMOD. At 12db/octave the difference is inaudible. But my subs are nicely protected.
Nice video! Just to add wjat I learned from a successful DIYer in a forum. Small enclosures can be beneficial for sealed enclosures if one has enough power and a DSP at hand. For given RMS power rating and linear excursion (xmax or Klippel tested) there is a volume such that the will reach it's x max at maximal power but never overshoot. Using this volume you can get the most output of the woofer at "higher" frequencies, which are limited due to power handling and still get maximal output down low without overexcursion. It requires a DSP and enough powet though. But I think it's what many commercial companies do (SVS etc) sinve their sealed subwoofer are usually quite small
@@DIYAudioGuy Yes, its usually Linkwitz transform. But it needa smaller enclosures to make sure the driver won't die. On the other hand, you can get away with less power in a bigger enclosure. That's why my sealed boxes are not that small
I have primarily only ran sealed boxes in all my car audio systems since the 90s up until recently. ( except i did had a prefab 4th order with a Pair of low power Kenwood 10s back in the day once). Currently Running an NVX vcw12 in a skar ported box around 2 cubes net tuned to about 35hZ. Output is decent but doesn’t hit every note on different types of music. Mainly sound best with rap and rebass music and i realize its a prefab and a custom or built to spec box would prob perform better. Always liked the accurate sound of the sealed boxes so just ordered a 1 cube box to try sealed again before deciding which box type to go with when going custom built enclosure for a pair of these subs wired to 1 ohm on a soundqubed 3k amp.
I completely agree. In 2012, I had a 12W7 I initially put it in a ported box made AV Priority specifically for the w7s tuned at 37hz and I was happy with it. But I was curious about how it would sound in a sealed box. So I ordered a sealed one from that same guy. Box delivered transfer the W7 and the first song I played was “I want to know what love is “ by foreigner and in 2 seconds I noticed the difference. They sound the same but the base of the sealed enclosure was shorter which means loss of lower frequencies. I removed it the next day. And never again. If I have a small space; I will use an 8” in a ported. By the way, the boomy and tight difference in my opinion is relative to the Subwoofer. I listen to varieties from Waka Flaka, Toto, Sade and Metallica and have good ears. If you have a good subwoofer and have sqf: go ported.
I'm running a 12" Fosgate T1S1 (shallow mount 600w 1ohm 12"). I had to get the shallow mount to fit under the seat of my truck - and this is one of the largest subs I can fit there. I've always used ported boxes in the past, but the manufacturer actually recommends a sealed box for this speaker. I feel like I'm missing some tones I'm used to feeling more. Would going against the manufacturers suggestion of using a ported box be beneficial, or would it just make the bass sloppy? Why would the manufacturer recommend a sealed box over a ported one? Thanks in advance!
It is tricky to get decent bass in an under-seat enclosure. My recommendation in this case is to stick with the sealed enclosure and use your EQ to boost the missing frequencies.
Back in the 70's i had pioneer 5.5" door speakers? And made outa 1×6 boxes just big enough for the speaker to fit the baffle. Open back, luckily just tall enough to lock in the back window of the nova standin up facin forward. Open back rules. Later I put a back on and even my buddy said they were louder open back
my problem on ported box on my cheap computer speaker watching movies is to loud and if playing in the lower volume no bass at all so i tried to remove the port and sealed it and finaly i enjoy watching movies . i dont want to annoy neighbor specially watching at night . GREAT VID !
nice testing. larger probably useful in the bass hobby, only around 2db difference at 20hz from S to M box. finally got to DIY more than 10 years ago a Sony Xplod 12" 300 watts ported. turns out it was too much bass than I ever dreamed of and poor with beats, feels slow while taking out a huge chunk of trunk space. good thing the industry has a lot power in such small packages while being cheaper with inflation.
Some drivers are designed far small boxes like car audio subwoofers, and home audio drivers for bigger boxes. You must know the Qtc for your sealed enclosure 0.707 gives the deepest F3, a lower Qtc has more output but some higher F3 and higher Qtc gives also higher F3 and a bump in output arround 100hz or so . Qtc depends on the driver you use in the sealed box, a car audio or a home audio subwoofer in the same size box have a different box Qtc. The best for me is a Qtc between 0.8 and 0.9 it gives a very small box and with dsp you can also tune the sub easy to 20hz+-3db. My DIY sub with a Qtc around 0.8 has dual opposed 12 inch Scan Speak discovery drivers on a Hypex FA501 plate amp, tuned deeper and flatter than a SVS SB2000 subwoofer. Intern its the same as a Sigberg 10D subwoofer with bigger drivers, it looks like the Arendal 1723 2S and with a 500 watt amp the same output as the Arendal 1723 1S subwoofer @20hz. But with a higher Qtc you can feed the woofers much more watts before it beats itself to death, way above the specs for the drivers. A 12 inch Scan Speak discovery woofer in a Qtc 0.6 box kills itself with 200 watt, but the same driver in a Qtc 0.85 box can handle 500 watt easy.
Small sealed enclosures work in 4th order bandpass applications where you put more than rated power to a woofer, it helps play lower frequencies and not lose cone control
Hey, great video! But I have to say. I use a sealed subwoofer box because they play lower, ported boxes unload below tune where sealed just roll off, yay DSP. the only time to use a ported subwoofer in my opinion is if the driver has a qts below 40;) Really thought if you only listen to rock and you don't need subsonic for movies a ported box will be just fine.
Something i noticed while i was "breaking in" my subs in open air was i could get almost the same excursion on a 60w home amp than i get after i put them in sealed boxes (limited space) in my truck on ~400w each. I have 3 12" subs in my truck, all of them in 0.8 cubic ft boxes. I can juuuuuuuuuuuuust barely do a hair trick with the passenger door closed and driver door open, but my friend's car with just a single 12 in a prefab ported box (granted a little more power, but the sub has less excursion than mine are supposed to have) can do hair tricks just as good as mine. Really makes me want to get rid of 2 of my subs and try to build one proper ported enclosure that makes use of the space the other 2 subs were taking up, this video makes me want to do it even more
When using inserts take the time to chamfer the drilled holes. The diameters are too large to sink the insert flush by force only. It also helps to let the insert engage perpendicular. And screwing them in properly is also better controlled when using a battery screwdriver. You get even more control when you screw some threaded bar into the insert from the back. Now you get something that you grab on to to keep your insert on perpendicular course. Just make sure the threaded bar is not in too deep because it could interfere with the hex key you are using to screw it in.
If you just don't have the room you can get back lost output with more power. Smaller enclosures have more control over the woofer letting it take more power. In this instance I'm not sure you would hear much of a difference being that 3db is the smallest difference in sound we can hear.
So. Adding height or width to a box that has to be shallow is ok ? Like. I got a build coming up that had to be as shallow as possible but I planned on adding height for air volume and to raise them from the floor.
@@DIYAudioGuy Not so big in my Living Room. I was told to make a horn shap over my mouth and then sing. That is what smaller speakers sound like in comparison. That was 45 years ago and they still are the best sound I have heard. Full and Natural. Used Etone (Guitar 12" Alloy Frame) Speakers up to 350 hz and then Philips (Holland) Domed Mid and Tweeters.
Hi, im currently building a mobile speaker with a small tpa3116d2 amp. I have a small and a large subwoofer chassis at hime which i dont need but i dont have their parameters to build exact enclosure for them... i want to use this box outdoor but i dont know if its better to go sealed or ported, small or large subwoofer because amp is under 100w rms on subwoofer channel. It should also not be to big to carry around. Maybe to got some help for me. Or should i buy a car subwoofer which parameters i know ?
