Starting EBS sonosub enclosure

[parboy]

With much help from Steve Callas, Steve nn, WillyD, Hmenke, and a few others, I am about to begin my sonosub construction. I will be using a Steve Callas model of 320 liters with a 6x27" port for a 14.5hz tune. I have decided to go with the 15" TC-2000 SVC driver and will power it with a Buttkicker amp, giving the sub 1100 watts at 4ohms.

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I went earlier this week and picked up the tube from a local distributor and had it cut down to the size of 48".

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This is just a shot of the tube in contrast with my current pc-ultra.

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As a complete surprise to me when I got home today, I had my driver waiting on me!! I wasn't expecting it untill next Friday Yes!!!

I will begin construction on the endcaps tomorrow (Saturday) and update with more pics when we finish for the day. Wish me luck

[nick77]

You may as well list that ultra on ebay. Hehe That TC2000 looks awesome and will soon rock your world. I love my RLP-15.

[steve nn]

You may as well list that ultra on ebay. Hehe That TC2000 looks awesome and will soon rock your world. I love my RLP-15.

Help me out here Nick, was it not you who I sold one of my Ultra's (box style) to?

I will begin construction on the endcaps tomorrow (Saturday) and update with more pics when we finish for the day. Wish me luck

Good luck and am really looking forward to your pics and impressions. 8)

[nick77]

Opps wrong thread.

[JonW]

Brian-
Good luck. You'll be happy with the results. I'm not sure if I had more fun building mine or listening to it.

-Jon

[parboy]

Today was moving day! My buddy Scott came over and we got started around 9:00 this morning.

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Getting started here drilling a pilot hole for the circle jig using a portable drill guide.

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The first circles cut out!

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Here are the 2 inner pieces of the top cap being glued and clamped together.

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Here are all 3 pieces of the top cap being glued and clamped. You can see the bottom cap and floor plate with legs in the background. The legs are screwed in to the bottom piece, but we haven't screwed them to the floorplate yet. Will of course wait until after we install the driver.

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Here is the top cap all glued up and ready to install.

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Here are all 4 pieces of the bottom cap glued and clamped. Instead of running a 3.5" screw all the way thru for the legs, we just went thru the bottom piece, attached the legs, and then glued it in place. Worked out very well.

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Here is a closeup of the bottom cap and floorplate. They are just sitting on top of each other, not screwed in yet.

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Here are all 4 pieces of the bottom cap with the legs installed.

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This is the inside of the bottom cap. We used a large forstner bit to cut holes for the input terminals. This will give us enough room to install the wire on the inside between the driver and terminals.

Ran into a few problems, nothing major thank goodness. Our biggest goof was drilling the holes for the t-nuts and bolts before making sure the bolt would fit in the driver holes! Doh! And of course, they didn't. I'll head out on Sunday and try to source some locally that will fit. Other than that, we got alot accomplished today. Both endcaps are ready to sand, prime, and paint. We'll get that going possibly Sunday as well, if not during the evenings next week. My wife and I are heading to JoAnn's fabrics on Sunday after Church to find some covering ideas. More to come, so stay tuned

[WillyD]

Well Brian, you did a lot more than me on your first day, and it looks a ton better too. :T

I need more tools. Ahhhh...the luxury of a drill guide, nice router, and big clamps. :rollhead:

My sub is a hack job in comparison. :rofl:

[nick77]

Brian looking good! Your only a few steps from firing that thing up. A little paint and line the walls and glue it up. I used r-13 and just peeled layers off and attached with spray adhesive.

[parboy]

Now I wouldn't say that Willy. Your pics look great. I like the channel you cut out for your tube to sit down in. I thought about it, but just didn't feel comfortable with being able to get it right on the first try. I only had enough wood for the number of cuts I needed, so I didn't try it.

As for the tools....well....only the drill guide is mine...everything else I borrowed from friends and from work The router, circle jig, bits, and clamps all came from different places :E

Nick, your right! It's just a few hours of work away from being ready for prime time! Bad news is my port won't be here untill sometime around the second week of October

[WillyD]

Ha, I am sure you could have done the channel on your first try considering I did. It should all sound the same in the end anyway...hey, do you have your amp yet?

Concerning the port...I guess good things come to those who wait, right? It does suck waiting, but...I think it'll be worth it. I really like the 2" PSP ports, so I know I'll be pleased with these.

I still need to brainstorm about what I'll use to cover the tube...I think I like Wackii's black carpet.

[parboy]

My amp is scheduled to arrive Monday. Im still not sure on a covering, but a trip to JoAnn's fabric today will hopefully turn up something nice.

