Break in period for subs

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

2-3dB gain seems as unlikely as TS parameters changing that much after only a minute and a half of play at 50W. That is so unusual if it were me I'd buy a couple more of those subs to do more careful/thorough testing.

Dunno what their ratings were but spiders failing prematurely was a somewhat commonly problem for Audioque in their early days and "you didn't break it in" was a cop-out they used often when presented with returns on things that had failed. Oddly enough since their first generation of subs we stopped reading about spiders tearing so either everybody is now properly "breaking in" their subs or they sorted their **** out with the shoddy Chinese parts since then.
I'm not looking to argue, I'm demanding evidence to prove dubious claims.

Why take this personal? If you had time to scour my post history I've called ******** on this "break in" thing every time the topic has come up around here. You started by making claims about this "break in" pheomenon, I declared ******** without proof. Burden of proof is on the person who makes a claim.

Again, nobody has attempted to contradict this, but the question is how much and over how much time? Show data to prove this is meaningful for practical purposes.

I'm still waiting on you to give me the names of a few non slowed or re-bassed songs that contain 25hz material. Seriously though, no I do not, but if your point is break in only matters at 25hz, why bring up DD as your evidence when their stuff is NOT designed to tune that low? Do you have any evidence or hard data to prove your claims?

Are you claiming that TS parameters do not predict the output of a woofer in a box? "It sounded better" is absolutely anecdotal and subjective as opposed to objective evidence which could be proven with some recorded data.

No, but give me the names of some non slowed commercial release music and I may give it a whirl. How precisely does this matter?

Again if you're claiming some audible difference that somehow cannot be predicted or shown by changes to TS parameters, post up some before and after RTA graphs or Termlab numbers for proof and do not forget to note after how much and what kind of play time and at what power these changes take place.

Correct. Are you claiming that some "break in" ritual is needed to prevent subs from breaking or are you claiming that there will be some audible difference in output and/or response after some conditions have been met? Or do you claim both? DO you claim that this is with any speakers or only with certain types/brands?

The fact that nobody has nailed any of this down with specifics or any hard data only confirms my assertion that this is largely just pixie dust, unicorn tears, and tribal rain dances. Until I am shown some hard evidence to the contrary I'll go on with my belief that the vast majority of change in compliance in those ultra stiff woofers happens within only minutes of hard play (up to x-max) and that if your sub is failing right out the gate it is from poor parts or build quality or outright abuse and not because someone didn't perform the right ritual beforehand. Furthermore I will continue to demand proof of claims, and if such proof exists you wouldn't need to write three or four text walls in reply but would simply link some videos of side by side testing or some recorded data to prove this claim.

Some links on the topic that provide measured data. My apologies if they use TS parameters as evidence.

http://[URL]https://www.audioholics.com/loudspeaker-design/speaker-break-in-fact-or-fiction

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http://[URL]https://www.audioholics...ction/speaker-break-in-fact-or-fiction-page-2

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http://[URL]http://matrixhifi.com/ENG_contenedor_rodajealtavoces.htm

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Responses from several well known manufacturers when asked about "break in".

http://[URL]https://www.audioscienc...php?threads/do-audio-speakers-break-in.11898/

[/URL]
You will notice that the ONLY people on this thread who are posting any measured data are proving that any change over time is inaudible. Another interesting point raised here is that never in the history of loudspeakers are any of these "break in" changes for the worse but always make things sound better.

An interesting message posted here by Dr. Sean Olive of Harmon International:

http://[URL]https://www.stereophile.com/content/breaking-new-speakers-4

[/URL]
Of course this is followed up by all the subjective feelings of the golden-ear crowd who can really hear the difference 200 hours later, some going as far as to claim a coil will perform differently after some heating and cooling cycles. No lie, there are people who claim amplifiers and even cables need hours of "break in" to really hear nuances and subtleties. Oddly enough nobody who can hear the difference weeks or months later is posting up any hard data by way of RTA graphs or TS parameters changing over time.

This topic has been beaten to death for decades now and I have yet to find any hard data provided by the "break in" camp. Post up some real data and not another page worth of subjective opinions and pseudo science.

