I just got my 8" subs today. I setup the baffles and installed a sub and it sounds like CRAP!

It sounds very boomy and muddy. When I take it out of the baffle, it sounds good, but looses it's punch and volume.

Also I'm running the front components and the subs off of a 4 channel amp. When I set the rear channels to the LPF, I'm still getting some vocals through the subs. I have the front x-over set at 180hz and the rear set at 220hz. Should I still be able to hear deep male voices through the sub? Could this be remedied by use of an external x-over?

I'm kinda lost as to what I should do to make everything sound better.

 

your subs sould be at a lower hz...... make sure if you are running 2 subs that u might have a mono/bridge option on the amp and u can drop the ohm load down and this will bring a better punch..... look in my gallery of pics to see what i am doing to my c3


b

 

The amp I have is only 4ohm stable bridged and both of my subs are 4ohm.

The rear channels on the amp are set on the low pass filter with the x-over on the amp set at 220hz. Doesn't that mean that the subs should be playing any tones below 220hz, or does that mean they are playing everything above 220hz?

 

woah, back up a bit. I dont remember what amp your using, what sub your using, and what kind of crossover you are using (active/passive/HU intergrated). A low pass crossover (IMO) should never exceed 120 hz - all the fequencies from 10-120hz should be only playing thru the subs. It is possible to hear some voice thru the sub, bu t more like "murmurs" rather then clear sounding....

Lets see what you're running (im sorry I dont remember) and we'll work from there.


snoopdan

 

Amp: RF punch 600.4

X-over: integrated with the amp. The amp has a HPF, full and LPF with a seperate potentiometer to set the x-over freq. Not sure if that is active or passive, I believe it's passive.

Subs: planet audio p860's 4ohm SVC. From what little I have been able to find out about them, they play from 35hz-1500hz, more of a midbass, but they have a nice excursion. I'm positive that if I can track down my problem they will work nicely.

I'm not currently using any of the freq adjustments on the headunit as I was trying to set the gains for both the front components and the rear subs. I'm running infinity reference comps up front. 5.25".

I will be getting a signal processor that integrates with the headunit I'm using now, but that will be a couple weeks from now. Tomorrow or the next day I'm going to redo the baffles for the subs and see if that makes a difference.

The vocals I'm hearing in the sub are more murmurs than anything else, unless I flip the switch for the LPF to full or HPF. Then the vocals will brighten up, but it doesn't sound very good. I'm more concerned with getting the subs to hit harder and not sound muddy or mushy.

 

looks like alot of love went into that dash of yours. Mad props to ya, thats a PITA to do.

snoopdan

 

I agree with snoopdan, never exceed 120 Hz with a subwoofer, esp a sub mounted behind the listener.
If the crossover is in the amp, it is a active crossover. I do lots of research on car audio and for the most part those pots used for setting a freq are off from the stated values. The only way to know for sure is to use a scope but the easiest way is to use your ears. Put both at 100 Hz and go from there. I feel the HPF (front channels) should be approx 80 Hz and up for the Infinities. The LPF (rear channels) should also be about 80 Hz and below, maybe 100 Hz. You should be fine without a external crossover as long as the amps internal crossover are at least a 12 db slope.

 

it is active, it is an electric xover, passives are non powered xovers and are usually non adjustable (some you can adjust the level but the freq are set based on the components used (caps, inductors, etc))

just because they are rated to play up to 1500hz does not mean that they will sound good doing so...remember they are SUBwoofers, meant to play sub bass freq, anything over that they will sound muddy (like what you are hearing)

if you are not experienced in setting xovers on an amp, i would suggest you to set both xovers on the amp to full range and use the ones on your deck as they are easier to set and for the average user, they are fine

im not trying to be a dick, but i would not buy a processor unless you actualy need one and know how to use it, if you are having trouble setting xover settings on an amp, i would research more about car audio and settings, because i doubt you actually need a processor

again, set your xovers on your deck if you can...a good setting is usually 80hz HPF for the front (of 100hz if the 5.25s get muddy playing lower) and 80hz LPF for your subs. I would start from there and then either go up or down until it sounds right...you should not be able to hear any vocals coming from the subs unless it is a extreamly deep male voice but still you should barely hear it in that case

 

I concour with the others here. I set my door speakers ( MB Quart Compoenent ) to 100hz+ with a 12db drop off under 100hz. I set
my Sub ( infinity 12" ) to 80hz with a 12db drop over that. so theoreticly they both produce the 90hz range, and the sub never
has to drive anything over about 100-110hz ( 18-1500 hz rated ) and the
components never have to drive anything under about 80-90hz
( 38-24,000?? hz rated ).



good luck

 

The headunit I'm using doesn't have any x-over capabilities. That's why I'm going to purchase the processor for it. I'm using clarion stuff that's about 4 years old. Was TOL stuff back then from their proaudio line. The processor will add x-over and equalizer capabilities that can be controlled through the head unit and can be had very cheap.

