SubSam

http://qik.com/m/v/21552031?link=a38c9855 I said I would hopefully ya'll can see the vid, I apologize for the Taylor swift in the background lol a customer was playing with our hu wall, decided to listen to her favorite country station but its obviously not playing through the woofers...

Of course! Got all sorts of sweet acoustic programs, we regularly plot SPL curves for almost every install we do, it only takes one minute to run a sine sweep across a couple thousand Hz and just plot it through termlab into any graphic program, even maple works tho we typically only use maple for our in house displays. We got a wall of jl w3s on an LRC circuit oscillating at 22Hz lol its sweet I should post a vid. Yea I was surprised by the increase also, but its entirely due to box placement. I fire my woofers into the cabin, from the trunk. With two 12s I got a wide, flat, soft bass response at higher freq(>50), which was worse with the w7 than the L7s or rockford hx2s. I tried angling those w7s upwards a bit, built a smaller higher tuned box, built a huge box tuned to 27 trying to flatten everything. I just hate when it is hella loud at around 32-38 Hz and drops several dB at higher freq... many don't care, I've just been in the game so long I get erked by these sort of things... I need to hear all the notes clearly, including some subsonics, so I tend to tune it lowww. If you listen to a song like Drake "Over" in a box tuned higher than 35 it just sounds like a different song entirely I love the 27-30hz bass too much to sacrifice

Out of a million or so ported boxes I've built for kicker L7s I have never heard a ported box tuned higher than 33 that had an acceptable freq response to my ears. Don't tune it below 30, no higher than 33. But the box is your biggest issue... nobody with L7s is really going for SQ, but they are capable of sounding very good regardless. I ran two L7 12s for about a year, but I eventually traded them in for two 12w7s to even out the "muddy bass". Tried about 8 boxes with the w7s, moved on to a single Fi Q15. The Q gets almost as loud as the others on the same power and sounds incredible doing it. I got like +4 dB from 45 to 100 Hz with 31.05 Hz tuning. If you want more output, you can buy a BL or BtL, just don't necessarily expect better SQ unless that p.o.s. pre fab is tuned to 40 Hz or some bs. If that's the case, stick with the L7s, give them a fair chance. Like M5 said, its alllllllll about your box.

ya you don't have the volume for 18's, those 15's will do the trick. Should pound real hard

Run the saz4500s at lower impedance for comps and up the load for daily if you want it to be daily... that's the cheapest route. Aq is good also, hear about competition issues with amps tho. If you got loot to spare is look at a real amp like rf bdcp or stetsom maybe... you have lots of choices

If it makes ya'll feel better I spent $150 for an entry in a car judging contest planning on having my N215 as a part of my install and had to pull out of the demo contest due to the lack of a subwoofer to complete the build. I wouldn't have sold my gen 2 BtL and ordered a new one if I knew I wouldn't get it in time, but hey that's life. The Fi guys told me I would get it in time, and I understand they have mechanical issues to deal with, so who cares. If I can stay patient you guys can too. Still went to the show, I would've placed a distant 5th at best, so that $150 was going down the drain anyways. Guy who placed first had real marble in his sub box with three rf T215s in a Mercedes glk. I think the marble cost more than my whole install lol. I coulda been the only one rockin a BtL N2 tho, woulda been sweet

If you already own that Kenwood amp I would get a copper coil with high QTS and bp power for a sealed setup. if you don't have an amp yet, go for that Audioque 1200 its a great deal then you can get the flatwind and bp power and go ported for more output. personally I love ported, ultimately its your choice, I would get the bp power either way for thermal reasons. can't over-cool it thats for sure keep those ts parameters consistent

That comes down to personal preference I tend to tune lower than 32 as a rule but anything recommended is a good bet until you decide to experiment a bit. If you tune those 12 BtLs too low you will lose out on the strong upper bass