It depends literally system by system man, and how it’s being used.

DD’s aren’t designed to be tuned at 38 hz or whatever. That’s just what they recommend. I literally know a DD employee who was working on setting a 20 hz record dude. Idk if you get this, there are no rules in sound. Not when it comes to boxes, that’s the whole point.

And you’re caling out somebody elselike you were there. Based on your logic, where is your data he’s wrong?

My ears are real data. You can look at data all you want, what happens in the real world matters.

Never said anything like a break in time was a good or bad thing. Just said it was a thing.

You’re just narrow minded honestly. You can’t understand things about audio because of you emotions, emotional BS stuff like essentially calling people’s tastes in music bad because they don’t listen to farts all day long.

“It doesn’t matter that you listen to 25 hz bc I don’t.”

Can your prove to me that t/s parameters need to change at all for a woofer to sound different?

I still don’t really disagree with you, but my ears don’t lie. If I wasn’t chronically ill and stuck in a bedroom, I’d love to do soeme tests. I’d really love to pull t/s.

I don’t care what the t/s say on this one. I’ve heard the difference with my ears with some subs and break in time. Usually it’s very short.

I’m not joking about the 9500’s either, there have multiple times and I’ve talked to individuals who say the same. In the past when I was around a lot of DD stuff, specifically the 9500’s would have this moment where they would play louder. And DD told us it would, and it did, and like 3 people on the car heard it man. I mean there was a pretty clear difference in how the woofer played and this happened with Multiple systems, albeit it was usually single woofer systems.

We all must be retarded and snorting DD unicorn dust right? And DD must be retarded and snorting neodymium magnet shavings right?

I wonder about glue types used for spiders and soft parts, and I wonder if there’s any extended hard cure time on that? Like I wonder if glue strength in relations to play time has anything to do with a break in. I’ve seen spiders lift off of stuff woofers before, but I think that’s usually crap manufacturing (American bass cough cough).

There are electrical proprieties that can change with high heat. Electricity flow is very sensitive to small changes, especially since electricity moves so quickly. Heat can rearrange molecule structures and heat can also take tension out of materials, like heat softens metal and can allow for molecules to move in slightdifferent positions. So fresh wound copper or something, which is typically soft and malleable, could slightly move around inside of things like amps.

No amp I know of needs a break in time, maybe besides a vacuum tube. I guess it depends on people’s ears.

But if you keep saying everyone’s ears are lying to them, idk what to tell you. People could have better ways than you, that could be a factor.

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

I’m tempted to straight up ask DD.

Why don’t you email DD directly and tell them that their magic ritual is wrong?

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

2-3dB gain seems as unlikely as TS parameters changing that much after only a minute and a half of play at 50W. That is so unusual if it were me I'd buy a couple more of those subs to do more careful/thorough testing.

Dunno what their ratings were but spiders failing prematurely was a somewhat commonly problem for Audioque in their early days and "you didn't break it in" was a cop-out they used often when presented with returns on things that had failed. Oddly enough since their first generation of subs we stopped reading about spiders tearing so either everybody is now properly "breaking in" their subs or they sorted their **** out with the shoddy Chinese parts since then.
I'm not looking to argue, I'm demanding evidence to prove dubious claims.

Why take this personal? If you had time to scour my post history I've called ******** on this "break in" thing every time the topic has come up around here. You started by making claims about this "break in" pheomenon, I declared ******** without proof. Burden of proof is on the person who makes a claim.

Again, nobody has attempted to contradict this, but the question is how much and over how much time? Show data to prove this is meaningful for practical purposes.

I'm still waiting on you to give me the names of a few non slowed or re-bassed songs that contain 25hz material. Seriously though, no I do not, but if your point is break in only matters at 25hz, why bring up DD as your evidence when their stuff is NOT designed to tune that low? Do you have any evidence or hard data to prove your claims?

Are you claiming that TS parameters do not predict the output of a woofer in a box? "It sounded better" is absolutely anecdotal and subjective as opposed to objective evidence which could be proven with some recorded data.

No, but give me the names of some non slowed commercial release music and I may give it a whirl. How precisely does this matter?