[parboy]

Went to JoAnn's on Sunday and picked up 3 yards of headliner material. I think that it's going to look nice once it's on the tube. It's kind of stretchy, so it should cover pretty easily. Will hopefully finish up the sanding this week and start getting some primer and paint on her!

[parboy]

Not a lot of progress today, but I'm just kind of taking my time now that the major stuff is out of the way and I have to wait for the port to get here anyway. The amp did show up today, so that is good news.

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Behold the mighty buttkicker 1100 watts at 4ohms, not too shabby.

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Just another angle for the amp.

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This is the floorplate. Put a rough sand on it and put a first coat of primer on.

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This is the top cap, which is where the port will live. Also just a rough sand and first coat of primer. I spent alot of time sanding on the part of the cap that will go inside the tube, making sure it was level and smooth with no ridges to hold up progress.

[steve nn]

Looking very nice! :T

[parboy]

Another evening of sanding tonight. Scott brought over a power disc sander and we made some good progress. Got a nice smooth sand on all the pieces and layed the primer on thick. We'll sand again, prime, light sand, then spray the color on them. The pictures really don't do them justice, they look phenominal!



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[WillyD]

You know you're motivating me to get back to work, right? :rofl:

[parboy]

Another good day today! Scott came over and we did a final sand on all pieces and then put 2 coats of semi-gloss on everything. We also mounted the input terminals and the t-nuts for securing the driver in place. It turned out VERY nice IMO. All we are waiting for now is for the port to arrive, which will hopefully be sometime this week. Once that gets here we can get it mounted, then install the endcaps, liquid nails around the seams top and bottom, install the acoustic dampening panels, put the cover on, then get ready to rock!

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This is the bottom cap, where the sub goes.

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This is the top cap, just waiting on the port to get here!!

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This is the floorplate.

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These are the banana post input terminals.

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This is the input terminals from the inside view.

[SteveCallas]

Great job on the painting :T

[parboy]

Thanks Steve! It took a few days of sanding and priming, but it was certainly worth it today. They turned out better than I had hoped, and a little more glossy as well. I was expecting a more flat finish, but the semi-gloss is more towards glossy I guess

[JonW]

Great work. :T I'm impressed by both the quality of the work and how rapidly you're making progress.

[parboy]

Thanks Jon. Patience is not one of my virtues, which is why im trying to do as much as I can when I can. If the port were here, this thing would already be belting out some notes......some awefully low ones

[Nichol1997]

Looks great. How many coats did you have to do around the edges? I always found the edges to absorb the most paint. It is all spray painted right?

[parboy]

Thanks Nichol. Yes, we used spray primer and then semi-gloss black paint for the whole process. For the black, we put 2 coats on everything.

[parboy]

Got a lot done this evening.

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The port arrived today! This is all the pieces which I had to put together with pvc cement. I had to put the top piece and the 2 tube sections together first, then install them in the port hole. Then I had to flip the whole thing over and install the inside flare from inside the tube.

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While the pvc cement was drying on the port I went ahead and installed the top cap and got the seam sealed with liquid nails. It went in tight enough that I probably didn't need it, but I bought it so......

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While I had the whole tube open I went ahead and glued in the first row of dampening panels since I had easy access.

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With those things out of the way I went ahead and installed the port and glued on the inside flare from inside the tube.

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Here is an outside shot of the top cap with the port installed.

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Next up was to install and seal the bottom cap. This is a shot after getting it in place in the tube. Once again, it was a very tight fit. Had to get creative with a method to hammer it in place without messing up the paint job!

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This is a shot looking inside from the bottom. I have the second row of dampening panels glued in.

Everything is done as far as putting stuff together. I'll hopefully get the fabric covering on tomorrow, the driver installed, the floorplate screwed in. Then it's time to tote this beast upstairs and see what she's made of

[parboy]

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And here I am standing next to the completed sonosub. Im 6' tall, so this thing isn't a baby by any means!

Ok, how does it sound you might ask? I have just 3 words for you.... holy crap!!!!! I can't believe how amazing this sub reproduces the sound. It just absolutely puts you right in the action of the movie. Watching the gun fight scenes on Equilibrium, Open Range, and The Matrix is just jaw dropping fun! I still have more left in the sub I think. I didn't want to push it too hard on it's first time, so the amp volume was just past 12:00. I'll let it break in a little and then crank her up a tad more. I'm going to have to have the smile surgically removed from my face I'll take a few more detailed pics of the finished sub this weekend.

Lots of thanks to Scott for all his hard work on this project!

[kano32]

Excellent job! How does it compare to your SVS? What was the key factors for choosing the TC-2000 over a RL-P15?

