Eh hem!...Subwoofers... What do ya know?


Subwoofers are a thing.  A thing to love.  A thing to avoid.  A misunderstood thing.  

What are your opinions on subwoofers?  What did you learn and how did you learn it? 


128x128jbhiller
And these are not my ideas or research, you can ask Duke LeJeune with Audiokinesis from which I learned everything I know about subs and which swarm array (trolls like the word or not) is the best bass solution I found after trying the conventional ones, he is IMO the one source of truth to go for these matters, I think he have commented in this thread already
Duke LeJeune is Da Man. Aka Audiokinesis, he has done more for this than anyone, which this will probably instigate a reaction owing to the fact his one fault is being blessed with an overabundance of modesty. 

Seriously though the research goes back to Dr Earl Geddes, and another whose name eludes me just now. Anyway, point being what Newton said, if we seem to see far it is because we stand on the shoulders of giants. These guys did the heavy lifting, the down and dirty grunt work of painstakingly measuring actual room modes in actual rooms with different numbers of actual subs in different locations. And then as if that was not enough they applied the brain power to first work out and then ultimately demonstrate- prove!- just how well lots of subs really does work.

Duke however is so much a part of the whole thing that not only did I learn about this from him here, but when I went looking for Swarm type subs and was able to find only two systems on the market, it turned out the other one was designed by Duke as well!

Anyway, congratulations! You did the research, asked the questions, learned what needed to be learned, and then had the courage to buck the trend and the trolls and do what's right. Good for you. Enjoy!
Does anyone technically know what happens when you aim two subs at each other?  Say a foot or 2 feet apart .


What do you mean? In phase? Or out of phase?

Is there an ideal distance apart to do with frequency?

What do you mean? Are we still talking about pointed at each other? Why would you even want to do that?

Does it have an affect on the opposing woofer itself such as improving the rearward movement of each other? Would have to be a specific distance i assume . A possible equation ?

Only thing I can think you might possibly be trying to get at is what's been covered a zillion times, that waves propagate and bounce and reinforce and cancel, everywhere and all the time, and at all frequencies. And regardless of which direction they were pointed first.
@millercarbon Very well said
Emphasis on this
his one fault is being blessed with an overabundance of modesty



Duke has made available to audiophiles an integrated multi subwoofer system at a great price. Kudos to him. 
There are three considerations when it comes to accurate bass performance. The woofer itself by which I mean the driver and it's enclosure, the amp driving it and it's integration with the satellites including crossover cut off points, slopes, phase/ time alignment and room control. There are plenty of high powered amps capable of great bass. More electronics are including digital bass management and room control with delay capabilities which makes integration a snap TACT, Anthem and Trinnov come to mind. It turns out the most difficult part to do correctly is the subwoofer itself. Making an enclosure capable of perfectly isolating a high power, long excursion 12" driver is very difficult. Put you hand on your subwoofer while it is playing. Feel that vibration? That is distortion. Any flex or movement of the enclosure is distortion. The ideal enclosure would be infinitely heavy and infinitely stiff. It would be a concrete bunker. This of course is commercially impractical. Designing the internal dimensions of a sealed subwoofer enclosure is easy. Making it acoustically dead is another story altogether. This is where the home hobbyist has a great advantage. There are a slew of great drivers out there and you don't have to worry about shipping and labor costs. You can make an enclosure as heavy as you want as long as it does not fall through the floor. We made killer enclosures with a sandwich of Corian and 1" MDF  Corian/MDF/Corian 2" thick. They weighted 250 lb each and when you put your hand on them you felt nothing.