Reducing Trunk Clutter
 

Hello everyone. It has been a while, but I have a question. I have a pair of subwoofers in a fairly large box in the trunk of my car. What I would do before, is put the groceries, or anything I was carrying in the backseat. Now, though, my rear seat is being occupied, I am carrying more stuff than ever in my car, and really need the trunk space.

Recently, I saw a set of 6x9 subwoofers on parts express. http://www.parts-express.com/tang-ba...oofer--264-837

They seem to have good reviews, but I am not sure if they can be installed on the rear deck, or if they would need an enclosure.

Also, would these even be a good purchase?

They will fit. But imo its not worth it. You want the trunk soace. You will have to remove your subs.

Another option would be to buy shallow mount subwoofers if you really want the bass.

Is the output too low or would it be too hard to set them up? As for removing my subs, I do want trunk space, but I don't really want to go sub- less.


Interesting Idea. I will probably have a look at those.

^Do they make that for Aleros? jk lol

Thats not a question for me. Im not huge on sound system stuff. :(

I know many may not like this idea, but have you thought about the Solo Baric line from kicker? It's a square sub so it can be smaller and yet have the same punch as 2 subs from the size over.

I bought a 10" Kicker Solo Baric L3 in an enclosed housing for my Camaro. Fits right into the little hole in the hatch area. With the right amp, I've had people tell me they thought I had 2 12"s in the back. The L3 was discontinued and replaced by the L7 for right now, so you would have to get the L7. It's more powerful than the L3 though.



They're truck enclosures, but you could also get 2 10" subs and make something to mount them on the sides of the trunk, like so.



These square subs don't really require much space in the box BUT you would sacrifice sound quality in favor of sound pressure. In other words, these subs can get really loud with a small design and a small enclosure BUT your frequencies will muddle. This to me isn't a big issue since I listen to a lot of rap, so it doesn't affect me since bass tones tend to be very basic in that genre, BUT if you listen to a lot of rock, you may notice a difference. This is why I started this post with "many may not like the idea". I've heard a lot of people don't like these for certain genre's of music, usually older music.

The bottom of the Kicker provided enclosure is 14" btw. You could easily line em up with the back seat and have about 85% of trunk space left.

Do you need all the trunkspace, or would an enclosure work that is half the size of the one you have now?

Pretty much, I just want to get the most out of my current trunk space. So rather than have two subs, maybe lower it to one and in a smaller enclosure. I do not really care if it is a bit less loud than it is now, as long as I do have some bass.


That seems good, but a bit over my current budget. I could maybe pull it off with another sub though. My current setup is just 300wrms @ 4ohms, so if I can pull that off in just one sub, and in a small enclosure, I will be happy.

Go with a sealed enclosure, not as popular for whatever reason but that's the route I went with a 10" sub and I still have plenty of room in trunk and I still get the bass.

The solo baric are kick ass too. Very good sound for the size though they aren't cheap for the set ups.

I currently have a sealed enclosure, but it is fairly large. I think I found something else now. http://www.ebay.com/itm/INFINITY-REF...e m27e2da5747 can handle almost as many watts as my current setup, but is just one sub, and eight inches. This will reduce my clutter a bit. Does this seem okay?

I would go with something off to the side. I didn't have the subs, but I did have the air horn tank which took up a lot of room when I needed it after the divorce ;)

I wouldn't go any lower than 10". 8", you would end up no better than using your 6x9 as subs.

Fun fact: The 1993-2002 Camaro's had optional subs that went in the "sail panel", where the rear passengers sat. To make a long story short, it sounded no better than just having bass through my normal speakers. 8 are similar that way.

If money is an issue, then I would recommend the Alpine SWE10S4. They're entry level speakers, and can be had as low as $55. The link is for a SWA series sub. I think they phased out the SWE subs.

http://www.sonicelectronix.com/item_...-SWA-10S4.html

You can also put em in a bandpass box, and it wouldn't take much space.

I used this one, had it in the Grand Am, and It only took away about 12-14 inches of space.

http://www.sonicelectronix.com/item_...2-12-GRAY.html

Also, the infinity 8 inch sub is only 250W rms, not 860 (this is the peak number which doesn't represent the true continuous power handling ability of the subwoofer).

Could try an "isobarik" enclosure using the speakers you have now:



That would reduce the enclosure volume by about 45%. The disadvantages are it reduces available power of the amp by 50%, and you have the output area of only one speaker cone. The sound quality should be much better, but at a lower sound level. The Wikipedia article on the subject appears to be inaccurate, other reliable sources have demonstrated good results in the past.

That is what I am now considering. I am probably going down to one sub.


Forgive my ignorance, but what is bad about using small subs if they are rated at the same rms level? I know bigger speakers go lower frequencies, but don't smaller speaker still punch certain bass notes hard?


That looks interesting. I like the bottom design. If I could pull it off with a small enclosure, that one seems good.

All is good, it's not ignorance on your part.

The smaller the sub is, the less cone area it has.

I'll riddle it to you like this. 1 15" sub will punch more hard than 2 12" subs using the same air space (for this example, lets use 2.0 cubic feet). So while you need more room to have 2 12"s at 2.0 ft2, you can be more efficient with one 15" because the bigger the cone area, the more air it can produce/compress. Therefore the smaller cone areas of 8 and 10 don't have the power to compress the same air in a 2.0ft2 box as a 15 or a 12 can. In fact, there is such thing as a box that's too big that it can't compress the air within it. This is why you'll never see a big box with 2 10s in it the way you do with 12's.

So while you do lose frequency at 8, you also lose pressure, and it will take a good box for it to sound near the size of a 10".

The only other way to get good pressure from a small sub is get a square one. MTX makes em as well, but I trust Kicker more.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Kicker-Solo-...e m461f6aff0c

Something like this will make you sound like a 10" and you can side mount it where the access area for the tail lights are.

I agree with what you said in general, except two 12's often have more total cone area than one 15. And sometimes changing the mechanical parameters of smaller woofers can make them require a larger box for flat response, but they are not usually designed that way.

Either way, there is more to it than just cone area, the woofer(s) should be designed for the particular box volume you are using.