I'm thinking 100 watts = can make pretty loud bass
I spent the better part of the night comparing 10's, and picked out the loudest ones for 100 watss i could find
put them in the vette, and they are SLIGHTLY louder than the audiobahns, but still nowhere NEAR my 100 watt home woofer.

The 100 watt woofer I have in house was a CHEAP one from radio shack, and it has about three times the SPL that the car sub has. I ran a big cable and put the home sub in the car, and it was LOUD.

But the 10's Ive tried so far in the car are all sickeningly quiet. My farts shake the rear view mirror more than these things.

Why is that?



[Modified by Smash, 12:38 AM 11/28/2001]

 

I think it has to do with the limitations of working with only 12-15 volts of power and the efficicenty of a subwoofer and the box that they are in.

Band-pass boxes are a lot louder than sealed boxes given the same conditions but the tightness of the bass falls off.

Why are you only working with 100 watts anyway? I have more than that going to each speaker in my car. :D 100x4 and 250x1 nominal. Go get a bigger amp and you can start enjoying the music and stop worring about the numbers.

 

Which 5 ch. Amp do you have?

 

Alpine MRD-F752 it rocks. :D

 

What type of amp do you have, I hope 100 watts is RMS? Is that 100 wats per sub. In someways I think power or "watts" somewhat is overrated, as that is need is adequate power.

The sub enclosure make a huge difference on how a sub sounds. I had 2 x10's in my 85 Supra, 2 Kicker Competition subs (not a high end sub I paid ~$100/each) and powered by a kenwood 70watt x2 amp. It would definately over power my 10" $600 Boston Acoustic Sub. A friend of friend in my town had 2 high 12's powered by a high end amp, my car had more bass than his. BTW what type of amp do you have, I hope 100 watts is RMS?

 

"I think it has to do with the limitations of working with only 12-15 volts of power and the efficicenty of a subwoofer and the box that they are in."


The power of a sub amp has very little to do with operating off 12-15 volts. All auto power amps over 20wrms have an internal DC-DC converter to generate the higher voltages needed to generate the required power. The only limitation is how much current your alternator can supply.

Two big problems with subs in a car is limit in how large you can make an enclosure and the internal volume of the vehicle. Both these factors limit the effectiveness of a sub.

 

Soundstream, 100watts RMS mono sub channel.
Powering sony xplod 10" in 1 cubic foot sealed enclosure as reccommended by the sub's documentation. Polyfill, of course. It sounds better than the Audiobahn, but it's still quiet.

Maybe it isn't sealed good enough, or hasn't broken in? Break in makes that much of a difference?



[Modified by Smash, 11:50 AM 11/28/2001]

 

If the seal isn't good then the sound would be muffled and now crisp and clear. maybe hook it up to someone else's amp to test her out. :rolleyes:

 

Yeah seal can make a big difference. "Break in" won't make much of a difference if at all.

 

I'll fill the outside edges up with caulk then.

 

Whoa, what outside edge are you caulking? I hope your not caulking the speaker to box...

 

Figured I'd put a bead of silicone or caulk around the outside edge of the speaker basket.

<BLOCKQUOTE>code:<HR><PRE>

SPEAKER TOP----|
BASKET-________|\______ SPEAKER BOX
</PRE>[/QUOTE]

Where "\" is the bead of silicon/caulk.




[Modified by Smash, 2:55 PM 11/28/2001]

 

Most car amps lie about thier output. How much watts at what level of distortion?
I put fairly small Rockforts in mine. Been awhile but 2-40s and a 60. the 60 was too much for the 2-12" kicker speakers so I switched it to the 40 and power 2- 6" and 2-4" off it. Even with the 40 the subs are dialed down.
Home stereos use 8 ohms speakers, this usually means less power for a cars amp but cleaner. The car amps now can go as low as 1- 2 ohms although the norm is 4 ohms. You can get dual voice coils or use more than 2 speakers to change the ohms. If you buy a good speaker and amp they will be loud.
I think the sensitivity of the speaker to be more important than the max wattage it can consume, you will rarely if ever use all of the power. But if one sub can be driven at 20 watts while another requires 50 just to begin working, you can see the difference.
The reason for large amounts of wattage isn't for a louder system, it's for lowering the noise thresh hold of the system. If a cheap 20 watt system is cranked to its limit so is the distortion. If a good 100 watt system is run at 20 watts there is no distortion.
The system I have computes out to 640 watts, even though the amps are listed at far below this.
A 100 watt amp might produce 200 watts if driving a 2 ohm load rather than the 4 ohm it is rated for. Usually it is slightly more than double. Just remember that 2 speakers at 4 ohms are say- 50 watts/ speaker, where 4 speakers at 2 ohms would still be about 50/speaker.