Again if you're claiming some audible difference that somehow cannot be predicted or shown by changes to TS parameters, post up some before and after RTA graphs or Termlab numbers for proof and do not forget to note after how much and what kind of play time and at what power these changes take place.

Correct. Are you claiming that some "break in" ritual is needed to prevent subs from breaking or are you claiming that there will be some audible difference in output and/or response after some conditions have been met? Or do you claim both? DO you claim that this is with any speakers or only with certain types/brands?

The fact that nobody has nailed any of this down with specifics or any hard data only confirms my assertion that this is largely just pixie dust, unicorn tears, and tribal rain dances. Until I am shown some hard evidence to the contrary I'll go on with my belief that the vast majority of change in compliance in those ultra stiff woofers happens within only minutes of hard play (up to x-max) and that if your sub is failing right out the gate it is from poor parts or build quality or outright abuse and not because someone didn't perform the right ritual beforehand. Furthermore I will continue to demand proof of claims, and if such proof exists you wouldn't need to write three or four text walls in reply but would simply link some videos of side by side testing or some recorded data to prove this claim.

Some links on the topic that provide measured data. My apologies if they use TS parameters as evidence.

Speaker Break In: Fact or Fiction?

Driver "break in", "burn in" or "run in" is a topic that's been debated in various forums for years. This topic continues to ignite occasional flame wars, fueled by the contributions of both

www.audioholics.com

Speaker Break In: Fact or Fiction?

Driver "break in", "burn in" or "run in" is a topic that's been debated in various forums for years. This topic continues to ignite occasional flame wars, fueled by the contributions of both

www.audioholics.com

Matrix-Hifi: Speakers Burn In

matrixhifi.com

Responses from several well known manufacturers when asked about "break in".

Do Audio Speakers Break-in?

There are a lot of "everybody knows" type of rules in audio with one of them being that audio gear in general, and speakers in the specific, benefit from "break-in." That is, their performance improves after some time. This is mostly touted by audiophiles but manufacturers also fuel this...

www.audiosciencereview.com

You will notice that the ONLY people on this thread who are posting any measured data are proving that any change over time is inaudible. Another interesting point raised here is that never in the history of loudspeakers are any of these "break in" changes for the worse but always make things sound better.

An interesting message posted here by Dr. Sean Olive of Harmon International:

Breaking in new Speakers

Hi, I am about to take delivery of a brand new pair of B & W 685 speakers. I read somewhere about breaking them in by playing low level back ground music for up to 50 hours.Does anyone know about breaking in speakers, and can give some guidelines?thanks.

www.stereophile.com

Of course this is followed up by all the subjective feelings of the golden-ear crowd who can really hear the difference 200 hours later, some going as far as to claim a coil will perform differently after some heating and cooling cycles. No lie, there are people who claim amplifiers and even cables need hours of "break in" to really hear nuances and subtleties. Oddly enough nobody who can hear the difference weeks or months later is posting up any hard data by way of RTA graphs or TS parameters changing over time.

This topic has been beaten to death for decades now and I have yet to find any hard data provided by the "break in" camp. Post up some real data and not another page worth of subjective opinions and pseudo science.

This is a legit request, can you respond in multiple posts? This is a very long post and it's hard to respond to all the quotes with the layout haha. I'm on my PC now and I'm gonna look at these links some.

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

"Correct. Are you claiming that some "break in" ritual is needed to prevent subs from breaking or are you claiming that there will be some audible difference in output and/or response after some conditions have been met? Or do you claim both? DO you claim that this is with any speakers or only with certain types/brands?" <- I had to pull that out of the quote to respond, just trying to respond here.

It's not a ritual. Stop being demeaning. It's far from a ritual. It's an educated guess. It's based on how the woofer is playing when we first hook it up, with no play time at all. While tuning the system, we test the sub across a bandwidth with just various songs, and see how the woofer plays. So we would tune at high volumes over a certain period of time in the shop. We definitely noticed some woofers low end reproduction would struggle straight out of the box. Some subs heat up a lot if you push them too hard. Most subs are fine. I want to make that clear. I'm not saying every sub needs a break in, and I'm also not saying that even DD needs a break in. I'm just saying I've heard DD 9500's literally play different after a lot of play time, and it's a significant change in volume, specifically the way the sub transitions notes, punches, stuff like that.