Nice video. It was a refresher for me. BTW 3 dB may be 2x power, but it is barely audible. As another said, porting will allow for smaller enclosures. I prefer sealed myself.
I have added ports to the tiny wedge flea market boxes. I fitted a piece of 2" pvc pipe in it about 10 or so inches long. The length of the port is all that mattered to getting the bass right. I was limited on space and the solution worked out nice.
@@andregunther4200 Yes. Getting the length right is key. The larger the diameter the longer the pipe will have to be. Also there is a diameter that would simple be too small. I have used the pvc pipe for small boxes forever. There is a tool online to calculate port length to dial in a tuned frequency. It wont be 100% but it will be in the ball park. I suggest an 1 1/4 for this speaker. Probably best to go in the side of the box to get the length you will need to get the desired frequency. Its gonna be close to the full length of the box. Do not start fully bottomed out. About an inch off is where I would start. That might be close to perfect. Find a bas test track with a note you like and tune to that. Pull out slow until the bass sound good. The cone will actually move less when you have the tune about where you want. Cut off excess and glue the pipe in place. Remove speaker and glue pipe in a few places inside so it dont rattle. I have been doing this since the 80's. I hope this helps you get your speaker sound better.
Dang. 1.2 million views. There's some valuable knowledge in here. Thanks for translating books into youtube videos for the younger generations lol. Sooo... I have a 67 chevy single cab truck, 2 skar vd-10's behind the seat(shallow mount) and one skar zvx 8 in the center console area. Yes theyre loud on 2200w rms, but not loud enough. They listed .65cuft sealed enclosures as reccomended for both speakers, so thats what i built with my space constraints. I tried many different speakers, ported and sealed and every ported box sounded terrible even though the low end was boosted. There were certain frequencies ,usually between 50-70hz, that just produced flatulent noises. How do i design ported boxes to sound good (sql+low end response) in a single cab truck?
When i was a kid i saw a woofer with the back covered with drum skin. Can you experiment in a video with a drum skin rear? what quality of bass and sound we get from it.
If you have an issue in the future with inserts sitting proud of the baffles mating surface consider countersinking the back of the sub granted the subs mounting ring has ample material to remove. If the IDs of the mounting holes are fairly close to the maximum OD of the inserts the less of a chamfer/ countersink will be needed. Anyway great content man, you really can't beat hard numbers when explaining theory. Keep up the good work.
Think of your neighbors man! The best solution is to install the speakers in the walls, using the air outside of your house as the enclosure, so that way everyone can enjoy the sound! 😂 But honestly, thank you for the video, great content as always.
i have a 10" ds18 car subwoofer rated down to 30hz and the manufacturer recommends about 1.25-1.4 cubic feet, my enclosure is only about 0.8 or so it's very small it's a ported pre fab tuned to around 47hz because I've never built a box I'm worried to try and fail and since I'm on a very tight budget at the moment (broke 17 year old struggling to make money😂) it hits nicely especially at 40hz i still would've expect it to hit louder but probs the box and above up to about 59hz or so any higher and it looses bass badly (because the box is custom tuned lower because it was originally tuned way too high) and anything under 40 the bass starts to get quieter until about 32hz then at 30 and 29 it gets even more quiet (which is the lowest it can play) anything lower is bad harmonics even at anything lower than 36-38 can't be heard if you're close to the subwoofer you have to be in a certain position in the room for it to become actual bass and not just harmonics, do you think my box is the problem? (should also mention the thickness of the mdf is 0.69" and sometimes under heavier loads it can flex a little) I'm pretty sure it is just wanted to confirm LOL
people who prefer sealed subwoofers generally mean turn the bass spl down. A properly EQ'd subwoofer, you will not be able to tell the difference between a sealed vs a ported. You can EQ down the peak of a Ported sub, You can not Boost the sealed like the one on this video up at the 25 hz level to match the ported counter part. But the ported can be EQ'd for a flat response with greater playback range than the sealed.
Glad you are finally using REW! These different box comparisons are really valuable. (would like to see less smoothing.) REW is super powerful. I hope you experiment with all the other tools it has
@@DIYAudioGuy If you are looking for something the average Joe can just turn on and know what to do, it's not super intuitive. That is true. As far as guidance, it does take some work to find the information. I didn't want to assume you didn't know these things. Saying there is NO guidance is just not true. The REW help file is huge. It has many how tos. MiniDSP site has many articles. The REW site itself has videos and links posted. The forums have guides made by users. If you can find a pdf REW 101 HTS is great. I have Rev 6.2 I found somewhere. All of this stuff is right under your nose. Audioholics has started making some videos on different features. You will find a lot of Home theater guys with videos. The problem I have with some video tutorials is it's hard to trust some of these guys when I see them not using simple buttons or options they would know about if they put in the time.
Idea for a video! I'd love to see what the actual measured differences are between a ported enclosure and a sealed enclosure besides the benefit of extension and/or output from the vented. I guess my question is how much do things like group delay change the response inside a vehicle...
It probably doesnt make much of a difference but I usually like to clamp after nailing glue ups. On sub boxes I also like to run a bead of glue along the inside corners as an extra measure. Working with solid wood when appearance matters i feel like clamping is a tighter, less noticible joint. Those corner clamps will be great for gluing without nails as well. Hold them in place just to get a big clamp on. That way you can avoid using wood filler which can be tricky to color match or clear coat 👍
Would like to know what you think of this: ruclips.net/video/dbVd5igcjHs/видео.html I am not 100% happy with the finish (second video in the series), so I guess that means that I need to build another!
@@DIYAudioGuy It came out pretty nice, what arent you happy with? I'm a perfectionist, so I fully understand not being 100% happy with the finished product. I think theres value in that, but also be aware that the vast majority of people dont even notice the minor imperfections that stick out like a sore thumb to you. Not sure how much "furniture" type stuff you've made, but its all a learning experience. If you redo it, the design and process it is only gonna get better. Youll develop your own style of things you like and can apply on future projects. I like that window design you used in the box. I'm not sure how I would have gone about making that. Your method was creative for sure. I know the router is one of the most versatile tools, but man I really need to get into making templates and flush trimming lol. I have the tools, just no projects that call for it. Questions for you now, how do you like polycrylic? I've only used oil base since its what I know, plus its cheaper. Ive recently switched to a 4" paint roller to apply poly, and have loved it. Brushing just takes too damn long, and I think the roller has given me a smoother surface compared to a brush. Big up on the DuraTex too. Never heard of it, but nice to hear your thoughts on that vs bedliner. My sub box is beat up and plastidipped and I was considering recoating it with something like that. Ive wanted to redo plenty-a projects but usually dont unless I hate it. The only downside to remaking it is the cost of material right now. I also tend not to redo them because I dont want to trash the first one, but I have no use for it. Maybe throw it for sale online or give it away, but other than that I don't want a bunch of first iteration projects laying around lol
Your video was very detailed and well done ! Congratulations ! I'm not savy at all on all this information given. I have 6 1/2 inches in-ceiling two way speakers at home, and I'd like to make a box enclosure for each of them. Would you please give me the dimensions to make them ? I really appreciate it ! Luis
Great video, once again! 👍 I know this didn't apply to what you displayed but one thing I did notice when you were showing the specs of theb recommended enclosure, Parts-Express always gives the ported Fv and the F3 but they never show the Fb of the enclosure. 🤷 It bugs me. LoL. The F3 of 22Hz is phenomenal out of a box with an Fv of 1.55 cu/ft! 👍
Your explanation of too small of an enclosure makes sense but it would be cool if you could explain what happens with too large of the enclosure. Ive heard you can lose power handling in too big of a box.
Learn more about getting bass in a small enclosure here: ruclips.net/video/v4rAkxck2_Q/видео.html
a calculator exist to build folded horn box?
