building an enclosure

[twich12 10+ year member]

i am going to be building 2 enclosures for my 12" 300w (RMS) infinity reference series (i think they are called 1020w infinity reference series) and the volume of the enclosures are going to be about 5000" (a little under 3') and i have a few questions

1. does the shape of the enclosure matter? does it matter whether it is almost a cube, or whether is 12 inches wide and 36 inches long? or even if it has 30 sides?

2. i dont have access to MDF so which would be better, 11/16" OSB (waferboard) or 3/4" plywood (they are the same size just OSB is measured true and ply is not)?

3. im going to go ahead and assume regular old coarse drywall screws are to be used?

4. should i line the inside of the box with something? and if so, what? egg crate? how thick?

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[disturbed471985 5,000+ posts]

Shape does not matter in most situations. Umm I guess plywood I mean I have no idea what waferboard is why no access to mdf?? No lowes, home depot in area?? Dry walls screws will be fine. Leave inside of box alone unless you want to resin the inside other than that leave it alone.

 

[twich12 10+ year member]

OSB is like chunks of wood glued together (from most processed to least its like solid wood, plywood is layers of wood, osb is pieces of layers of wood glued together, particle board is saw dust glued together, and mdf is fine dust compressed and glued together) and the reason i dont have access is because im getting this for free and my current enclosures are WAY undersized and made of OSB (they were free... well my amp plus subs plus enclosures were all free) so im basically just doing all of this for free, once i have more experience i plan on making some out of MDF but this is kind of like a practice run with all the free stuff i got, in the long run i plan on getting a couple of 15's (maybe 18's depending one how ambitious i am) and making nice mdf boxes and getting a nice amp

 

[Kangaroux 5,000+ posts]

Please don't use OSB....

Do it the right way the first time and use MDF or birch ply. Why are you building 2 enclosures?

 

[hispls 5,000+ posts]

i am going to be building 2 enclosures for my 12" 300w (RMS) infinity reference series (i think they are called 1020w infinity reference series) and the volume of the enclosures are going to be about 5000" (a little under 3') and i have a few questions
1. does the shape of the enclosure matter? does it matter whether it is almost a cube, or whether is 12 inches wide and 36 inches long? or even if it has 30 sides?

For your application, shape won't matter whatsoever so long as your volume is correct and it's airtight.

2. i dont have access to MDF so which would be better, 11/16" OSB (waferboard) or 3/4" plywood (they are the same size just OSB is measured true and ply is not)?

Plywood. IMHO MDF is awful to work with and if you get a tiny bit of water on it (leaky gasket or whatever) it melts. Plywood, and brace any large side

3. im going to go ahead and assume regular old coarse drywall screws are to be used?

You may break the heads off of them depending on the plywood you use, otherwise, glue and screw is common and simple. If you have a nail-gun that's really nice, and if you have some long clamps and patience you can do without.

4. should i line the inside of the box with something? and if so, what? egg crate? how thick?

No need for your application.

IMHO you should be more concerned with the orientation of the subs and box in your trunk. If you block off that passage between the trunk and the cabin you will have terrible output regardless of what you do. Keep that as your #1 goal if you can. If you must have things right up to the back of the back seat, see if you can fire the woofers through that hole into the front and then try to keep the rest of the box as snug as possible around that.

If you have those boxes you have now you can play around with aiming and orientation of subs to see what sounds best. Do some experimenting before you decide on a plan.

 

[Heeltoeclutch 10+ year member]

I used polyfill batting on the inside walls of the last two boxes I made; I will be doing that from now on after asking here if it were the best thing to do. Reduce yer standing backwave-ness...

 

[twich12 10+ year member]

i have been playing with the orientation and i figure i may as build some new boxes (something that will help me orient them towards the front) since they will be free anyways... im planning on having them at 45 degrees on the box aimed towards that gap to help channel sound from the trunk into the cabin

 

[twich12 10+ year member]

good news everyone, im using 3/4" Russian birch instead of cdx! now my largest span is going to be 18", you guys thing i need to use bracing? keep in mind its 3/4"! will be using PL600 (maybe 400? not sure, whatever numbers comes in red and yellow tubes are) and drywall screws to construct it