Yea I've been waiting for my n215 for almost a month, I know how it feels to be pacing around waiting for it. But then I realize there's always domehing I can do to make my box better or my car look cleaner, so I occupy myself. When that sub rolls thru the door I will be more than ready for it

ive got the 2000 grand prix gtp since both of our cars are supercharged be careful about what alt and battery you get remember that our motor requires alot of cranking amps to run correctly (mine is the 3800 series 2 motor) you dont want your overdrive to cut in and out when you give it some gas as far as the subs id go with the 4 ssd's over the 15's the 12's will have alot more output and as far as response (15's dont have better response than 12's thats horse sh!t lol) trust me i know your car very well and know what different setups sound like in it ive had 1 12, 2 12's, 3 12's, 1 15, 2 15's and 2 fosgate 18's the bigger speakers have lower bass but most music is produced on a 80hz average anyway go with the 12's lol The average sub stage is going to be playing ~28hz to 70hz and upwards 80hz. Saying bigger speakers have lower bass is bullshit. The size of the cone does not effect the drivers ability to play one frequency verse another, it does however effect output / loudness of the material being played. bigger speakers have lower bass because they can play the lower frequencies louder lol thats why for 15's you set your crossover to 50hz and 12's to 80hz and your wrong the average sub will not be playing 28hz to 70 hz that all depends on the sub, size, and enclosure I said sub stage, referring to the driver and enclosure. I stated 28hz as some like to tune low although most tune around the low 30s. Crossing over is also preference based, some cross at 70ish and others go up to 80. Just depends on the person and the rest of their sound system. Your statement about different size drivers playing different frequencies louder is completely wrong. I won't argue anymore with you as I'm just beating the shit out of a dead horse and it's not waking up. lol name one speaker that has an fs of 27hz that isnt bottoming out lol the 18" n2 btl has an fs of 34hz lol if i am some where wrong correct me and prove it so my opinion may be changed in the right directing because i am not getting what you are talking about You are right about one thing: YOU AREN'T GETTING IT. Or making sense. You know what a mass-loaded driver even refers to? Know what a pole-vent does? I've got a half-dozen rockford rfd2212 and 2112s laying around, the fs is 25 for that woofer, and is one of my favorite subs to install, but has no chance in competing with my gen 2 BtL at 28Hz. And neither bottoms out. It's a miracle!

Based on that last post, I would say you may be looking for a couple BtL or BLs. I originally said Q15 as it seems like you have the room for a 7 cubic box you could tune down to 28-30 Hz, which would be very flat from 100Hz down (I have had an 89 grand prix not totally comparable but). That sort of enclosure in a trunk really hits on the high bass and thunders the lows. You can check plenty of YouTube vids of Qs bumpin. If you get a couple 12" BtLs you will get just what you are looking for, the BL is a great woofer too, both have that infamous "saddle-shaped" (compliance) response, still sounds plenty musical all around, with awesome output, especially down lowww

Ok: Every speaker has the ability to "move in and out" at any given frequency in the audible range of a human. That's what determines frequency, the "pace" at which the speakers oscillate. As the sound frequency nears the limits of our hearing range, our sensitivity to each frequency drops off rapidly.(as well as many mechanically/ electromagnetic issues with speaker design but ignore that for now) Therefore the lower notes need to be played louder for us to perceive them at a normal volume. Thus we make speakers with larger cone area and high power handling to play the lowest notes in our audible range. 6.5" speakers typically bottom out when you try to play low bass through them but that doesn't mean they can't produce the note. The motor/design of that 6.5 are to play mid range, not low bass. You could design a 6.5" subwoofer to play low volume bass easily, and without the speaker ever booming out, as is what would be its design intention: its a SUBWOOFER. Just most companies choose to make bigger subwoofers than 6.5's for practicality. The "lowest note your sub can safely play" is a bit of a flawed idea, but to give you an idea in a ported enclosure you only have "control" of the sub down to the tuning frequency, any note you play below that the speaker behaves worse and worse, and it gets even worse if you crank up the volume. I hope I kept it simple if you want a better picture read here: READ EVERY WORD