@@Durolith what you want to do is download some free software called Hornresp.
What about the distance between the sub vent and the back wall? Is there some "standard" that cam be followed or can you basically be 1/8" clear (or 1/4", or 1/2", etc.) from it?
@@REG3305 I could probably do an entire video about that. Far too much to answer in the comment section.
@@DIYAudioGuy I'll keep a look out for 1 then.
All I learned from this video is you like numbers, and don't put sub in small cabinet.
Sometimes that's all you need to know😂😂😂😂😂(sike)
I listen to a wide spectrum of music genres and while I notice my preffered sealed enclosures aren’t as strong with the deep bass of rap, I can’t sacrifice their accuracy with percussion in rock and other genres. Investing in better subs with appropiate amplification can compensate for the lower efficiency. Thanks for another great video.
Right!
I listen to EVERYTHING music wise, from hardcore rap to Bob Marley then Megadeth and other metal stuff, acoustic and much more.. I have been satisfied with crisp, slamming bass no matter what music I was listening to with the sub's ported very low.
I would think sealed would sound a little better, but I think the low port tuning gives a little flatter curve so it sounds good and hits hard, least it sure seems to.. I am hoping to install my 7 band rear and 5 band front EQ which should really get it sounding clean as well.
Agreed 100%. The types of music I listen to don't require that big low blast. Nor do I really want that much output. The sealed box works well for me and thay is what I have in my car 90% of the time. I'm kind of an audio nut so I have tons of different amps and subs and I'm constantly buying stuff to add to the collection. From time to time I will throw a different box in the car and set it up for that enclosure and play with that for a couple weeks. I've noticed huge differences not only between Woofer sizes, but between enclosure sizes too, even though they're getting similar power. You should put whatever box you have space for, possibly choosing a Woofer that will work keat with your available space and also the type of music you listen to predominantly.
@@derekgardin1512 absolutely, although I am definitely an audiophile, almost snob at times, I also love the slamming, hard Hitting, low bass from some rap and some bass tunes etc .. but it has to sound good, and switch to Megadeth or whatever and sound just as it should too!!
@@derekgardin1512
Then I suggest you ditch a car audio subwoofer and get a dedicated woofer like the Peavey Black Widow or PRV MB series or Electro Voice woofers or any PA type woofer designed for concerts. They are ear splitting loud but not intended to be so loud under 35hz but for everything above that up to 5khz.
I'm 52 and from 1993 until 2015 I ran sealed. In 2015 I bought my first ported enclosure for two alpine type S. Man what a difference. Ported is the way to go IMO
I would agree.
Depends on what type of vehicle you're putting them in!
Correctly ported gives stepped up decibel output in the lower frequency ranges but at the compromise of distortion & power handling.
I've tried Alpine S-Series in a Chrysler minivan- Ported enclosures versus sealed enclosures and No if and buts about it a sealed enclosure clearly outperforms ported.
larger Vehicles open up lower frequencies such as vans. And also the S-Series Alpine Subs just don't work as good in a ported box.. .
@@bobadingoYour opinion of sealed boxes outperforming ported boxes is funny lol. A sealed box will never ever in my eyes and alot of bass heads eyes beat a ported box. A properly tuned ported box will be way more efficient than any sealed box. Less power to make more boom.
@@thelegendarywasdgamer9724 the last word in your comment is exactly the results of a ported enclosure!
we no longer worry about efficiency as amplifiers have plenty of power nowadays any audio file will clearly tell you what system sounds best but also tuning ported closure is next to an impossibility in an automobile, you don't just tune it to the driver! you tune it to vehicle cab volume and a lot of people don't know that, just the placement of a subwoofer makes a massive difference.
the type of vehicle, it's ambient noise footprint, & various other parameters all go into tuning an enclosure for a particular vehicle remember We reproduce music in its original form and not to add Distortion and falsified frequency ranges.. .
For car bass, ported is always the way to go. Very few sealed applications will sound better or louder for bass reproduction in a car. I have one 10 ported right now that is just as loud as two 12s sealed so imagine the usable car area being saved. Sealed just doesn't make much sense anymore.
Thank you for such an informative experiment. Being a bass lover and had built numerous speakers and subs for past 20 yrs here in Singapore, I would like to share these observations:
- MDF wood made enclosures needs much lesser bracing than plywood enclosures to sound equally good.
- MDF Wood doesn't do well in wet, rain or outdoor conditions.
- Sealed subs produced the least spectrum decay bass, typically less than 10ms aka 'tight' or 'defined' bass. Comparing to ported subs designs, bass seems much lesser.
- Most ported subs are capable of producing more bass than enclosed subs. However, the bass has longer decay around 10-20ms. Which most folks deem bass as 'fuller' sounding. Seems like a little bass decay may not be such a bad thing .
- passive radiator subs produced the most bass among the 3 types of enclosure but has the longest bass decay, usually 20ms & above. Some may find this type of bass undefined or 'boomy'. Still this type of subs are great for outdoor. Bass can be felt further than the other 2 types of subs.
- Lastly, if space is limited, I like to used sealed subs with Apex Aural Exciter+Big Bottom. This is often used in P.A to extend the bass decay to sound fuller without increasing volume.
Fav subs: Cerwin Vega 15" drivers, Das Audio PA 18" drivers and Magnum extra long throw 12" drivers, Eminence 15" drivers & Audax 8".
Software used: Winspeakerz.
Bro u rule
Thank you!!!
…for mentioning passive radiators instead of ports. Some of the smartest and best sounding speakers ever made used P/Rs, and were moderate to relatively small enclosures. Ported cabinets unload the woofer below port tuning and let it flop in the wind, hence is that popping sound that we’ve all heard banging our ears at that point. And also, sealed or P/R enclosures have a much higher transient response or group delay which is why the fans of those boxes say they sound better. They get moving almost instantly, vs the ported and buried woofer designs taking forever to get going(and also stop stroking too, causing harmonic distortions). Loudness and feeling the kick are great when experienced together, no need to have to choose one or the other. That’s an old 80’s car audio myth.
I am a sound quality guy but love the deep bass also. I have a 2012 GMC Sierra and made a sealed enclosure for my Skar EVL-10 to fit under the front arm rest between my front seats. I am powering it with my Rockford Fosgate 1200-1D. I listen to literally everything music and this performs VERY VERY well!
Cool!
This is a nice video to show how a acoustic suspension box can deliver different results depending on box volume. Also a great woofer to use. This is one of your best DIY!
It was a fun project and I thought it would pair nicely with my Iron law video. Hopefully people will find it helpful.
IMO sealed, OB, or IB are the clear winners for sound quality _IF_ you use an appropriate driver. The trick is that the market is so heavily skewed toward tuned cabinets that the selection of such drivers is limited. For deep bass in a sealed enclosure you need both low fs and rather high Qts. That is to say the huge magnets that sell so well are contraindicated.
The other thing that is often not considered is room or cabin gain. If f3 is significantly below the frequency where room gain starts you get a nasty bloom or bloat in bass output and then when the 4th order roll-off kicks in the bottom falls out. For some applications this is no big deal but for serious music listening it can be a problem.
In a sealed enclosure the 2nd order roll-off is closer to the room gain boost curve so the final result is often more natural.
I also think that in general (up to a point) you are better off getting your displacement from larger cone area than from excursion.
What you don't mention is that every car/truck will have what they call "cabin gain" which boosts the low frequencies so that in fact a very small box can sound very good in a specific vehicle. The best non boomy bass I ever had was an 8 inch woofer in a sealed box with a QTC of 1 and a FC of 60 Hz. It could easily play to 20 Hz and below in my Honda CRX. Using Mike Oldfield's The Songs of Distant Earth CD, the bass on the track Ascension sounded excellent and extended below even what my house subwoofer could play.