Heavy bass with those hard knock punches break in subs good. I've heard new subs give a few punches and become almost immediately louder. You know those punches in songs that like whack you in the face.

Now this was with protype subs and they had issues, but I was given 4 CT Sounds Strato 18 early models or prototypes. They weren't good subs, not the ones I got, but I don't think the ones I got went into production. The spiders on those subs were incredibly stiff. Waaayyyyy too stiff for the thermal limits of the coil, the amount of power they were limited to wouldn't push the cone around very well. But those subs had a break in time, absolutely. They never sounded right, but I went around the block and rode around in circles for about an hour and the system was literally about 50% louder after that hour. Now those were poor designs. But they did break in after playing them, to an extent, and they did get louder, and if you were there, you'd be lying if you said you couldn't hear it.



Some woofers will play differently after some amount of play time. Yes, I am 100% claiming that as KNOWLEDGE, because it's just really not that f*cking hard to hear, I've experienced that my entire life. I can hear it? So what? Many people do, with the situations I'm talking about. Some brands that I've noticed woofers playing differently over time, and they're usually like 1500w+ models: American Bass, SoundQubed, and Digital Designs. Basically the HD's, HDC3's, and 9500's are some of the woofers that I've noticed this with the most. I'm not saying you always have to break them in to not hurt the woofer. I am saying that in certain, very specific situations, the amount of play time on woofers can change things. I have seen woofers overheat that are brand new, because I or someone was trying to play low notes to see how the box was doing, and the subs were too stiff to travel enough under the power I was giving them. That usually doesn't happen to people, but it can.

Rule of thumb too is to play it safe. Even if a woofer shouldn't have issues, that doesn't mean you shouldn't be safe it if does. Sometimes break in is just an extra step of caution, so many woofers are made in China LOL

 

[mat3833 10+ year member]

As much as I love a good ****-slinging both of you are correct. A subs "break in" or lack thereof, is entirely based on the construction of the woofer and its intended use.

I've ran more subs than I can remember, and I've only done any kind of break in procedure on a handful. Mechanical compliance and motor force are the only 2 things that really matter when it comes to break in. Enclosure type affects overall compliance, but for simplicity sake let's remove that variable.

Very strong motors don't give a **** about how stiff or soft a spider is. You give it X power and it will move X distance with very little variation. Softer spiders are more compliant from the get-go, and a stack of 3 soft spiders may have the same overall compliance of a single stiff spider, but they don't have the same potential for cracking as that stiff spider. Think of it like this:

Anyone who has used PVC or any kind will tell you to be careful with it in below 50 degree Temps. A prime example of this is XPVC sheets. A 1/4 inch thick 4'X8' sheet can be bent into a circle when it's 90 degrees, but that same sheet will Shatter if you try the same thing at 40 degrees. Spiders are basically just some kind of polymer binder mixed with fibers and heat cured into a specific shape. Anyone who has used bondo understands the concept. Those polymer binders start out resistant to flexing, some more than others. Flex a stiff polymer too much and it will Shatter.

Honestly I could care less if a Yahoo rips their sub apart. And I could also care less if Joe blow has ran the "bass monster 30k" aka, worlds stiffest sub, on 50k watts right out of the box. Anyone who knows anything about material compliance or mechanical fatigue should understand that anything designed to flex under a load will inherently require some form of break in and will also have specified limits to operating temperature/compliance range before a failure is going to happen.

This is what a fatigue failure looks like:

That's a 1/4 inch stainless high pressure line for a water Jet.

That line is designed to move with the track and flex while carrying a 60 THOUSAND PSI stream of water inside of it. You can coil a 20 foot section of the line into a 30 inch circle without much trouble. Hell, you can tow a car with a section of this stuff, it isn't fragile.

The simple fact of all of this ******** is some subs do need a break in period. It may not be absolutely critical, and you may get away without doing it just fine, but that doesn't change the facts.