[parboy]

Thanks kano! Even though it's not an apples to apples comparison, I'd have to say it would take about 3 of the svs to compare to this sono. That is not a knock agaist the svs as I still think it's a great sounding and hard hitting sub. It's just hard to keep up with half the size, half the power, and using a 12" vs the 15" in the sono.

As for why I chose the tc2000 over the rl-p15, the tc2000 had more xmax I doubt I could tell the difference between the two if they were played in a side by side, but I hate the whole second guessing game so I went ahead and got the one I wanted first

[mboy]

Nice job dude. Looks GREAT!

[JorgenMan]

Nice job - very sharp looking. Do you have a way to do any measurements?

[parboy]

Thanks guys! I do have a rat shack spl meter. My installer friend is supposed to come over this weekend to do some work for me around the house. He will be bringing his laptop and software, so I hope to have some good graphs to show everyone soon.

[ssabripo]

nice job Parboy....cool stuff! :T

[steve nn]

Thanks guys! I do have a rat shack spl meter. My installer friend is supposed to come over this weekend to do some work for me around the house. He will be bringing his laptop and software, so I hope to have some good graphs to show everyone soon.

Things really came out nice!.. Great work and love them pics. I'll most definitely be looking forward to hearing more. :T

[parboy]

Thanks again for all the kind words gents! Im just heading up to watch a movie, but decided to hook you guys up with a couple more pics


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[WillyD]

You're gonna let her loose tonight, right? Don't go easy on her, she can take it.

[steve nn]

You're gonna let her loose tonight, right? Don't go easy on her, she can take it.

I think we pretty much know he'll be plugging in WOTW. :driving:

[Risingjay]

Did you use the single voice coil or the dual vc?

Looks awesome!

[Risingjay]

Ignore my last question about the voice coils.

What diameter sonotube did you use?

What is the exact length of the sonotube? Is it 48" or did you add 1 1/2" for the two layers of MDF that is inside the sonotube?

If I use a different width of sonotube and go taller to keep the same liters, will the port legth stay the same?

Is the port length from the mouth of the flare inside to the mouth of the flare on top?


Any help will do. I'm trying to keep the threads down to a minimum.

Thanks again

[WillyD]

I'll try to answer some of your questions for Parboy, if he doesn't mind.

1. He used 24" Diameter sonotube.

2. 48"

3. Yes, since the port length is proportional to the enclosure volume, not its shape.

[parboy]

Risingjay, Will hit all the questions for you. Don't mind at all Will

I didn't lengthen the tube due to the portion of the caps inside the tube. The volume that those displace was figured into the design. I used alot of tips from the fine people on this forum and avs.com. I also played around with the figures using bassbox 6 pro, which is a subwoofer modeling program I have on my pc.

With the precision port kit, the flares themselves add 5" to the port length. So using a 27" port like I did, I just cut the tubes to equal 22". After putting the flares on both ends it makes it 27".

[Risingjay]

Awesome, I believe I just found my design.

So how does it feel haveing someone copy your design? Should make you proud that you have inspired people. Thanks for everything. I'll be asking for small bits and pieces of the puzzle in the very near future.....If you don't mind.

Thanks again!

Just one more question, If I were to go from 24" down to 20", what would be my height?

[WillyD]

20" tube for this design? The tube would need to be ~67.5" tall.

[SteveCallas]

Collo is putting the finishing touches on a sonosub program with a nice GUI and several parameters that you can alter that will tell you exactly what dimensions of tube, end cap, port, and all that other stuff you will need. Basically you start with WinISD, create a design you like, then play around with dimensions in the Sonosub program until it all matches up just right. You can do it by hand for sure, but in my limited testing with the program, it makes it much faster, you're not going to accidentally forget to account for anything, you won't make any accidental math mistakes, and based on my real world tuning measurements, his program is spot on deadly accurate.

Combined with WinISD and his own Flare It program, one has everything they need to whip up a complete design with all dimensions ready to go in a matter of minutes.

[parboy]

That sounds very cool Steve. Can't wait to see the program!

[Risingjay]

Does anyone have a link to all the meanings of the specs required to enter into the WinISD programs. Exapmle: Fs, Re, Vas, Bl and so on. Sometimes I think that the specs are referred to a different name therefore confuseing me when I evter the info into the program.

I hope I explainded this well enough.

[parboy]

Here is a quick graph I did with the sonosub. I took two measurements, the blue line is with the receiver crossover set to 80hz and the pink like is it set to 100hz. Receiver was set to 7ch stereo, speakers off, sub only playing. I hope to have a much nicer and more representative graph tomorrow when my friend comes over with his high tech toys

Risingjay, here is a link to a site I found very helpful: http://www.bcae1.com/ It's geared toward car audio, but I believe he goes through the questions you asked about parameters.