I did a gen 2 BtL 18" in a 6th order for a Chrysler 300 it was a pain in that the design called for the woofer to be installed halfway through the build process, so it was all draped up in plastic for a few days, but man did it pound. Both ports fired into the cabin, it had three plexi windows facing back. I went for a 3:1 volume ratio between the two "halves" of the box, as I've had good luck with that ratio before, but ended closer to 4:1 due to a weird shaped trunk. I was too scared to fiberglass in more volume, as the tuning is soooo finicky Be thorough, be precise, post pictures

As Scott said, the 4th and 6th are both equally doable, the 6th (if made correctly) will be far superior to the 4th. The problem is that you need a LOT of volume for a good 6th, and if ur not willing to rebuild the box if its mis-tuned, you may just want to go with a simpler ported design. But hey, if you can do it, I'd love to see another good BtL 6th order

It always costs more than you think... you budget $100 for the box it'll cost you $350. Boost ur amp power and dish out some cash for new alts/batts. You can't avoid it, just keep yourself modest and don't overextend your build, it'll be more frustrating than fun. We all want four 18's and 25k watts, but i think its cooler to do big things with less cash and more ingenuity. Not saying be ghetto about everything, just do it right the first time. Don't chip away at until you need a new car lol

i can't wait for mine either... my fiance ordered it, and she never checks her email it'll be quite the surprise Good thing there's a cozy 14.125" hole in my trunk just waiting to get filled up

Didn't mean to count out the BtL either, nobody can go wrong such a monster woofer. That's what they are: monstrous

also I believe the Q15s do well in a small ported box, without being as suffocated as big dB woofers. If you have the room for a 17" baffle, I vote Q15 all the way, with the AQ3500 "running light" and that 2.5 cubic and 33 Hz tuning... Damn that's a match made in heaven. Save some dough on woofers and get the big amp and run it like its on vacation. The other setups may hit higher dB by a bit, and if output really is your goal then by all means, I mean 4 SSDs would look so sick and pound hard. I think two Q15s are impressively loud myself.

I say invert them for the sake of saving displacement in the sealed box and bc all Fi woofers have sexy magnets If you wanted to go ported its up to you, if you listen to any deep bass you may want to, as the low end will be significantly more pronounced. The SSDs do well sealed, however, so it will sound good regardless. I've found once you go ported you don't go back

Sundowns would be good, I like the Audioque 1200 and 2200. If you consider the saz-2500d and you already have us amps you could check into strapping the re/us amps 4000ev3 for a tight budget, never heard or clamped the vlx 4de but that could work. If you can spare a few bucks I recommend a few RF 2500bdCP its a monster amp.

Your opinion is based on a VERY small sampling. And no this isn't a knock on the Q, but when you say "any 12 fails in comparison" it shows you haven't heard all that many. It's not that extreme of a statement since I was comparing 12's to a 15, but I stand by it totally. Why would I have a small sampling? I install about 85% 12's all day at work (since '04 check us out @ soundcraftcarstereo.com) and had only 12's in my car for a decade, never outside a one or two woofer configuration; from jl w3s and w6's and kicker L7's (UGH) to rockford hx2s (personal fav still got a few of them 12's around). So I guess I should say any 12 in the same price range, including many above the Q15 that I have had experience with. No I can't say I've heard an AA Havoc 12 or a SI MAG 12 (tho I've heard the 15) or a few other drivers but I will totally still say I believe 100% the Q15 is the most musical sub for average to above average-sized enclosures. I like the SSD 12 just fine but its peakier to my ear, but my best buddy loves the SSDs I put in his car... we don't carry Fi in the shop, but I made it clear to my boss I gotta stick with Fi woofers.

two Q 15's! I love the linearity of the Q15, any 12 fails in comparison to the response of the Q15 in my opinion, tho 4 SSDs would be beastly

Invert the subs if you get that box, but I recommend building a custom ported that is a little bigger. The SSDs are very musical ported!

As I own/ worship a Q15 I have to ask why you don't want a Q

SSD = Good subwoofer output at all frequencies, with less power requirements BL = KNOCK UR SOCKS OFF LOW END but power hungry