Another sub question

colosilverado · February 3, 2005

Okay, I know variations of this question have been asked 100's of times, but I cannot find a decent answer. When it comes to car audio, I am behind the times. I want a good setup for hitting low freqs, and not for biiiiim booooooooom music either. I want to put in a good sub/s/ that will get down to at least 16Hz, but I can't see any spec'd that low. I also want to be able to play classic rock and heavier stuff and have it sound good. If I were to replace the whole shooting match but keep everything in their stock locations (other than the subs obviously), what should I go with? I am thinking Infinity all around for speakers and some sort of Nakamichi for the head unit. If I could afford them, I'd put in some Dynaudio tweets.

In the "old" days, a buddy of mine had a setup in his LeBaron that would crush you if you were listening to anything. It made freakin' Madonna sound good. He had Infinity speakers for everything except a pair of Dynaudio tweets. He was powered by Infinity amps and Phoenix gold equipment and had several crossovers. I know he wanted to upgrade to SoundStream amps, but he never got around to it. What are some good brands these days? I'm not talking Fosgate or stuff that you buy at Best Buy or Circuit City necessarily. I don't play rap, but do play pretty much anything else.

I'm talking about it being able to play stuff like Scorn, Lull, Lustmord, Bill Laswell, Sunn and things like that. If any of you guys with decent setups have an opportunity, go to Napster or something and download a song by one of those groups or a song by Portishead called "Scorn" and tell me how it sounds. I want to really work the subs.

I know that nobody will probably be able to help, but I thought I'd give it a shot.

Wingnut · February 4, 2005

Why do you need it down to 16 hz? That's below the normal human auditory spectrum.

I really just wanted to say "auditory spectrum".

And one of the king daddy-o brands out there for mobile fidelity would be MB Quart. Some of their component sets go for over two grand though. My MB Quarts were less than $500.

The lowest freq response I can find is the Kicker Solobaric L7 and L5 15" square subs. They go down to 18 hz.

bballa · February 4, 2005

Image Dynamics = high quality speakers and subs!

colosilverado · February 4, 2005

Why do you need it down to 16 hz? That's below the normal human auditory spectrum.

I really just wanted to say "auditory spectrum".

And one of the king daddy-o brands out there for mobile fidelity would be MB Quart. Some of their component sets go for over two grand though. My MB Quarts were less than $500.

The lowest freq response I can find is the Kicker Solobaric L7 and L5 15" square subs. They go down to 18 hz.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Huh-huh-huh...you said auditory spectrum.....that wuz kewl....huh-huh-huh

I don't really HAVE to have that low of freqs....but you can certainly feel them.

What was kinda funny is that when I was testing my R.A.B.O.S. kit for my home speakers, Infinity IL60's, I was running through the warble tones. I could barley hear the 20-some hz stuff and was watching the subs pulsate and watching to see what was rattling in the house. All of the sudden the dogs started barking out back. I stopped the CD that was playing the warble tones and they stopped barking. I started it back up and there they go again. I stopped it and changed to a lower freq and they started up and stopped each time I did. I don't know if they could hear it and it bothered them or they just heard the rattling and thought someone was stopping by.

Wingie, I do dig your setup. I'll probably throw an Infinity Perfect back there and some Infinity components and call it good, along with an Infinity amp and Nakamichi head unit. I know that isn't an audiophile setup, but it should provide some noise. Anything is better than that stock POS that hurts my ears and has no separation.

Winger, was it you who said a 12 sounds like kaka in a box back there?? I can't remember. Is there just not enough space in a box like yours to run a 12 back, as far as air to move? I would really like at least a 12 back there, but if it sounds like crud, I guess I'll go 10". Infinity's tweets are a little bright for me, though, so I may consider some of the Dynaudio sets or the knockoffs made in China.

The 16 speakers in my buddy's car back in the late 80's/early 90's really spoiled me though. He had 2 Dynaudio tweets, 2 Infinity 12's, 4 Infinity 6" mid domed mid bass, and 4 Infinity mid range and 4 other Infinity tweets if I remember correctly. I am pretty sure he was pushing 1200 watts continuous and could peak at almost double that. He had them tuned for a flat response though. That car could play anything and make it sound good, like I said. We put on the radio once and a Madonna song was on. We were like "aaaaaaaahhhhh, turn the station" being metalheads and all,but we heard the bassline and it was pretty cool. We listened to it for awhile because you never new it was there before. We vibrated a 3x5 picture off the wall in his mom's living room from inside the garage when we were playing some sort of classical music song. I swear, I had a bad headache and my back was hurting one night when we went for a cruise. I whined about him not turning it up and he basically ignored me. All I know is that 1/2 hour later, my headache and backache was gone. I don't know if the low freqs from Pink Floyd "massaged" the muscles or what. That was cool.

