Custom Fiberglass Subwoofer Enclosure

[Joshw0000]

One of the first mods I did to my car was a subwoofer. Well, technically several subwoofers. I started with the Kicker Hideaways but they weren't cutting it so I ended up with a Solo Baric 10" sub and a amp capable of 500 watts RMS @ 4 OHMs. The amp and all of the wiring are hid behind the factory carpet but the ported box I have it in stands out like a sore thumb so I've wanted to make a custom box for some time now. I actually bought the supplies in October but it's been too cold.

Well, today I finally got started. Note, I've NEVER made a fiberglass box before. This is the first time I've ever tried this. I ended up buying a gallon of polyester fiberglass, a couple oz of hardener, and 10 yds of chopped strand fiberglass. I also picked up a roller, some tape, and plastic. Again, this was last October.

This is going to be a pretty long post. If you bore easily, come back in a few weeks and scroll to the end...

Today I taped off the right back corner, got a general idea of where I want the sub to sit, and laid 2 layers of fiberglass.

If I'm being completly honest, I think I used too much resin and not enough hardener (4 drops per oz). It was only about 50-60 degrees today but after a few hours this stuff is still extremely sticky. So I'm now hitting it with the heat gun and kicking back a few cold ones as I **** time.

I hope by the end of the night I can remove the shell from the trunk and tomorrow I'd like to add a few more layers to the base to give it strength. 1 oz chop is lighter than most people use so I expect it's going to take a lot of layers. I have a sassy wife and 2 girls... I'm practically made of patience.

Hopefully I'll have more to post tomorrow.

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[krewat]

Subscribed

 

[xFallenxCripplex]

I got this car for this reason the trunk being so wide I could put two 12" solos in both sides then mount the 2k watt amp bottom of the rear deck but seeing my car actually came with "subs" I was going to first seal those off better to see how much better it will sound but I know I want 2k if using sealed subs but closing it off would be a quicker goal.

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[Joshw0000]

I got this car for this reason the trunk being so wide I could put two 12" solos in both sides then mount the 2k watt amp bottom of the rear deck but seeing my car actually came with "subs" I was going to first seal those off better to see how much better it will sound but I know I want 2k if using sealed subs but closing it off would be a quicker goal.

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I have a GM-D9701. The car doesn't even know it's running (no dimming or other power draws). I want to keep as much space for junk (I use it) as possible. I've got a lot of sound deadener in my trunk. And I really like the hard, tight base of 10's.

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[xFallenxCripplex]

I have a GM-D9701. The car doesn't even know it's running (no dimming or other power draws). I want to keep as much space for junk (I use it) as possible. I've got a lot of sound deadener in my trunk. And I really like the hard, tight base of 10's.

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Did the tack finally go away?

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[Joshw0000]

Did the tack finally go away?

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Mostly. I just checked this morning and my hand doesn't stick to it but it doesn't feel completely solid. I started to try an peel it out but it doesn't feel strong enough to support itself yet. Guess the next layer will go on inside the car. I'm going to double up on the hardener this time.

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[Joshw0000]

Layer 3 is in. 8 drops of hardener per oz of resin. It's about 50-55 degrees outside today and I decided to do this layer outside so I don't stink up the garage/house. Yesterday I poured the resin on and primarily used the roller to spread it. Today I poured it on the brush and dabbed it on the fiberglass. That worked much better.

Hopefully I can remove the box today. My back would appreciate that.

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[Joshw0000]

The bottom layer was still wet when I took it out. At first I thought this thing was ruined. It wasn't difficult to remove most of the tape (because it wasn't cured) and luckily I was able to hit it with the roller and it began to cure fairly quickly.

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[xFallenxCripplex]

Layer 3 is in. 8 drops of hardener per oz of resin. It's about 50-55 degrees outside today and I decided to do this layer outside so I don't stink up the garage/house. Yesterday I poured the resin on and primarily used the roller to spread it. Today I poured it on the brush and dabbed it on the fiberglass. That worked much better.

Hopefully I can remove the box today. My back would appreciate that.

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Do you plan on using body filler on it? I did just to give it more support turned out great I used only two layers of thick Matt

I just used the case from the noise cancelling sub.
Type s dual voice coil wired to 2 ohms because I didn't know of any amp that was 1200 1 ohm stable.
As you can tell the carpet hides any imperfections very well although this was a hidden sub.