I think your problem is the sound stream amp. I have a similar cheap "highly" rated 4-channel in my Caddy. The 10" woofs that sounded lousy in the 'Vette sound Ok in the doors of the caddy. I think this is from slightly better amps and the extremely close location to me. The doors aren't sealed, just mounted in them.
Also you can only feed low freqs to a sub this might also be part of the problem.
You can try feeding your radio shacks speakers from your 100 watt amp to see how the amp sounds.

Polyfill can also make the speaker think its in a larger volume, you can stuff it but not to the point of compaction, this is how I made the boxes for the 12" a little "larger".

 

I've got it polyfilled. Soundstream doesn't make cheappoopie amps like Jensen does, so I'm sure what you see is what you get. it can run 150watts 2 ohm, i was doing that with the Audiobahns, but the 100 watts 4 ohm sounds nicer on the Xplod.

 

The problem isn't the amp I don't think. Unfortunately I'm not there so I can't figure out what's wrong specifically. Soundstream amps are very good quality amps. Much better than pioneer, clarion, etc. On par with the top level Fosgates, Orions, Alpines, etc. The rating of the amp is a good solid rating. It may be that the sub needs more power, something is wrong with the box that I can't identify without seeing it, you have a bad crossover point, the wires aren't up to par, you got a bum sub(not brand but the one you specifically have is bad), etc. The xplode is a more expensive sub than the one you have. It also is more efficient needing less power for the amount of sound you get. From you saying your lights dim from the amp leads me to believe you may not be getting enough juice to supply the system. Could be your alternator. With my 3 amps the lights never dim no matter how loud I go and if I have AC, etc. running as well. You may want to try one of two things. Neither would be a waste regardless. One is a capacitor. It will store up energy and release it to the amp when it needs it stoping the dimming and making sure you have enough energy going to the amp. The other is a bigger alternator. If yours is old now, it might not be a bad idea to replace it with a larger one making more power. Either will solve your dimming situation. And as long as you are running 8 gauge or larger wire to the amp, 12 gauge to the sub(smaller gauge #s) you should have the full potential of the amp power wise.
The way to test the sub to see if it is blown is two fold. Easy is to push in the cone gently. As it travels in and out if it makes a scratchy scrappy noise it could mean a coil is blown. Also, test the resistance with a meter to see if it is blown. If it is ok it should be good. If not, that's your problem. Hope this helps.
92TripleBlack :cheers:

 

They suck because ...

the voltage... 12V vs. 110V is correct...

 

I siliconed it and went ahead and ported the box even though the sub instructions say NOT TO.

Well... now it's loud enough to make my car sound like its coming apart! Definately what I expect for 100 watts now. Guess i just needed a port. :\ and the seal wasn't perfect. It can play tones the Audiobahn couldn't touch, and is about 3x louder. Definately happy with it now, but everyone makes fun of Xplod. Shoulda got a JL sub... this will do until i can power the audiobahns with 250watts each or more. Thanks.

 

One Q. I asked was whether the C5 center enclosed area with a 12" needs a port or not. I listen to heavy metal and some hip/hop so bass is important. I am considering sealing everything like Smash has.

George

 

I have mine set up with a removable port and plug. Just make sure you have the polyfil AWAY from the port so it doesnt block it, or blow it all over the car.

I put the port in for rap and some music, and plug it up for other music. Works really well for me.

port = sloppier blurrier LOUDER bass
sealed = nice tight slightly quieter bass

I think porting a box also reduces the power handling of the sub. Can someone back me up on that?



[Modified by Smash, 1:20 PM 11/30/2001]

 

Poly fill in a ported box will do nothing for you. How many cubic feet is the box. If it is too small, you will not get the deep base. 100 Watts on a 10 isn't going to give you mind blowing base. But the Soundstream amp is probably underrated power wise. I just don't see why you got an Explode sub over the audiobahn....what was wrong with the audiobahn??? They need quite a bit of airspace.....Where is the speaker pointing??? To get the most SPL from the sub, get a box that points up at the back hatch window, if it is not you will be surprised by the difference. If you can't do that, point the sub at the back of the car, it sounds better and you will get slightly louder base.

Or go to a better amp and speaker..... Fosgate makes good amps and they are always underrated when it comes to power. JL make great subs like the 10W6 or 10W3. If you want to get rediculous amouts of base from 1 10" get the W7 and an amp to push it and hold onto something because your eyeballs with shake in your head... :D :eek:

But I hope that you get what you are looking for........
With car audio get what you want the first time so you won't have to get different components later. Which Audiobahn 10 do you have?? How much you want for it??

Damon