That car was baaad. It had a vent tube coming from underneath the car to let the heat and battery gasses (from the 2nd battery) out. It looked like he had a toilet or something in there. People always asked him if it was for a crapper. The 12's were firing through a long slot in the top of the box. The midbass were in the door map pockets and firing through nickel sized holes in the wood that the enclosures were made of. You could not see ANY of the system other than the Nakamichi head unit which controlled the changer in the trunk. It was stealthy. He was going to his first audio competition up in Vail or somewhere and totalled the car on the way up there. He lost it and hit a construction hole. A guy that was following him up there to compete as well pulled over and heard the system for the first time. He was like " that sounds waaaay better than mine" and then the guy helped him pull the gear out so it wouldn't get stolen. That guy ended up winning the competition. LOL! Sadly, that system never made it back into another car and is probably still sitting in his mom's basement.

Sorry for the rambling....it is fun to remember that crap.

Halen5150 · February 8, 2005

I am thinking Infinity all around for speakers

I'm not talking Fosgate or stuff that you buy at Best Buy or Circuit City necessarily.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

They sell Infinity at circuit city, dude. Maybe I'm biased towards certain brands, but if you want to stick with all one brand(which is not easy to do sometimes), go with Orion. Their products are awesome, and d@mn good quality at that too. I run their P-series components and they are some of the best I've ever heard, and can really take some serious power. I have an Orion 1200D on two Punch HX2 10" subs, and they hit good with everything. Not really enough to crush your skull or anything, but I can make CCR and Hendrix sound really good and hit pretty dang hard for older rock. I don't listen to much rap. But rap and even some rock songs will make my windhshield wipers bounce a little, and that's with the settings turned way down. It would be nice to let us know some info like what type and how many subs you want to run, what kind of enclosure you're looking for, do you plan to keep the rear seat, your budget, etc. This subject is too broad without you narrowing it down some first.

Edit: Btw, here's your sub that you're looking for, this one can do 15Hz

Premier baby, yeah!

Wingnut · February 8, 2005

You could do one twelve back there, and have plenty of air.

I'm not a hard-core audio guy, just a hobbyist. So I'm not in on the latest and greatest. I can only comment on the ones that I heard with two 12 inchers, and they did sound horrible. I'm sure that with the right subs, in a properly built box, you could probably do 12's with success. I remember reading something about somebody raising the back seat of their rig a couple of inches in order to allow for a bigger box. That might be an option as well.

jt1872001 · February 9, 2005

i have 2 10' image dynamic subs each in a custom wood box that fits under the rear seat. driven by a 500 watt pheonix gold tantrum? amp the 2 front doors have the (mid level) diamond audio 6' seperates and the rear doors have 6' diamond audio components driven by phoenix gold 400 w 4 channle tantrum amp all 4 doors and rear cab wall are dynomatted.a must to keep the vibration down and helps to better the sound. the head unit is an eclipse 5443 (eclipse rules! best sound quality) optima battery and 130Amp alternator.

this set up is awsome sounds like a nite club in there. so loud and clear that my friend a profesional music artist likes to listen to his music in there to see what it will realy sound like in the real world.

i would say if you went this route 4000$ youd be happy all music sounds great in here. good luck

graet systems cost $

Halen5150 · February 10, 2005

I would say if I went that route, I wouldn't pay near $4000 for all of that. For $4000 I could get over 3000 watts worth of equipment, including everything needed for a complete top-of-the-line system, and still have cash to spend. You didn't pay retail did you?

mburnam · February 10, 2005

I am running 2 RF P312D4 12" subwoofers in a custom ProBox that sits under the back seat. Recommended box volume for each of these speakers is .65 - .85 cubic feet (for a small sealed enclosure). The ProBox has .70 cf of volume on each side; very close to .75 cf, which would have been perfect. I also added a bit of poly stuffing in each each side (to simulate a slightly larger box). The speakers are down-firing, and the whole cab is DynaMatted.

The sub-woofers are being run by a Crossfire VR-600D mono-amp (1 ohm stable). I think that these two 12's sound just great in my truck.

And I tend to agree with jt1872001, great systems can cost $$$.