From playing with it some more this morning, I think the LPF in the amp isn't working as designed. Even with the LPF engaged and the x-over set at 100 I can still hear some tones that are above that. I'm going to burn a test tone cd and see what that tells me.

 

which head unit are you using? you said which makes me

 

What type of enclosure are the 8's in.
Sealed? Ported? a-Periodic? bandpass?

are you using any filler?

pictures would help too.

also, maybe a wire diagram of how things are setup.

 

Sorry, didn't mean to confuse anyone. It only has bass and treble adjustments, but no adjustments for specific frequencies. I should have said tone controls. I have a really bad headcold and it's effecting my thinking, lol.

I got it worked out. The baffles I was using weren't sealing very well, so I made some new ones, 100% improvement. Bass hits nice and hard and pretty clean. I might still have a couple leaks, but it's fine for now. It's hard to get a good seal between the baffle and the car. Seems like these 8's like to be driven hard.

I ended up setting the x-overs at 100 for the components and 120 for the subs. That's what sounded best to me. Although I still think the LPF on the amp is leaking some higher freqs through, but the bass is loud enough now that you can't hear it.

 

They are in a sealed enclosure consisting of a baffle over the space where the bose pods normally go in the rear of a C4. I have about 5oz. of polyfill in each enclosure.

I borrowed this pic from agent86's install thread, but mine is setup exactly the same way.

 

Good I recommend that when you go back in to seal the baffles completely (which I also agree they should be completely sealed) that you put some acousitical fiberfill. It will help prevent sound reflecting off the inner walls of the enclosure which can make the woofer sound worse than it should.

I'm curious, how many sets of pre-amp outputs does the radio have. I would also like to know if your processor mates with the radio in a closed loop configuration. We are all here to help

 

Each enclosure has about 5 ounces of fiberfill in it. I might put some sound deadener in there too since I have some left over.

The headunit has 3 sets of preamps front, rear, and a non-fader sub. The processor uses a proprietary clarion cable (cenet) to interface with the headunit, then the rca cables are run from the processor to the amp. I'm not sure if this is closed loop or not.

I'm pretty happy I went with some older equipment. I picked up the headunit (clarion drx9575z) for $100. I had originally planned on using an eclipse headunit, but this clarion was cheaper and had a more interesting display. I can pick up the processor (DPH7500Z) for $25 and a 12 disk changer for another $100. I haven't been into the car audio scene for about 8 years and back then I dropped a couple grand for a system for my truck. I've got about $450 into this one, plus some time.

 

Glad to hear its working. My next guess was going to be to test to make sure the enclosure was sealed.

A good way to tell is just to push on the speaker. It should have some hellatious resistance against it when you push down.

 

Cool, use the front rcas for the the front channels and use the sub rcas for you subs. That way you will use you processors cross-overs w/ or without the amps crossovers. Personally, I would use your processor's crossovers. They will be more acturate than the amps.
I personally like Clarion HUs. Before they had the Pro line their hi-end was called Audax (??). I owned two of them, very hi-end for the mid-80s. JFYI, your processor is mostly open-loop. I was just wondering since I wanted to know where the rca outputs were coming from.
I think you'll end up with a sweet system.

 

What are the Thiel/Small parameters of the woofer? What is the approximate enclosure volume? Apart from the Xover freq. being too high, the alignment may be underdamped (high Q) which would reduce the output at lower bass frequencies and accentuate the mid bass frequencies.

 

can someone translate this to english please, lol

I have a parameter sheet that came with the subs, but I don't know which# is the right one for the questions your asking.

I'm not really sure of the size of the enclosure. It's the rear location for the bose pods and is oddly shaped. I'd guess it's close to 1ft^3 give or take.

So far it sounds great except for some low hz freqs but I think that's more a limitation of the size of the woofer. I'm going to play around with it some more this afternoon. I have to chase some rattles outside the car now