Matt

 

[audiobaun 5,000+ posts]

Ive always taken it easy on my subs for a good couple months before going full tilt and retune before I do. Playing full tilt constantly will wear down any sub over a period of time. Nothing last these days.Just about everything has its limitations. Its how you use or abuse those limitations, and take care of

 

[audiobaun 5,000+ posts]

I have 4 pair of Audiobahn AW1008T subs and 4 AW1006T subs, and they still look and play great. They are more than 10 years old and i have taken care of them, and they have always had the proper enclosures built and power.Never over powered them to theyre limits ,always stayed within the RMS range.Still work great.

 

[hispls 5,000+ posts]

Can your prove to me that t/s parameters need to change at all for a woofer to sound different?

Yeah, I guess not. TS parameters don't mean anything and neither does the Termlab or an RTA meter. Just trust that golden ear of yours.

Why don’t you email DD directly and tell them that their magic ritual is wrong?

Why would I? These companies who make these claims about break in rituals making some dramatic difference or taking several weeks or months have expensive and precision test equipment and an unlimited access to new drivers to post real data as evidence if any existed. Oddly enough companies that don't pitch that ******** have provided data showing that the biggest changes happen very quickly and are still too small to produce any audible difference.

You posted an awful lot of replies just to say "No, I don't have any real evidence to substantiate my claim".

Enclosure type affects overall compliance, but for simplicity sake let's remove that variable.

So let's just toss out the variable that will largely determine compliance of the system (and therefore performance).

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

Here's a really good statement about Cms of woofers. I don't know how many people understand Cms, but I calculate Cms based off other t/s parameters, and that's part of the t/s calculations I do for what box size I want to give a woofer. Cms is how much the cone travels under a force. The stiffer the woofer, the less it will travel under power. This is one of the main factors in determining woofer stiffness, and the needed box size resulting from that stiffness.

Many woofers with a low Cms also have low Q values overall, especially low Qms values. Woofers with low Q values control themselves better or frankly are typically more stiff, but it depends on the suspension type, whether it's a progressive or linear suspension, or a mix of both. Progressive suspension woofers t/s are harder to read, because the stiffness of the woofer changes as the cone travels more, so you can get a low Fs and still have a low Qms and relatively low Cms.

"DD Audio subwoofers tend to be low compliance drivers. This means that our suspension tends to be pretty tight. Why would we do this, you might ask? It’s simple really, DD Audio customers demand the most from their woofers. Many people see something like a 9500 series woofer that is built to handle 2000 watts of continuous program power and think, “Gee maybe I should run that 3800 watt M3c amplifier on it.” Is it too much power? Potentially, but it certainly doesn’t stop people. To combat this DD makes the suspension strong enough to mechanically handle that kind of power."

Tech Talk: Why Breaking in Your Woofer is Important - DD Audio

Tech Talk | WRITTEN BY AARON TRIMBLE | October 2018 If you’re a frequenter of any online car audio forum or social media group, you’ve invariably run across folks talking about “Breaking In” their woofers. Breaking in a woofer is the process of playing a speaker in order to stretch or loosen the...

ddaudio.com

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

Yeah, I guess not. TS parameters don't mean anything and neither does the Termlab or an RTA meter. Just trust that golden ear of yours.

Yeah, I guess not. TS parameters don't mean anything and neither does the Termlab or an RTA meter. Just trust that golden ear of yours.



Why would I? These companies who make these claims about break in rituals making some dramatic difference or taking several weeks or months have expensive and precision test equipment and an unlimited access to new drivers to post real data as evidence if any existed. Oddly enough companies that don't pitch that ******** have provided data showing that the biggest changes happen very quickly and are still too small to produce any audible difference.

You posted an awful lot of replies just to say "No, I don't have any real evidence to substantiate my claim".



So let's just toss out the variable that will largely determine compliance of the system (and therefore performance).

Hearing sounds is evidence. Unless you can't trust your own ears. Do you set your crossovers with SPL equipment, or do you do it by ear?

 

[mat3833 10+ year member]

Yeah, I guess not. TS parameters don't mean anything and neither does the Termlab or an RTA meter. Just trust that golden ear of yours.