Just imagine would it would have been like with a bigger sub in a bigger box.
@@DIYAudioGuy Quite bloated probably. Civic is a pretty small cabin.
Nice video showing frequency comparisons. One thing to consider is that sealed enclosures generally produce less distortion below the box's resonant frequency than ported enclosures. Ported boxes don't provide driver damping below the enclosure's resonant frequency, allowing the driver to vibrate unhindered.
No question you're right that the properly designed ported enclosure is going to outperform the sealed at low frequency. However, the extreme difference shown on the graph looks more like the result of testing a driver that prefers a ported enclosure. I suspect it's a bit less dramatic when testing speakers that are specifically built for sealed applications. Also, you can EQ boost a sealed sub (within reason) all the way down to the lowest frequencies. You can't boost a ported sub below it's port tuning because it lacks the air suspension to dampen it's movement and it will likely be destroyed.
👍
I haven't built a subwoofer box since 2001 but it was such a satisfying experience that just watching this video gave me a vicarious thrill. As soon as I upgrade vehicles and get my hands on about 3 or 4 thousand extra bucks (or a credit card offer with a 0% intro rate for a year) I'm gonna do it right like you did. Some of these new software tools (and old but improved ones like WinISD) can really make sound quality AND simultaneous ground pounding SPL a thing. I'm gonna invest time and money into sound deadening every damned rattle panel on whatever SUV/crossover I end up with. I SHALL ACCEPT NO RATTLES! My cat is this gigantic orange tabby who used to be a feral street thug who had a rattlesnake rattler installed on the tip of his tail to be more intimidating and I've always just accepted it, but no more!
Great video explaining how the basics work.
Please can you do this test again with all 3 boxes but now put in the fabric that fools the subwoofer into thinking it is in a bigger box. I see other comments about doing a ported one, which would be fun, but just adding some speaker fabric (don't know technical name) into it, how much does it increase the perceived volume. Since the boxes are already made, not much has to be changed.
Stay tuned!
Not only you explained it well, but you took the time to get a loan and purchase the mdf. 🤪.
On a serious note, my single cab had the largest enclosure that would fit and it was still too small so I bought irrigation 3” pipe and cut it into several lengths ( tested all three to find the optimal one) to create a ported enclosure. I ran the pipe along the back wall of the cab and towards the passenger side. Ironically enough even though it sounded louder it still had the punchy tight bass of a sealed enclosure and I added another one. Tuning for a specific vehicle is monotonous and sometimes it sucks but it’s 💯 rewarding when you nail it!
Open the video will get some views, if not the loan sharks are going to come break my legs.
I kerf and port every enclosure including the port. Haven’t met a sub that sounds cleaner in a sealed enclosure! I also am a fan of fit the sub to the vehicle because they don’t fit the car around the subs! Awesome video! Excellent job explaining the difference in enclosure size and why experienced builders don’t just guess!
👍
I just watched a video a$80 Walmart subwoofer and he put 3000 watts through it, crazy how stuff has changed in 20 years since I was into stereo stuff.
Now I am starting over, great info.
Amplifier power's gotten cheaper and subwoofers have gotten a lot beefier.
Im digging the woodworking content. Its great when hobbies overlap
It is something that I had to learn in order to build speakers, that is what I find so fascinating about the hobby. It overlaps with so many other hobbies.
Yes, absolutely. I have learned a lot. Installing alone you get to play with electrical wires and connectors, solder, dismantling car interiors. If youre fabricating boxes; woodworking or fiberglass, possibly upholstery/paint or other finishing. All of these skills are valuable in so many other aspects of life.
Props to you for diving into woodworking instead of buying prefab or having someone else do it.
Thank you for the great video. In winisd don't forget to encourage your viewers to look at group delay when comparing two models. The sealed enclosure will handly outperform most any ported design when judged on basis of a metric that quantifies transient response, but will need more drivers/excursion if it is to stack up to the ported design in steady state SPL. The casual listener is accustomed to late bass, but will prefer "tight" bass, all other things being equal, 100% of the time. Late bass isn't phase aligned well with the harmonics of the waveform being reproduced. Its the kid that always lags behind riding bikes around town. With complex numbers, like Winisd most certainly uses, there are at minimum two plots that define a response. Magnitude and phase. It is probably worth the small amount of time to play around with the parameters in the planning phase of a project, maybe sacrifice low end extension to give a better transient response, at a minimum know what the tradeoff is in simulation land.
Awesome video. It's rare to see a sub that performs so we'll sealed and ported, but I'm even more surprised by how much better the ported enclosure performs here.
I really enjoyed this subwoofer.
@@DIYAudioGuy What are the fs and Qts?
Before you closed this video out, I was already thinking about how easy it would be to cut in holes for a passive radiator in each box and try this test again. Then seeing the graph line for the ported enclosure, I think this really needs doing. Hopefully you still have those 3 boxes laying around.
I just bought an 8" JLW3 and I'm really tight on space in my '21 F150. I'm going go build a shallow, thin box, as wide as I can manage (I also need storage space) and I'm going to try a Kicker 8" passive radiator setup. I know it's not going to be ideal, but the differences in boxes seem small enough that it will still be great for what I need it for, pushing 250w RMS @ 4ohms.
Box size will be roughly 10"x 6"x 24" with a bit of slope to follow the pitch of the seat bottom. But I'm hoping for the sweet (middle) spot between a sealed enclosure and a ported enclosure. I just don't have room for a 10" radiator, so 8" will have to do.
Justin is always a wealth of information.
That is the goal.
Thank You
In my experience with a comprt 10 inch in .4 cubic feet. You don’t wanna underestimate the importance of getting/making a bigger box.
After watching this video I’m am 99 percent sure my small box is the result of poor performance even in the higher frequencies.
Think about it, you get a subwoofer. More than likely you want it for the low frequencies your door speakers can’t play.
I’m more committed to going ported now haha. Also thanks for your videos they help a lot!
Thanks for watching.
I did an experiment with a subwoofer in different enclosures: large sealed, small ported, large ported. The large ported sounds the best, and that's what I ended up using.
I actually used to be a sealed enclosure purist until I built a proper ported box tuned for flat response.
Yep.
Add DSP and you'll be even happier
I have 3 types of 10" subwoofers in my listening room. 1. a downfiring powered subwoofer. 2. a Kerf Subwoofer and 3. a Sealed subwoofer. I am using Revel 10" drivers in all of them. To my personal taste, the best sound in the Sealed subwoofer, I just have it because a good friend gave it to me, after over 35 years of buying and building subwoofers, I can tell you that my last subwoofer ( the sealed one ) that I modified, is, by far, the best in sound performance, took me all these years to find out. Really worth to have sealed subwoofers, BUT they tend to be bigger than the others and need at least 30% more power.
A lot of people feel the same way.
Best system I ever had in a vehicle was an SQ box sealed for 4 12s on 4000 watts, could play everything extremely accurately with insane output and hit lower than a ported SQ box I also had that was tuned to 30hz
That is a lot of power.
What subwoofers did you have & what amplifier did you use
@@Luminous.Dynamics phoenix gold elite series subs with phoenix gold elite.1 amp wired to .5ohm with elite series door speakers and tweeters as well with 2 more amps.
Had 2 kicker 10’s in small truck enclosure- sounds great but thru the years it was time to buy new ones-
Bought the same kicker 10’s but in a big ported kicker box- same 600rms on 600rms kicker amp
Holy shhh what a difference-
If u buying subs get the biggest box u can for that sub- and get an epicenter
It's amazing the difference a good box makes.
