I can't stop fiddling with my subwoofer :rolleyes:

[Howard]

Although I guess a new driver isn't just a minor "fiddle"...


This is the bottom of the sub as it was...




Can you guess which is the new one?



And here she is in her new home


Those drivers look a LOT smaller than they actually are in those photos... Should have put a CD on them or something for comparison... They're 12" in diameter.

I got the new driver for free, all I had to do is pay postage, which is pretty cool!

It's a proper home cinema sub driver, unlike the car sub I was using, which means it delves deeper in the frequency range It goes down to about 23Hz if I remember correctly. Specifications are here if you wanna have a look.

It doesn't sound a whole lot different, but I can immediately tell it goes deeper. It hits harder too!

My mum mentioned after I had finished testing that the radiators downstairs in the living room were resonating...

All in all, lovely jubly! Just gotta fix the driver in properly (it's held in with 2 screws at the moment ) and make a few minor tweaks to the enclosure/positioning, but it's all good

[Alex]

Nice. What are you doing about amplification for that thing?

[Aaron]

Any scientific reason for the hexagonal box or did you do it just because it looks good?

[Howard]

Alex: I'm using a 100Watt Technics stereo integrated amp. Quite convenient seeing as the sub is rated at 100W also

Aaron: I bought the enclosure and old driver together on Ebay, so I didn't build it.
There is some speculation that non-square shapes such as Hexagons can reduce standing waves inside the enclosure, but I don't know a great deal about that

[unrealrocks]

Heh - looks good, I was thinking about getting one of those drivers a while back ... still want to but not had time to build an enclosure.

[Zak33]

word of advice for ya.

Use good big strong screws. If you bur one over, or ruin a hole, make sure you try to use a new one and make it fit TIGHT.

Make sure it is air tight around the seal, where it rests on the box. No air to escape from the sides.

Change your sig

but best of all........

Get 4 large screws....big ones. Screw them into the bottom of the enclosure (the side you decide is bottom)

Take the screws back out. Use a hacksaw to cut off the heads....then screw them back in, using pliars to hold them, but with the pointy end facing OUT.

What you are looking to do is have 4 spikes to penetrate the carpet.

Then get your mum to live up the garden cos THEN it will work properly. Big speakers like than NEED to be on the floor...right through the carpet...onto the floor boards .

Then if its too much you can turn ot round one turn until your Mum goes out

Offically SPEAKER SPIKES are something you buy, but my method works really well.

and as far as I know I am the person who invented it

[Howard]

Yep I've got the big screws that held in the existing sub, it's only got 2 in at the moment because I haven't drilled any more holes yet

The sub is down firing, like it used to be. I was only experimenting/photographing with it on it's side And the feet I made keep it pretty solid.
The driver also has a rubber seal around the inside to keep it airtight, and I was prepared with the draught excluder (that I used for the old driver) incase it didn't have a seal

Thanks for all the advice Zakky


And yeah, my sig needs updating so I'll change it back temporarily whilst I work on that

[unrealrocks]

I don't quite see why spikes make ANY difference, because Pressure = force * area yes? which means if you've just lowered the area the force on each cm^2 touching the ground will increase which means the pressure stays the same - so surely the audio transmission will stay the same?

[turkster]

Well I dont think the spikes are designed to transmit sound waves into the floor boards but more to anchor the sub properly.
The spikes go through the carpet and reduce the chances of the sub moving around too much.

PS nice job Howard. How LOUD does your mother allow you to listen to music etc. .

[Howard]

She doesn't like to hear too much of it. I mainly watch movies with my home cinema setup anyway. Music on my PC. I play movies at a moderate level, not too loud. But loud enough

[SilentDeath]

I don't quite see why spikes make ANY difference, because Pressure = force * area yes? which means if you've just lowered the area the force on each cm^2 touching the ground will increase which means the pressure stays the same - so surely the audio transmission will stay the same?

Acctually Pressure = force / area

Anyway the reson it works, is becuase the carpet is soft. Soft materials dont move the same when sound is put into them. Think of it like when you put your head under water, and it makes everything sound softer.
With metal spikes, they penetrate through the carpet, so sound is transmitted through the spikes to the wood, and not through the carpet.
Harder materials transmit sound better ..