My most successful subwoofer build

[audio amateur]

So as I was telling GM the other day, I've completed a subwoofer project which is actually the finishing of a semi finshed/working build I made 4 years back. At the time, it was my second subwoofer build and first ported build. I had left the exterior unfinished, and the sound was terrible (distorted even at low volume). It was a 3.5CF ported box using a cheap 12" Sony driver.
I thought the problem was with the driver/enclosure mismatch but in fact the bracing partitions in the enclosure weren't letting enough air get from one chamber to the other. Eventually I gave the driver to a friend and left the box sit in the basement for 4 years.

Recently i was contemplating using a decent driver in a new enclosure (sonotube) but then I figured I should give my dying enclosure another try. I went for another 12" driver (apparently a variation of the Lab12 Eminence driver) built to spec for a British company who also makes OEM products for other audio companies, such as REL. It models perfectly with this enclosure.

Anyways, so I worked on the partitions (tough job given the limited room, did most of the cutting with the hand saw), placed the port a little differently which required adding another sheet of MDF on the side where the amp and port were - I decided not to mount the plate amp on the enclosure like I had before. Fortunately the previous 12" hole was just the right size.

The colour paint I had planned to use was white, but I went with mat white as there was some in the basement already. I did buy some primer. 2 layers primer, 2 layers paint. My sander is crap so there are still some uneveness but it looked good enough so I just started painting it anyway. I am quite please with the outcome. Here are some pics, it sits behind the right speaker in my bedroom



You can see the plate amp which powers the sub. As Im using it with an HT receiver im thinking of going with a bridgeable NAD power amp instead or something similar











Yes that is my foot lol and don't ask me what the 6 by 9s are doing there







Visually speaking, there's no denying the new driver is a completely different beast.

There's a couple more to come...