Great video!!! This makes so much sense. I have a ported box for my subwoofers and I would never use a sealed box for them because the difference in output is huge. However, for the midbasses in my doors, sealed would be perfect. It won't take a lot of space and since they are running from 80 hz to 800 hz, I don't need to worry about it getting low. But for subwoofers, I would 100% use ported enclosures.
Glad it was helpful!
@@DIYAudioGuy It was, that is why I subscribed to your channel. There is a tremendous amount of things I can learn from you so that I can keep improving my car audio system. Cheers!!!!!
A friend of mine back in the 90’s had a new Chevy standard cab. He had two 10’s in a box that took up the space behind the seat. Even moved the seat forward but was still small for two 10’s. He went to a stereo shop to see about adding two more 10’s I kept telling him it’s to small for the two he had now. He had to put a big amp just to make it sound decent
I put my threaded inserts in from the bottom of baffle and use longer screws to avoid the head of inserts not being flush. You can thread screws from either end of the inserts so it works great because if you need to take screws out when you turn screws counter clockwise since they are threaded through the non head end of insert it doesn't loosen insert but tries to tighten it
Clever!
What about a somewhat shallow box but big spacing around the speaker.. I’m looking at using a 15 in a shallow mounting but the space around the speaker is almost infinite.. and sealed. But possibly can be ported.
Putting a subwoofer with lots of linear excursion and high power handling/mechanical resilience in a small (sealed) enclosure is common and useful, as long as you achieve your desired target function by utilising a DSP/EQ or something akin. This principle is widely known as "Under Resonance Principle Subwoofer", short URPS. It works totally fine if you know what you're doing....
With cheap DSPs and cheap powerful amps, the size of sealed enclosures doesn't really matter anymore. It does matter if you're trying to manipulate your speaker with its enclosure only...but who does that anyway?
Me, I am doing that.
Does the DSP have to stay connected all the time? Like a miniDSP? I want good base for Jazz music. Do you recommend a good 10" or 12" and sealed I assume? Is there a specific driver you can recommend?
I am 54 and in 2015 I cut the bed of my truck to the cab and I have ran a 4th order blowthru with 4 18s. I just put a new to me 2020 deck in the dash and it is even louder and cleaner than before
Awesome!
One thing I do notice is that nearly all sub boxes are made from raw mdf. I’m a trade cnc machinist with 25 years experience and when you put raw mdf onto a machine you can feel the vacuum pressure through the mdf. Raw mdf is even used as a sacrificial sheet on nesting machines. When I make my sub boxes I use melamine board or use a quality paint sealer inside the box. You probably can’t hear the difference but I bet air will be getting pushed and pulled through raw mdf on sealed boxes
True (I make speakers). It breathes primarily thru the surface layer of spongy material. Same is true for damping materials. So - more important to seal the inside of enclosure than the outside
This doesn't actually happen. This was a popular demonstration a couple of decades ago as a constant vacuum can indeed pull air through MDF. A woofer, however, is not a constant vacuum - it is cycling 20-80 times a second. The change from vacuum to pressure is too fast for the air to move through the wood.
a speaker is way different than a constant vacuum
Depends on speakers parameters. Some speakers do better or can only be used in sealed enclosures. This is not a black and white scenario.
Awesome information 👍
I learned this the hard way . Had 4 10s in sealed enclosure only 2 ft3 total.
Sounded great above 45hz but just fell off hard after that . It sounded much better with only 2 10s in the same air space.
Then I moved along to ported enclosures tuned low with big port area.
Soooo much better 😎
I get a lot of people asking for advice on under-seat truck enclosures. Now I can just link them to this video and hopefully they will stop trying to cram 4 12's under the back seat of a truck.
I have Sundown SA12 v2"s CRAMMED into a box under my seat in my silverado extended cab, it was a down firing box, I put 1 1/8 mdf to block the bottom hole and cut holes in the top and then added 1" spacers AND had to grind the mdf to fit the magnet. It dose hit hard but I wonder if it would hit harder with shallow subs or just sound way cleaner. I'm going for as much feelable bass as possible, I'm obnoxious lol
I am not a huge fan of shallow subs, they often need the same airspace as a normal sub. It is just easier to cram them into an undersized box.
Excellent video 👍
One question I have though is...
How did they sound?
Especially at the point where they were all equal in level.
Was the smaller box quicker and tighter sounding is my point.
If so, then the lower frequencies could really be potentially EQed if the speaker is playing a lot under its capability.
Also a much more efficient bass driver could be used and rolled off if matching with mids / trebles if volume was an issue under the seat / wheel well etc.
An excellent video 👍
I was looking at using a larger bass driver in a much too small box with a full range drive for home audio as an idea.. speed accuracy, control, phase and response time are what I am interested in. Rarely do I like the sound of vented inclosures.
That's a good question, I didn't really hook them up and do a listening test. I suppose I need to pop them in my truck and see how they sound with cabin gain.
@@DIYAudioGuy
Yes, I would have also liked to have seen what the in-vehicle low-end extension and overall response of each size enclosure was with the added transfer function or "cabin gain" of your truck.
I would have also like to have seen the response of the small and medium size enclosures compared to the next larger enclosure with the small & medium boxes stuffed with 75% Polyfill.
The loose Polyfill stuffing (or lamb's wool, fiberglass batting, etc.) can effectively make the box act as if it were up to ~20% larger. The polyfill works by converting the vibrational energy of the subwoofer to low level heat.
There is an article with tests and charts from the March/April 1995 issue of Car Stereo Review magazine by Tom Nuissane. Search for "Glasswolf, Tom Nuissane, Make a small box act like a larger one with polyester fiberfill".
So if you are stuck with using a smaller than ideal sealed box for your subwoofer, you'll probably benefit from adding some Polyfill stuffing to the enclosure.
Hey!
I don't know if you've done this yet - and it involves quite a bit more expense and time - but I would like to see a comparison of a 6", 8", and 10" woofer (as close to identical as possible except for size) in the same boxes you have there. I am particularly interested in the sound quality as a subwoofer with the same passive 3-way system that is an inexpensive bookshelf size. There are about a hundred iterations of possible combinations here - and for many of those you would just vary the low end on the paired speaker. I'd also like to see the effect of adding a port in both speakers in multiple locations (that wouldn't be hard.)
You've got a million views here - I'll bet you didn't expect that. How about a repeat? (I'll check your text.)
I am working on it. Savard sent me several subs from their Rap product line so I can do that now.
I would like to see this done with poly fill vs eggcrate foam . Biggest thing is to see the gain or loss of output and quality .
Stay tuned!
Ported is good if you don't like good bass. All cheap home subwoofers use ported designs. The better expensive ones are sealed. Do you think JL Audio would make a $12,000 subwoofer sealed if ported had better sound?
Ported subs are out of phase at a certain frequency, and sealed enclosures handle more power. The only real benefit of ported designs is getting more output with less power, so manufacturers can save money using cheaper amps.
All 3 sealed boxes can produce the same results with EQ/transform, but the small box needs more power to do it and may begin to stretch the limits of the thermal power handling of the voice coil if driven hard. A vented enclosure will have to quite a bit larger than sealed for a woofer like this to handle the air displacement without chuffing noise (the port itself will likely have to consume more space by itself than one of the smaller sealed boxes). You could put a pair of these subs into a sealed box the size of the single-driver vented box and achieve similar results with EQ/transform.
Or... do what I did and put the UM-10 in a bass horn enclosure. ~25-80hz with ~95dB@2.83V sensitivity.
That sounds cool!
How can I learn more about basshorn there's hardly anything I can find
@@fasterthanaturtle you can model them using a piece of software called Hornresp.
