man you guys got me wanting to try these RE 8's out!!! I'd probably port 8 of them instead of 4 though, not enough for me. 4 of them probably don't even add up to much more than a single 12" //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/biggrin.gif.d71a5d36fcbab170f2364c9f2e3946cb.gif
Someone needs to do a review on these badboys. And shit if they were $33 i would buy a SHITLOAD
Heres one for you.
Review Corner
Resonant Engineering RE 8
By Loyd "bigbassman" Lowry
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Yeah yeah, I know you're all expecting me to have another world-class monster woofer for review, and here I am with a piddly 'lil 8" woofer. The audio world appears to be going through a crazy 8" phase, with multiple companies now building 8-inch SUBwoofers. We're talking driver that can displace more air than most modest 10 inch woofers. With that in mind, I reviewed the new Resonant Engineering 8". A budget minded driver with claims of excellent response and output. And away we go…
Build
Build quality is nice. The woofer uses a stamped 4 legged black basket, with a small depth. The motor employs a single magnet slug with a thin top plate and back plate, which have a golden hue to them. The back plate is also bumped out. The voice coil is an 8-layer, 1.5" diameter, copper coil wound on a lightweight former. The woofer uses a poly cone, with a somewhat soft dust cap. Finally, the RE 8 uses a decently wide santoprene style surround.
Parameters
Here's the full list of woofer parameters as given by Resonant Engineering, with additional information provided by LSP-Cad
Qms 7.05 Znom 2 ohm
Qes .36 Le .38 m/H
Qts .34 Mms 65 grams
Vas 22.4 liters Bl 7.15 n/A
Fs 28 hz Xmax 10 mm
Re 1.6 ohm Sd 180 cm2
Efficiency .13% (83..2 db 1w / 1m)
EBP: 77.8
Enclosures and Vehicle
For the first time for a Momentum Review, I employ the services of my vehicle, a 1990 4 door grand prix for testing. The woofer was tested in both a sealed and ported enclosure, which is mounted down in the floor under the center of the dash. I used a .28 cubic foot (7.9 liter) sealed box, which had a .707 alignment. The ported box was .45 cubic foot (12.7 liters) after displacement, and used a single 2" diameter round port that was 3.2 inches long, giving it a 33hz tuning frequency. Power was provided by the rear bridged channels of a Coustic 320qe amplifier (gained down to 150 watts RMS into 2 ohm mono). Multiple x-over points were tried, and I eventually settled on 90hz with an 18 db /octave slope.
Sealed Performance
I was highly impressed with the RE 8's performance sealed. She sounded very good with any type of music thrown at it. The woofer had excellent depth, accuracy, and clarity. I feel that she particularly excelled with hard rock and metal baselines. Each note or line was well defined, and the woofer remained extremely composed even with more than the recommended amount of power on it. My normal testing material went over well. The Eagles' "Hotel California" (Geffen) sounded very nice indeed. Even with low bass intensive music, such as "In Da Club" by 50 Cent had decent punch. I can certainly see this woofer having enough output to content a lot of listeners.
Ported Performance
Wow! What a difference an extra bit of airspace, and a port can do! This sub got downright nasty in the ported box. For an 8-inch woofer, she got loud, and stayed composed while doing it. The biggest difference was the large increase of output below 50hz. Going with the ported box gives you a flat response to below 35hz. Whoever says an 8" woofer can't get low needs to check out this sub. Unless space is an utmost issue, I'd certainly suggest the ported design.
SPL Testing
This is usually the portion of the review where I give the SPL measurements of the woofer from the Linear X pcrta. I am omitting the test this month, due to time constraints on my end. I'll try to meter the woofer soon, and add the data into the review.
Torture Testing
I'll try to make up for the lack of SPL number in this portion. I've found several good things that go along with owning 8-inch woofers and one of them is certainly the price. I took a go at this woofer with some nasty power levels, sines, sweeps, and warbles to establish the woofers breaking point. So I cranked the gain up on the 'ol Coustic amp, which will now provide nearly 300 watts to the 8. Using the sealed box I wanted to find out if the coil could reach back plate, which it did, at 55hz. So 300 watts is a bit much for it…good…so I continued onward. Next off, I tried to find a thermal limit. Using a nasty repeating 100-60hz sweep, I turned the amp loose on the woofer and let her play. After about 3 minutes, and a noticeable drop in output, I shut her down, and examined the woofer. Other than a really warm dust cap, and some of that wonderful VC annozidation odor, the woofer appeared to be in fine shape. After cool down, the coil still checked out at 1.6 ohm DCR. So now we know the woofer is mechanically limited more so than thermally. If RE were to allow some more rearward clearance, the woofer would certainly be suited to at least 300 watts RMS for usage.
While this testing is always fun, I had to do something completely uncalled for. While using the same sealed box, I hooked up my pair of American Bass 1200d amps onto the woofer (2600 watts + into 2 ohm) and let off a single burp at 100hz, just to see what'd happen. Other than a horrid sounding tone, coupled with some loud cracks of the former knocking back plate, she did survive. After another inspection of the woofer to check for a VC offset, everything checked out ok. Currently this woofer still resides in the car for daily use in the sealed box.
Overall
The RE 8 is a **** fine little sub. She can do anything her big brothers can, just with a limited amount of output. She sounds great sealed, excels in a ported box, and will provide a user with maximum performance for a minimal price. For an MSRP of $99 (which can be had for under that from a dealer), this is a deal too good to pass up.
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