$$ SOLD $$
Some may think owning Dual 18inch subwoofers is close to crazy in a residential environment.
Well I say you haven't heard bass until you have experienced the depth, speed and impact of large diameter/piston drivers. Nothing will prepare you for the sheer weight and authority of a large diameter bass driver, especially when compare to today's small and compact subwoofer solutions.
The Mach 5 18ixl drivers I selected offer incredible value for money, and have only recently been replaced by Mach 5's new IST Mach 5 UXL-18 18" subwoofer, an incredible driver to say the least.
I built my subwoofers with the following end goals in mind:
- I wanted subwoofers that would dig deep for movies, and have excellent transient response
- They need to be musical when listening to hifi, and exhibit no overhang or obvious group delay.
- My subs needed to be powerful and capable of handling 800watt-1200 RMS each for bass impacts during movies and musical transients.
- The cabinets needed to be manageable, and have some WAF. Although these cabinets are not small and still unfinished in raw MDF, they are not HUGE like some other LTE/subwoofer designs.
The software I used to help design the cabinet size and tuning was WIN ISD Design. its free & found here: WIN ISD Linearteam Design
After settling on the "maximum box size" I could manage in my space, WINISD quickly gave the following parameters for my design. You will notice I give both sealed and ported alignments here. That's because I designed the subs to be ported for movies and sealed for music (via port foam bungs).
Internal Volume: Circa 167litres
Internal Volume Less brace/Ports: 140litres
Weight: Lets just say the are bloody heavy
Ported Alignment tuning: 24HZ -3db free space in estimated 140litres
Port length: Dual 100mm ports @ Circa 47cm, with end correction
Sealed Alignment: 0.646
MACH 5 18.2.2 DRIVER FEATURES
Below you will find the driver specifications for the Mach 5 18ixl, taken from the Affordable drivers website. This is where I purchased the drivers.
- High quality, ultra-low distortion, long-throw 18" subwoofer suitable for home and car audio
- Heavy 6-spoke cast aluminum basket
- 3" dual 2 Ohm voice coils (can be wired in series to produce a 4 Ohm load or in parallel for a 1 Ohm load)
- Thick pulp cone with heavy foam surround
- Wrap-around rubber gasket
- Vented pole
- Triple stacked motor
- 75mm four layer voice coil
- 2 layer spiders
- Suitable with amplifiers of up to 800 watts RMS
- Plain dust cap (no logo)
- Twelve months warranty
PARAMETERS
- Power handling: 800 watts RMS
- Sensitivity: 89db (2.83 volts) - coils wired in series (4 Ohm nominal impedance)
- Impedance: 2 + 2 Ohm (DVC)
DIMENSIONS
- Outside Diameter: 46.2cm (18 3/16")
- Mounting diameter: 42.4cm (16 11/16")
- Depth: 24.8cm (9 3/4")
- Weight: 16 kg
T/S PARAMETERS
- Fs: 17.7 hz
- Re: 3.4 ohms
- Qes: 0.39
- Qms: 5.59
- Qts: 0.37
- Mms: 434.3 grams
- Rms: 8.69 kg/s
- Cms: 0.184 mm/N
- Vas: 274.1 litres
- Sd: 1029.2cm2
- Xmax: 22mm (one way linear). Xmech is limited only to the depth of the spider landing of the basket which exceeds 30mm
- Cone Diameter: 36.2cm
Believe it or not, these DIY subwoofers sound more musical due to their extended frequency capability than my Dual (Yes 2) $4500 Velodyne dd10's. If that is not saying something for DIY Speaker building I don't know what is.
On movies these subwoofers have jaw dropping performance. They run rings around any brand name subwoofer I have heard upto $6000 in value. They move serious air, and have the ability to compress my large 8x7 meter listening room (which has 2 stairwells with free space) with ease.
Just the ticket for high impact movies.
On War of the Worlds, when the alien robot machine comes out of the ground, these subs exhibit serious power handling. Lesser subs including my Velodynes at reference levels digitally compress/bottom out on this scene, due to the huge amount of low end information present and the SPL required to reproduce at reference levels.
These subs handle 800-1000 watt RMS loads with ease in ported mode, producing the most amazing and clean low end extension I have heard from a subwoofer solution to date. They cruise through high energy action scenes, with immense power, impact and pose. Truly exceptional subwoofers!!
Their transients and impact delivery is flawless, due to their massive motor travel and rigid surround. On music in sealed mode they are "VERY" fast and hit with pose and speed. I have run them up to a crossover point of 60-80hz and they deliver sound quality on par with my Velodynes.
Considering these drivers cost me $320inc gst, plus time and MDF, its a non brainer for the DIYer looking to achieve top tier subwoofer results. Just remember to include the cost of an amplifier into your mix.
Commercial PA amplifiers such as the Behringer EP2500, Crown XT, etc offer the best value for money here. Preferably look for amplifiers with DSP capability for room equalisation and tuning, if your digital processor doesn't offer this functionality via Audessey XT32 or similar, room acoustics can be difficult to overcome otherwise.
Key selection criteria should be:
- Power Output @ correct impedance load
- Current delivery capability
- Dampening Factor - The higher the better, over 1500 is preferable for tight bass & good piston control
- Quite Operation / Fanless if possible
BUILD PICTURES
This was my first Hifi DIY speaker build of any kind. I have previous experience with 3-4 automotive subwoofer and speaker solutions. Construction of the cabinets was completed with very basic tools. The main tools utilised included:
- Square
- Circular saw - But not really utilised
- Hand saw
- Router & Router bit set
- Clamps
- Electric Drill & Drill Bits
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