@@DIYAudioGuy Hornresp is excellent. Great for virtually any kind of enclosure design.
Ported is always more efficient and much louder bass. Whether its oval port or rectangular the sound is the most reinforcement of the bass frequencies. Passive radiator, band pass and sealed boxes do not have the high decibel reinforcement of the bass frequencies as ported. With ported you essentially double the maximum watts handling of your speaker, regarding the bass. With a ported box, your speaker cone excursion is far less, cleaner less distorted bass, and the bass is double the decibels, of any box design. The only issue is the ported box can sound boomy. You will need a tuned box with proper insulation to cut down on a boomy sound.
Sealed enclosures have a much better impulse response, and thus perform better especially when it comes to percussion. It tends to feel "tighter" and more accurate. If you just want lots of low end, sure go for the ported. But generally speaking, the sealed enclosure will feel more musical, which will ultimately sound and feel better.
A lot of people agree with you.
Go ported servo subs. Better control that sealed and deep controlled bass.
I personally dont know too much about building boxes but, what if you were to preset the walls and woofer in the box and outline the underside where the breathing hole is and cut it out, would it help?
Thanks for the video! It's like you knew exactly what I wanted to see. I've always thought it would be fun to build a few boxes and compare them.
**(Sorry for the wall of text lol, it makes sense in my head but as I type it, it might get a bit disorganized and lose a bit of my intended meanings)**
One thing to touch on is the sealed box for the UM10 (and just about any sub) is when comparing these sealed enclosures, it's good to keep an eye on cone excursion. I bought the sealed kit for my UM10 so the box was 1.5 cubic feet. Technically 1.5 cubic feet and a 1 cubic foot box would perform identically. Only difference is efficiency of the bigger box would add a dB or so to the sensitivity around 20Hz. Which personally to me is insignificant and almost pointless. If you look at cone excursion for them, I'll look at 20Hz for this example, the cone excursion for the 1cuft box is touching xmax on 500w. While it takes 400w to reach xmax on the 1.5cuft box. So while you can get an extra 1dB on 100w less power, in reality that extra output you'll likely never hear. And you gain more the lower it plays, but this sub isn't going to do that well under 20Hz, and the cone excursion rises fast in the 1.5cuft box to the point it physically can't perform better than the 1cuft box under 20Hz.
I know you didn't go bigger than a 0.85cuft box in the video. But in the end the 0.85cuft box after looking at it in WinISD is probably the biggest box you need for the UM10 sealed. Because any bigger won't really give you any big additional improvements due to xmax limits on rated power. Which you basically already shown in the video with the small vs medium showing a much smaller difference.
Touching on the ported part. You've already seen my PR box for my UM10 but it basically acts like ported and going from sealed to that new (not new these days but you get what I mean) box it was like a whole new sub. Blew my mind with the low end I got out of it the first time I played it. Sound quality didn't get worse. IMO it sounds 10x better being able to cover a wider bandwidth.
Anyway, sorry for the rambling lol. Thanks again for the entertaining video!
If I were to do it again I would add an oversized box just to compare and contrast the tiny box.
Should of lined box walls with blanket polyfil and see what difference was on each enclosure. Would of been interesting.
Got another video in the works already. The results are quite interesting!
It can help, but isn't a replacement for a properly sized box
@@Luke-qs2cg I already know this I was interested in seeing actual numbers.
@@DIYAudioGuy awesome I use this method on almost all my enclosures even though they are ported i cover every wall with a layer except the entire port length area I don’t. From what I hear it gives the enclosure more range and just a better sound musically. Also seem to have some db gain as well. Can’t wait to see what the numbers are.
*would have
Threaded insert hack … if you install the threaded insert from the rear of the baffle (before assembly if you can) it will prevent you form having to countersink. The lip of the threaded insert also allows you to mount heavier subwoofers vertically inverted by sandwiching the baffle. Center hole punch highly encourage as mentioned before.
I am not a big fan of threaded inserts or T-Nuts. They are not worth the trouble for most builds. I only used them this time because I planned to repeatedly remove and replace the subwoofer.
@@DIYAudioGuy I got the notice that you did not care of the hardware when i watched the video, I just posted the detail for other subscribers/community members. Good demonstration, Thanks for the post!
Sealed sounds better across a large frequency range. Ported is substantially louder at the tuning frequency. It is what it is.
One thing no one ever mentions is that you need a stronger box for ported. They build way more internal pressure than sealed.
Another thing to consider is that sealed boxes make the speaker easier to blow with frequencies below tuning.
Generally not a big problem with low tuned boxes, but if you're running a turntable, microphone(s), or showing movies, you can intruduce inaudible subsonic frequencies that can absolutely blow your speaker. Sounds below box tuning frequency will make the driver absolutely lose control of itself. And distortion is what usually blows speakers.
Moral of the story is, if you run ported boxes, use a high pass crossover at the tuning frequency or slightly above it. Even a basic FMOD is excellent, cheap insurance for ported boxes.
My ported subs are tuned to 30hz and i run a 40hz higg pass FMOD. At 12db/octave the difference is inaudible. But my subs are nicely protected.
Congratulations! You've just demonstrated the law of diminishing returns.
When the marginal product is zero the airspace is maximized.
Nice video! Just to add wjat I learned from a successful DIYer in a forum. Small enclosures can be beneficial for sealed enclosures if one has enough power and a DSP at hand. For given RMS power rating and linear excursion (xmax or Klippel tested) there is a volume such that the will reach it's x max at maximal power but never overshoot.
Using this volume you can get the most output of the woofer at "higher" frequencies, which are limited due to power handling and still get maximal output down low without overexcursion.
It requires a DSP and enough powet though. But I think it's what many commercial companies do (SVS etc) sinve their sealed subwoofer are usually quite small
Yep, the Linkwitz transform
@@DIYAudioGuy Yes, its usually Linkwitz transform. But it needa smaller enclosures to make sure the driver won't die.
On the other hand, you can get away with less power in a bigger enclosure. That's why my sealed boxes are not that small
I have primarily only ran sealed boxes in all my car audio systems since the 90s up until recently. ( except i did had a prefab 4th order with a Pair of low power Kenwood 10s back in the day once). Currently Running an NVX vcw12 in a skar ported box around 2 cubes net tuned to about 35hZ. Output is decent but doesn’t hit every note on different types of music. Mainly sound best with rap and rebass music and i realize its a prefab and a custom or built to spec box would prob perform better. Always liked the accurate sound of the sealed boxes so just ordered a 1 cube box to try sealed again before deciding which box type to go with when going custom built enclosure for a pair of these subs wired to 1 ohm on a soundqubed 3k amp.
If you are a fan of NVX you can use the code DIYAUDIO15 for a discount at nvx.com.
I completely agree. In 2012, I had a 12W7 I initially put it in a ported box made AV Priority specifically for the w7s tuned at 37hz and I was happy with it. But I was curious about how it would sound in a sealed box. So I ordered a sealed one from that same guy. Box delivered transfer the W7 and the first song I played was “I want to know what love is “ by foreigner and in 2 seconds I noticed the difference. They sound the same but the base of the sealed enclosure was shorter which means loss of lower frequencies. I removed it the next day. And never again. If I have a small space; I will use an 8” in a ported. By the way, the boomy and tight difference in my opinion is relative to the Subwoofer. I listen to varieties from Waka Flaka, Toto, Sade and Metallica and have good ears. If you have a good subwoofer and have sqf: go ported.
I'm running a 12" Fosgate T1S1 (shallow mount 600w 1ohm 12"). I had to get the shallow mount to fit under the seat of my truck - and this is one of the largest subs I can fit there.
