2 way separate sub units

[George Othen]

Hello there,

I've been intrigued recently by the thought of using 2 way subs, if such a term is accurate. Essentially small sub for the 80 - 50/40hz range and a larger sub to cover below that.

background stuff:
I'm sure plenty of people have had experience with this: buy a 15" car sub driver, build a cabinet, chuck a class D amp into the mix and then power it with an old ATX PSU type deals. The result was anything but pleasing, tried sealed design, ported design both just didn't work out. Didn't really know too much back then but at time of writing I realise it's because the driver was designed to be loud and that's about it. Anyway, rent time came around so it was sold.

I got a bursary from my uni course and ended up getting my first HiFi. Bought a sub and 2 towers. The sub being a Teufel 12" 5000SW; A bass reflex design with room to reach a fairly low 25Hz, even then below 30 cycles was just a port chuff supreme. Whilst the extension was welcomed, I found that this lagged behind with music. Sold it to get something that worked better with music, figured I'd just dedicate the low end to my towers until I could afford something decent.

Did a job for a school, they were chucking out a yamaha sw205, a small 8" thing that claims a response down to 23hz, ha ha.

I'll be honest, it sounds legitimately amazing, it doesn't have quite the output I was after below the 35hz mark but given the size of my student lets it's terrific. I ended up buying a 2nd in the hopes of sorting problems with my listening position.

I'm quite intested in keeping these 2 subs just because they work so well with music imo.

The question:
Is there a device that exists that can split a sub signal into 2 different frequency bands? So I can chuck the 80-50/40hz stuffs to the yamahas and deal with everything below that on a larger sub? Does this hypothetical device allow set delays for each? Or even a configurable xover frequency?

I think a more prominent question... Has anyone given this a go before? Does it work out?

Was thinking of getting a BK monolith for the low lows, the sealed subs seem cool but given the design I'm not sure how much extra they're really going to add in terms of extension.

My setup:
a pair of Teufel Ultima 40's (Some german 3 way floorstander, not sure how well known these are)
2 yamaha sw205's xover'd @ 80Hz
a yamaha rx-375 receiver

 

[lovinthehd]

You could handle crossover/dsp with something like a miniDSP 2x4....you could look up articles on implementation of mid-bass modules and subs.

ps Welcome to the forum...

 

[everettT]

How large is your room? What music do you listen to? Their are plenty of well proven kits that will give you great performance. Have you ever measured your in room Performance? If not you would need to before the endeavor begins. You have to understand what's going on before you blindly start to make changes like this.

 

[George Othen]

You could handle crossover/dsp with something like a miniDSP 2x4....you could look up articles on implementation of mid-bass modules and subs.

ps Welcome to the forum...

Thank you

I've been thinking of joining for a while now, glad I did.

 

[lovinthehd]

You might also consider just getting a more capable sub, I'd never consider Yamaha for a sub fwiw. Nor an 8" driver no matter the brand.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Did a job for a school, they were chucking out a yamaha sw205, a small 8" thing that claims a response down to 23hz, ha ha.

Going down to 20Hz is NOT salient to me. What's salient is how LOUD the sub can play without DISTORTING too much.

So the sub could pay down to 23Hz, but it may only be at 40dB in volume at 20% distortion.

 

[George Othen]

Ok... I can't post my reply, I keep getting a spam warning.

I guess more general, I listen to most anything. 40% dubstep, 60% anything else.

I have tried measuring before but I couldn't figure out the software I was using, so I just EQ'd it by ear with Equalizer APO. I just EQ it for each room I'm listening in, this could range from a 4mx5m room to a 8mx10m room.

I have certainly been thinking about it but I really don't know what budgetish sub I could find that offers a faster musical sound with the extension I desire. Let's call it £500ish.

I don't think I would've ever considered a yamaha myself, but given it was free and it works so well with my music I'm not too sure about leaving it. I imagine come a time when this system is possible I'll have a more objective view of such a replacement.

 

[George Othen]

Going down to 20Hz is NOT salient to me. What's salient is how LOUD the sub can play without DISTORTING too much.

So the sub could pay down to 23Hz, but it may only be at 40dB in volume at 20% distortion.

I crave extension myself, I couldn't really explain why but just feeling that guteral wobbling really hits the spot.

 

[George Othen]

One absolutely ridiculous idea I thought would be fun, that I may put to the test in the future, if income easily accomodates, is to buy like another 14 of these yamaha's and literally stack em

Probably after testing other subs first of course
for £40 used, I'd be genuinely interested to see how 16 would fair.

 

[TLS Guy]

What you propose often advocated. It is a bad idea. A decent sub driver is quite capable of an FR of 20 to 120 Hz and often higher.

Crossovers need to be minimized, and they should never be closely spaced. All add time shifts. The ideal speaker would have no crossovers.

In addition with closely spaced crossovers band pass gain becomes impossible to properly control, DSP or not.

Your best solution is one decent sub.

 

[lovinthehd]

I crave extension myself, I couldn't really explain why but just feeling that guteral wobbling really hits the spot.

I doubt those subs you have currently extend below 40hz at a reasonable level, I wouldn't be surprised that their f3 is closer to 50hz....

As far as "faster" goes, try number three here http://www.data-bass.com/myths

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

One absolutely ridiculous idea I thought would be fun, that I may put to the test in the future, if income easily accomodates, is to buy like another 14 of these yamaha's and literally stack em

Probably after testing other subs first of course
for £40 used, I'd be genuinely interested to see how 16 would fair.

The thing about that is, you said you crave extension. Even if you had 100 of those yamahas it wouldn't change where they roll off. You would obviously gain output but not extension.
I would get the most capable single sub you can afford and start budgeting immediately for a second.