Excited to see how you're is going to turn out.

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[xFallenxCripplex]

The bottom layer was still wet when I took it out. At first I thought this thing was ruined. It wasn't difficult to remove most of the tape (because it wasn't cured) and luckily I was able to hit it with the roller and it began to cure fairly quickly.

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Are you using a carbon cartridge on your half face?

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[Joshw0000]

Do you plan on using body filler on it? I did just to give it more support turned out great I used only two layers of thick Matt

I just used the case from the noise cancelling sub.
Type s dual voice coil wired to 2 ohms because I didn't know of any amp that was 1200 1 ohm stable.
As you can tell the carpet hides any imperfections very well although this was a hidden sub.

Excited to see how you're is going to turn out. View attachment 12193

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Wow, that does look good with the carpet. I hadn't planned on using body filler but I may have to. Is there any in particular you would recommend?

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[Joshw0000]

Are you using a carbon cartridge on your half face?

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I'm not sure honestly.

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[xFallenxCripplex]

I'm not sure honestly.

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Ok it should since it says for aerosols.

Make sure to put it back in the bag if your not going to be using it to make the cartridge last longer although the fumes are not going to give you an acute reaction in the doses your using it.

And thats just general good practice if you where on a construction site when OSHA sees it would be a fine.

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[xFallenxCripplex]

Wow, that does look good with the carpet. I hadn't planned on using body filler but I may have to. Is there any in particular you would recommend?

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Any body filler will work think I used something cheap that I got from the paint store that had the chopped Matt but I have used bondo and that was fine too think the bondo might have been easier to work with but it was my second time and kinda had a better feeling of what I was doing.

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[Joshw0000]

4th layer is on. I went with 10 drops of hardener per oz this time. 9 drops might be the right #.

I'll probably water test it tomorrow to get a feel for where 0.66 to 1 air volume falls. I'll shoot for somewhere in the middle.

I'll put in wooden dowels on the flat spots before the next layer. It should be strong enough by the 6th layer.

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[Joshw0000]

I had some bubbles that needed addressing. So I dremeled/sanded those on both sides, patched some light spots on the inside, and added a layer to the outside. It's beginning to feel solid. 1 gallon of resin won't be enough using this 1 oz fiber.

Maybe I'll have more time to work on it this week with the apocolypse and all. I'm interested to see what work says tomorrow.



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[Joshw0000]

I have a question for some of you audiophiles. My speaker is DVC 2 ohm, rated for 500 watts RMS and my amp is a Mono, rated for as much as 1200 watts RMS at 1 ohm. My speaker is wired in series, exactly like the first picture. So I should be getting 500 watts RMS at 4 ohms. I'm about 99% sure it's wired correctly now and nothing needs to be changed. I've not had any distortion issues wired this way and it produces pretty good bass (hopefully more when I finish this sealed box).

If I decided one day to buy another sub and both subs where wired in series, does it change my ohms at all? At that point, both speakers would be at 4 ohms and they would be sharing the 500 watt RMS from the amp, right? So they'd each get 250ish watts RMS?

Now, let's say I wired both subs in parralel. At that point, the amp would produce 1200 watts RMS at 1 ohm and each speaker would receive about 600 watts RMS? Since this exceeds the rated RMS of each sub by 100 watts, I assume this is a big no no? If I turned the gain way down, would I be ok or should I still not consider doing this?

 

[Joshw0000]

Didn't feel like itching today so I decided to cut out the MDF rings (squares). They're not attached yet and I still need to do a lot of sanding. I don't have a router table and doing it by hand isn't working.

Once I get the inner ring how I how I want it I'll glue the two together, square the edges on a table saw and potentially round the edges. I feel like I can hide any sharp edges under fiberglass.

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[SHOMON]

No problem at all. But you can't run both subs in parallel and then connect it to the amp. The amp because it is mono would see a .5 OHM load. Wire them both in series and the amp will see a 2 OHM load. 4 OHM for each woofer. Which would be 800w rms 400w to each woofer! Perfect!!

 

[xFallenxCripplex]

That would work great to get a 1 ohm load

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