I've always used ported boxes in the past, but the manufacturer actually recommends a sealed box for this speaker. I feel like I'm missing some tones I'm used to feeling more. Would going against the manufacturers suggestion of using a ported box be beneficial, or would it just make the bass sloppy? Why would the manufacturer recommend a sealed box over a ported one?
Thanks in advance!
It is tricky to get decent bass in an under-seat enclosure. My recommendation in this case is to stick with the sealed enclosure and use your EQ to boost the missing frequencies.
I've got 2 jbl 15inch subs... Ported box...bass works box ... It's ran at 1800 watts. I definitely love em. They are like a free massage ❤❤❤
I hear some say sealed boxes are louder than port. But all my test shows this is the opposite. You cleared that up for me.
People usually say that sealed sounds better, I don't agree.
Does the shape of the enclosure make a big difference?
I want to put woofers behind my projection screen and make them thin and long. Any thoughts?
I have not seen any evidence that the shape makes any difference.
Back in the 70's i had pioneer 5.5" door speakers? And made outa 1×6 boxes just big enough for the speaker to fit the baffle. Open back, luckily just tall enough to lock in the back window of the nova standin up facin forward. Open back rules. Later I put a back on and even my buddy said they were louder open back
Such a great intro. You cover what you need to know. The rest is just trial and error.
👍
Hello, I am from Iran, can your box shield damage the sub's mechanical factor in the long run?؟؟؟
my problem on ported box on my cheap computer speaker watching movies is to loud and if playing in the lower volume no bass at all so i tried to remove the port and sealed it and finaly i enjoy watching movies . i dont want to annoy neighbor specially watching at night . GREAT VID !
Ported tends to give you more output.
nice testing. larger probably useful in the bass hobby, only around 2db difference at 20hz from S to M box. finally got to DIY more than 10 years ago a Sony Xplod 12" 300 watts ported. turns out it was too much bass than I ever dreamed of and poor with beats, feels slow while taking out a huge chunk of trunk space. good thing the industry has a lot power in such small packages while being cheaper with inflation.
Some drivers are designed far small boxes like car audio subwoofers, and home audio drivers for bigger boxes.
You must know the Qtc for your sealed enclosure 0.707 gives the deepest F3, a lower Qtc has more output but some higher F3 and higher Qtc gives also higher F3 and a bump in output arround 100hz or so .
Qtc depends on the driver you use in the sealed box, a car audio or a home audio subwoofer in the same size box have a different box Qtc.
The best for me is a Qtc between 0.8 and 0.9 it gives a very small box and with dsp you can also tune the sub easy to 20hz+-3db.
My DIY sub with a Qtc around 0.8 has dual opposed 12 inch Scan Speak discovery drivers on a Hypex FA501 plate amp, tuned deeper and flatter than a SVS SB2000 subwoofer.
Intern its the same as a Sigberg 10D subwoofer with bigger drivers, it looks like the Arendal 1723 2S and with a 500 watt amp the same output as the Arendal 1723 1S subwoofer @20hz.
But with a higher Qtc you can feed the woofers much more watts before it beats itself to death, way above the specs for the drivers.
A 12 inch Scan Speak discovery woofer in a Qtc 0.6 box kills itself with 200 watt, but the same driver in a Qtc 0.85 box can handle 500 watt easy.
Small sealed enclosures work in 4th order bandpass applications where you put more than rated power to a woofer, it helps play lower frequencies and not lose cone control
Yep.
Hey, great video! But I have to say.
I use a sealed subwoofer box because they play lower, ported boxes unload below tune where sealed just roll off, yay DSP.
the only time to use a ported subwoofer in my opinion is if the driver has a qts below 40;)
Really thought if you only listen to rock and you don't need subsonic for movies a ported box will be just fine.
An observation: when you stacked the three builds at the end, the added depth was representative of the gain in low frequency on the graph.
I like sealed enclosures best. I think they sound so much better personally.
Come on guys all these views? Subscribe!!!! This man is humble and absolutely intelligent on this stuff.
Something i noticed while i was "breaking in" my subs in open air was i could get almost the same excursion on a 60w home amp than i get after i put them in sealed boxes (limited space) in my truck on ~400w each. I have 3 12" subs in my truck, all of them in 0.8 cubic ft boxes. I can juuuuuuuuuuuuust barely do a hair trick with the passenger door closed and driver door open, but my friend's car with just a single 12 in a prefab ported box (granted a little more power, but the sub has less excursion than mine are supposed to have) can do hair tricks just as good as mine. Really makes me want to get rid of 2 of my subs and try to build one proper ported enclosure that makes use of the space the other 2 subs were taking up, this video makes me want to do it even more
The box matters.
When using inserts take the time to chamfer the drilled holes. The diameters are too large to sink the insert flush by force only. It also helps to let the insert engage perpendicular. And screwing them in properly is also better controlled when using a battery screwdriver. You get even more control when you screw some threaded bar into the insert from the back. Now you get something that you grab on to to keep your insert on perpendicular course. Just make sure the threaded bar is not in too deep because it could interfere with the hex key you are using to screw it in.
Great tips! Thank you.
If you just don't have the room you can get back lost output with more power. Smaller enclosures have more control over the woofer letting it take more power. In this instance I'm not sure you would hear much of a difference being that 3db is the smallest difference in sound we can hear.
Wow, that router table is worth its weight in hold.! 😊 Great Video!!
It has been handy.
So. Adding height or width to a box that has to be shallow is ok ? Like. I got a build coming up that had to be as shallow as possible but I planned on adding height for air volume and to raise them from the floor.
When I made my first Speakers, I was told to size the Enclosure at 9 cubic feet.
That works so well.
That is huge.
@@DIYAudioGuy
Not so big in my Living Room. I was told to make a horn shap over my mouth and then sing. That is what smaller speakers sound like in comparison. That was 45 years ago and they still are the best sound I have heard. Full and Natural. Used Etone (Guitar 12" Alloy Frame) Speakers up to 350 hz and then Philips (Holland) Domed Mid and Tweeters.
Hi, im currently building a mobile speaker with a small tpa3116d2 amp. I have a small and a large subwoofer chassis at hime which i dont need but i dont have their parameters to build exact enclosure for them... i want to use this box outdoor but i dont know if its better to go sealed or ported, small or large subwoofer because amp is under 100w rms on subwoofer channel. It should also not be to big to carry around. Maybe to got some help for me. Or should i buy a car subwoofer which parameters i know ?
Nice video. It was a refresher for me. BTW 3 dB may be 2x power, but it is barely audible. As another said, porting will allow for smaller enclosures. I prefer sealed myself.
U-line has a double sided tape dispenser I’ve had one for about 12 years now they work awesome
11:56 experiment with low density/size plugs for a compromise. get rid of port noise and greatly increase cone control
I have added ports to the tiny wedge flea market boxes. I fitted a piece of 2" pvc pipe in it about 10 or so inches long. The length of the port is all that mattered to getting the bass right. I was limited on space and the solution worked out nice.
If it works it works.
Would the pvc pipe work on a box for 6x9s
@@andregunther4200 Yes. Getting the length right is key. The larger the diameter the longer the pipe will have to be. Also there is a diameter that would simple be too small. I have used the pvc pipe for small boxes forever. There is a tool online to calculate port length to dial in a tuned frequency. It wont be 100% but it will be in the ball park.
I suggest an 1 1/4 for this speaker. Probably best to go in the side of the box to get the length you will need to get the desired frequency. Its gonna be close to the full length of the box. Do not start fully bottomed out. About an inch off is where I would start. That might be close to perfect. Find a bas test track with a note you like and tune to that. Pull out slow until the bass sound good. The cone will actually move less when you have the tune about where you want. Cut off excess and glue the pipe in place. Remove speaker and glue pipe in a few places inside so it dont rattle. I have been doing this since the 80's. I hope this helps you get your speaker sound better.