Why would I? These companies who make these claims about break in rituals making some dramatic difference or taking several weeks or months have expensive and precision test equipment and an unlimited access to new drivers to post real data as evidence if any existed. Oddly enough companies that don't pitch that ******** have provided data showing that the biggest changes happen very quickly and are still too small to produce any audible difference.

You posted an awful lot of replies just to say "No, I don't have any real evidence to substantiate my claim".



So let's just toss out the variable that will largely determine compliance of the system (and therefore performance).

OK, then let's not. It makes zero difference whatsoever in reality, just makes it eaiser to ELI5 you.

Let's use 3 different scenarios here, all with a stiff suspension driver. First will be sealed, second will be a musical tuned ported, third will be a burp box/output based box. Some assumptions will be made here, so feel free to nitpick as you will.

Scenario 1 - sealed box. So, you have a super stiff woofer with a very strong motor and you cram it into a sealed enclosure. GREAT! Now you gave that motor something extra to fight against and increased the mechanical dampening. The same **** still applies. Sealed enclosures have a shallow rolloff. Unless you put whatever woofer into a super small enclosure, you are still very much capable of driving the spiders too hard. You just gave yourself a larger margin for error.

Scenario 2 - musical ported enclosure. Same woofer, but this time we have an appropriately sized ported enclosure tuned to 31hz. Pretty solid tuning for a musical box. Woooooo hooooop, buckle up boys and girls, it's going to be a Rollercoaster of fun now! You just gave yourself extra safety AND potentially fucked yourself in the ass at the same time! I'm impressed! See, ported enclosures increase output by driving a mass of air and using that to increase output. You use motor force to drive that mass of air. good on ya mate, you gave your spiders a good bit of safety net. Unfortunately, if you don't have a proper subsonic filter you did a bad thing. Below port tuning, your sweet sound producing air mass doesn't do jack ****. It no longer helps control the woofer once you dip below tuning and it's basically like operating your sub without an enclosure at all. With a properly set subsonic filter, you can beat on your sub like a military husband going after his wife all day and she will stay with you forever. But you forget that all important knob to set your subsonic filter and your beaten, broken wife is going to grab your handgun and end your **** QUICK. You go from having tons of damping to almost ZERO, and that spells disaster in this case. 2000w of power hammering at 31hz will have virtually no cone movement because of your port, track change to a song that peaks at 25hz and all of a sudden your 4mm of total cone movement turns into 60mm of total cone movment. Even if you have the excursion capacity for that to avoid smashing the backplate or leaving the gap, you still just possibly cracked your spiders.

Scenario 3- output tuned ported enclosure. Yep, same ****, but this time homie wants his **** to SLAM on some 40hz music. Great, bump that tuning up to 39hz and rock on man! Oops, Jaquine forgot his 10000w Xplod amp doesn't have **** for subsonic filter and wanted to impress his new ***** by dropping some Young Jeezy. Oh no, so much for that woofer control when he's playing a 20hz note. All that hope for dropping some panties goes up like a trailer park meth lab.


Any other questions, comments, concerns, or nitpicking? Any way you look at this the facts are facts. Some subs do need a break in. Some manufacturers even state specific subs need a break in.

Matt

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

OK, then let's not. It makes zero difference whatsoever in reality, just makes it eaiser to ELI5 you.

Let's use 3 different scenarios here, all with a stiff suspension driver. First will be sealed, second will be a musical tuned ported, third will be a burp box/output based box. Some assumptions will be made here, so feel free to nitpick as you will.

Scenario 1 - sealed box. So, you have a super stiff woofer with a very strong motor and you cram it into a sealed enclosure. GREAT! Now you gave that motor something extra to fight against and increased the mechanical dampening. The same **** still applies. Sealed enclosures have a shallow rolloff. Unless you put whatever woofer into a super small enclosure, you are still very much capable of driving the spiders too hard. You just gave yourself a larger margin for error.