I’ve also noticed in winISD that as the sealed box gets larger, the subwoofer gets closer to its Xmax for a given power input
Yep.
Dang. 1.2 million views. There's some valuable knowledge in here. Thanks for translating books into youtube videos for the younger generations lol. Sooo... I have a 67 chevy single cab truck, 2 skar vd-10's behind the seat(shallow mount) and one skar zvx 8 in the center console area. Yes theyre loud on 2200w rms, but not loud enough. They listed .65cuft sealed enclosures as reccomended for both speakers, so thats what i built with my space constraints. I tried many different speakers, ported and sealed and every ported box sounded terrible even though the low end was boosted. There were certain frequencies ,usually between 50-70hz, that just produced flatulent noises. How do i design ported boxes to sound good (sql+low end response) in a single cab truck?
You are waging an uphill battle against the laws of physics. I don't think there's much else you can do.
The difference in the Group Delay would have been interesting.
Nice to see someone wearing safety equipment!
I don't wear it as often as I should.
You gotta love that SAWSTOP fence!
It was a big upgrade from my old saw.
When i was a kid i saw a woofer with the back covered with drum skin. Can you experiment in a video with a drum skin rear? what quality of bass and sound we get from it.
If you have an issue in the future with inserts sitting proud of the baffles mating surface consider countersinking the back of the sub granted the subs mounting ring has ample material to remove. If the IDs of the mounting holes are fairly close to the maximum OD of the inserts the less of a chamfer/ countersink will be needed. Anyway great content man, you really can't beat hard numbers when explaining theory. Keep up the good work.
Think of your neighbors man! The best solution is to install the speakers in the walls, using the air outside of your house as the enclosure, so that way everyone can enjoy the sound! 😂
But honestly, thank you for the video, great content as always.
😂
Can you please show what happens with Polly fill and how much that effects things?
Stay tuned!
Very nice video, big like ,you can put inserts on the back side!
i have a 10" ds18 car subwoofer rated down to 30hz and the manufacturer recommends about 1.25-1.4 cubic feet, my enclosure is only about 0.8 or so it's very small it's a ported pre fab tuned to around 47hz because I've never built a box I'm worried to try and fail and since I'm on a very tight budget at the moment (broke 17 year old struggling to make money😂) it hits nicely especially at 40hz i still would've expect it to hit louder but probs the box
and above up to about 59hz or so any higher and it looses bass badly (because the box is custom tuned lower because it was originally tuned way too high) and anything under 40 the bass starts to get quieter until about 32hz then at 30 and 29 it gets even more quiet (which is the lowest it can play) anything lower is bad harmonics even at anything lower than 36-38 can't be heard if you're close to the subwoofer you have to be in a certain position in the room for it to become actual bass and not just harmonics,
do you think my box is the problem? (should also mention the thickness of the mdf is 0.69" and sometimes under heavier loads it can flex a little) I'm pretty sure it is just wanted to confirm LOL
Yeah, the box is holding you back.
people who prefer sealed subwoofers generally mean turn the bass spl down. A properly EQ'd subwoofer, you will not be able to tell the difference between a sealed vs a ported. You can EQ down the peak of a Ported sub, You can not Boost the sealed like the one on this video up at the 25 hz level to match the ported counter part.
But the ported can be EQ'd for a flat response with greater playback range than the sealed.
Glad you are finally using REW! These different box comparisons are really valuable. (would like to see less smoothing.) REW is super powerful. I hope you experiment with all the other tools it has
That is the thing with REW, it has all of these powerful tools with no guidance on how to use them.
@@DIYAudioGuy If you are looking for something the average Joe can just turn on and know what to do, it's not super intuitive. That is true. As far as guidance, it does take some work to find the information.
I didn't want to assume you didn't know these things. Saying there is NO guidance is just not true. The REW help file is huge. It has many how tos. MiniDSP site has many articles. The REW site itself has videos and links posted. The forums have guides made by users. If you can find a pdf REW 101 HTS is great. I have Rev 6.2 I found somewhere. All of this stuff is right under your nose.
Audioholics has started making some videos on different features. You will find a lot of Home theater guys with videos. The problem I have with some video tutorials is it's hard to trust some of these guys when I see them not using simple buttons or options they would know about if they put in the time.
AMAZING VIDEO! But it makes me wonder: What if those same boxes were ported? How would they compare to sealed and each other?
Good question.
Idea for a video! I'd love to see what the actual measured differences are between a ported enclosure and a sealed enclosure besides the benefit of extension and/or output from the vented. I guess my question is how much do things like group delay change the response inside a vehicle...
It probably doesnt make much of a difference but I usually like to clamp after nailing glue ups. On sub boxes I also like to run a bead of glue along the inside corners as an extra measure.
Working with solid wood when appearance matters i feel like clamping is a tighter, less noticible joint. Those corner clamps will be great for gluing without nails as well. Hold them in place just to get a big clamp on. That way you can avoid using wood filler which can be tricky to color match or clear coat 👍
Would like to know what you think of this: ruclips.net/video/dbVd5igcjHs/видео.html I am not 100% happy with the finish (second video in the series), so I guess that means that I need to build another!
@@DIYAudioGuy It came out pretty nice, what arent you happy with? I'm a perfectionist, so I fully understand not being 100% happy with the finished product. I think theres value in that, but also be aware that the vast majority of people dont even notice the minor imperfections that stick out like a sore thumb to you.
Not sure how much "furniture" type stuff you've made, but its all a learning experience. If you redo it, the design and process it is only gonna get better. Youll develop your own style of things you like and can apply on future projects.
I like that window design you used in the box. I'm not sure how I would have gone about making that. Your method was creative for sure. I know the router is one of the most versatile tools, but man I really need to get into making templates and flush trimming lol. I have the tools, just no projects that call for it.
Questions for you now, how do you like polycrylic? I've only used oil base since its what I know, plus its cheaper. Ive recently switched to a 4" paint roller to apply poly, and have loved it. Brushing just takes too damn long, and I think the roller has given me a smoother surface compared to a brush.
Big up on the DuraTex too. Never heard of it, but nice to hear your thoughts on that vs bedliner. My sub box is beat up and plastidipped and I was considering recoating it with something like that.
Ive wanted to redo plenty-a projects but usually dont unless I hate it. The only downside to remaking it is the cost of material right now. I also tend not to redo them because I dont want to trash the first one, but I have no use for it. Maybe throw it for sale online or give it away, but other than that I don't want a bunch of first iteration projects laying around lol
Your video was very detailed and well done ! Congratulations !
I'm not savy at all on all this information given.
I have 6 1/2 inches in-ceiling two way speakers at home, and I'd like to make a box enclosure for each of them. Would you please give me the dimensions to make them ? I really appreciate it !
Luis
Great video, once again! 👍
I know this didn't apply to what you displayed but one thing I did notice when you were showing the specs of theb recommended enclosure, Parts-Express always gives the ported Fv and the F3 but they never show the Fb of the enclosure. 🤷 It bugs me. LoL. The F3 of 22Hz is phenomenal out of a box with an Fv of 1.55 cu/ft! 👍
I have noticed that as well. Makes it hard to back out the enclosure design without using WinISD.
Your explanation of too small of an enclosure makes sense but it would be cool if you could explain what happens with too large of the enclosure. Ive heard you can lose power handling in too big of a box.
I may have to make a video!
What a lovely channel with so much knowledge to share !!!
❤
Should have been tried the sound. Great information video..