Scenario 2 - musical ported enclosure. Same woofer, but this time we have an appropriately sized ported enclosure tuned to 31hz. Pretty solid tuning for a musical box. Woooooo hooooop, buckle up boys and girls, it's going to be a Rollercoaster of fun now! You just gave yourself extra safety AND potentially fucked yourself in the ass at the same time! I'm impressed! See, ported enclosures increase output by driving a mass of air and using that to increase output. You use motor force to drive that mass of air. good on ya mate, you gave your spiders a good bit of safety net. Unfortunately, if you don't have a proper subsonic filter you did a bad thing. Below port tuning, your sweet sound producing air mass doesn't do jack ****. It no longer helps control the woofer once you dip below tuning and it's basically like operating your sub without an enclosure at all. With a properly set subsonic filter, you can beat on your sub like a military husband going after his wife all day and she will stay with you forever. But you forget that all important knob to set your subsonic filter and your beaten, broken wife is going to grab your handgun and end your **** QUICK. You go from having tons of damping to almost ZERO, and that spells disaster in this case. 2000w of power hammering at 31hz will have virtually no cone movement because of your port, track change to a song that peaks at 25hz and all of a sudden your 4mm of total cone movement turns into 60mm of total cone movment. Even if you have the excursion capacity for that to avoid smashing the backplate or leaving the gap, you still just possibly cracked your spiders.

Scenario 3- output tuned ported enclosure. Yep, same ****, but this time homie wants his **** to SLAM on some 40hz music. Great, bump that tuning up to 39hz and rock on man! Oops, Jaquine forgot his 10000w Xplod amp doesn't have **** for subsonic filter and wanted to impress his new ***** by dropping some Young Jeezy. Oh no, so much for that woofer control when he's playing a 20hz note. All that hope for dropping some panties goes up like a trailer park meth lab.


Any other questions, comments, concerns, or nitpicking? Any way you look at this the facts are facts. Some subs do need a break in. Some manufacturers even state specific subs need a break in.

Matt

Hahahaha thank you

 

[mat3833 10+ year member]

Hahahaha thank you

Wasn't doing it for you man, but you are welcome. This is stupid. If multiple companies that build subwoofers recommend a break in, why in the Alabama cousin-******* ******** would you say it's not a thing.

T/S shift is real, and I'm sure alot of it happens rather quickly, but T/S aren't measured under a large power situation, these are measurements made with very low power driving the speaker. Nobody has done full power testing of T/S specs because it isn't an actual thing...

Matt

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

2000w of power hammering at 31hz will have virtually no cone movement because of your port, track change to a song that peaks at 25hz and all of a sudden your 4mm of total cone movement turns into 60mm of total cone movment. Even if you have the excursion capacity for that to avoid smashing the backplate or leaving the gap, you still just possibly cracked your spiders.

THIS.

Great explanation. I'm trying to design a wall and put a box in a CNC and talk about this at the same time lol.

That's so the way I look at it man. You explained my mind better than I did.

That's why I was making a reference to low notes. You can over-travel from playing too high in a ported box, but since high notes have less polarity duration, the cones tend not move as much per stroke, before they have to go back the other direction.

Low notes and port tuning <--- one of the quickest ways to destroy your woofer is not respecting this relationship. I design my boxes for music almost always; that's what most people want. I design around cone control, largely, and with cone control comes proper frequency bandwidth volume, or leveling, where the woofer is moving more consistently across the bandwidth. Another way to say that: I try to give the sub ton of mechanical air support and loading as it sweeps across a bandwidth. This is extremely important to sound quality and somewhat flatter responses, because some boxes will unload so quickly under tuning that it's easy for the sub to damage itself. It doesn't take much of the bottom of the coil slapping the motor back plate to absolutely destroy a coil and former. It's also very important to control cone movement to limit the variances in impedance and voltage spikes that the amp deals with from the sub movement. When the sub unloads, you run the risk of amplifier problems and dirty signal/distortion problems.

I design my boxes, largely, around giving the woofer a home it's happy in, relative to how you want the system to sound. Sometimes you gotta let your woofer stretch before you try to make it run a marathon, you know?

 

[Slo_Ride 5,000+ posts]

Yeah I don't believe in the whole break in thing. I install em, I play em. Also I never liked AQ (now SQ) subs. Just don't like them.