Calling BS on "breaking in" subwoofers, prove me wrong.

[bhsdriller 10+ year member]

are you ever around the orange county area? 15s seems pretty quiet, but id love to hear //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/wink.gif.608e3ea05f1a9f98611af0861652f8fb.gif

not really...I plan on attending shows down in the L.A. area next time there are any, there was one last month but I couldn't make it

 

[CHEMMINS 10+ year member]

As with anything that moves.....It will change from new. Things will settle where they need to be. Same as an engine, you need to break it in for a short period (20 mins) before you go full throttle. Shiat has to move/shift/align properly before being tortured.

 

[outsideshot23 10+ year member]

There's a lot of talk here about peoples subs getting louder or noticeably changing TSPs after some unspecified "break in" period. There have been some scientific studies proving that after the first few seconds suspension is stretched out pretty much as well as it will be and any slight varience is generally less than normal variations right off the assembly line.
SO who here has had subs that have metered differently (with no other variables changed) over time playing them? (I sure haven't and I owned a TL and metered often last year).

I've also given plenty of subs full throttle right out of the box (or right after the glue dries with ones I build) and the ONLY things that have failed are poorly made junk brands; so I'll further state that this myth is a cop-out by manufacturers who use low quality materials and glues and third world child labor to excuse products that fail.

Someone post evidence to convince me otherwise.

Dont need eveidence..compete for awhile and you will know.. MOST of the time subs will get quieter as they break in.. hence the reason 90% of competitors are reconing their **** the night before finals.. but it is setup specific.. Some setups WILL gain .. but 90% of people think they are going to get louder and thats just wrong... most of the time they are getting quieter as far as the meter is concerned...........

 

[outsideshot23 10+ year member]

As with anything that moves.....It will change from new. Things will settle where they need to be. Same as an engine, you need to break it in for a short period (20 mins) before you go full throttle. Shiat has to move/shift/align properly before being tortured.

not if your trying to set a world record... think about it,.. why is **** louder when its cold.. efficiency has a little to do with it but its because its stiff.. like a new sub.. break it in and you lose

 

[outsideshot23 10+ year member]

What precisely is "way louder" in decibels? Actual measurements please.


Definition of Objective and Subjective

Objective is a statement that is completely unbiased. It is not touched by the speaker’s previous experiences or tastes. It is verifiable by looking up facts or performing mathematical calculations.

Subjective is a statement that has been colored by the character of the speaker or writer. It often has a basis in reality, but reflects the perspective through with the speaker views reality. It cannot be verified using concrete facts and figures.

Let's stick to OBJECTIVE evidence please.

he doesnt have any.. may sound louder.. im bet your quieter on the meter

 

[CHEMMINS 10+ year member]

not if your trying to set a world record... think about it,.. why is **** louder when its cold.. efficiency has a little to do with it but its because its stiff.. like a new sub.. break it in and you lose

Reason it is louder when it is cold, it two fold. One, the coils are cold, keeping resistance down, letting the amp push more power. Second, the amps being cold, are not driven into thermal protection.

It has nothing to do with being brand new subs. If that was the case, teams would be dropping in all new, never used subs in right before they meter. Which is not the case.

 

[sacsking916 5,000+ posts]

Reason it is louder when it is cold, it two fold. One, the coils are cold, keeping resistance down, letting the amp push more power. Second, the amps being cold, are not driven into thermal protection.
It has nothing to do with being brand new subs. If that was the case, teams would be dropping in all new, never used subs in right before they meter. Which is not the case.

that is the case from what i have seen. a guy with 4 solo x's in a crx with a fart box would change his cones before every run. they werent always brand new cones but he would constantly change them before every run. the first set was always new while the 2nd or 3rd set were probably burped once or twice before. never made much sense to me til later on down the road.

 

[CHEMMINS 10+ year member]

You could technically "chill" the coils before a run and achieve the same result. I know for a fact that Team Riprock does not change their sub ever run.

 

[outsideshot23 10+ year member]

Reason it is louder when it is cold, it two fold. One, the coils are cold, keeping resistance down, letting the amp push more power. Second, the amps being cold, are not driven into thermal protection.
It has nothing to do with being brand new subs. If that was the case, teams would be dropping in all new, never used subs in right before they meter. Which is not the case.

like i said.. this is obviously just a hobby for you.. got to finals.. its an all out recone night the night before.. guys are not going to recone 8 perfectly working subs to lose in the lanes.. guys do THOUSANDS of hours testing in a year .. they know whats louder.. new subs... you learned something today

 

[Chriszle 10+ year member]

When a sub with a stiff suspension breaks in it will play lower. Naturally, this will sound louder to the ear, but show up as a loss on the meter. Ear loudness and SPL are two different beasts.

 

[outsideshot23 10+ year member]

You could technically "chill" the coils before a run and achieve the same result. I know for a fact that Team Riprock does not change their sub ever run.

they dont change every run because you ruin the sub to recone it.. they just cruise all eyar get their points.. recone for finals.. thats good you know about 1 team.. i know about at least a dozen world champions and current world record holders and guess what... they recone the night before finals.. you should go sometime.. if your going to give half *** advidse at least get out there in the lanes witht he real competitors and learn a thing or 2

 

---------- Post added at 12:41 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:40 PM ----------

 

When a sub with a stiff suspension breaks in it will play lower. Naturally, this will sound louder to the ear, but show up as a loss on the meter. Ear loudness and SPL are two different beasts.

hit it on the head... also the reason other guy says it drains his electrical more.. play 70 hz and play 30 see which one drains more.. lower tuning=harder on electrical

 

[CHEMMINS 10+ year member]

Well seeing as we derailed this thread with trying to get every last tenth out of a sub, to get back to the OP's question of if things change....obviously they do.

 

[Electrodynamic 10+ year member]

As previously stated, the biggest reason for break-in is for the spider. Spiders are made of cloth that is pressed and then dipped in epoxy. When you break-in a driver you introduce micro-cracks throughout the epoxy, which will make the spider softer. You can typically see a 20% drop in Fs over a lengthy break-in. But because Cms changes, your Fs will drop and so will Qt and Qe and Vas will increase.

Paul Roth of Credence did a test where he broke-in a driver for a long period of time and immediately tested the T/S's, let it cool down to room temperature and then tested the T/S's again on a M-130 model loudspeaker. *Note that this speaker has a much softer compliance than most car audio subwoofers

Here are the parameters immediately after a very long and hard break-in:

Fs: 46.9

Re: 5.5

Qms: 1.86

Qes: 0.33

Qts: 0.28

Cms: 1.64

Mms: 6.99

BL: 5.84

Vas: 20.69

SPL: 90.12

Le: 0.32

And here are the T/S parameters after it cooled back down to room temperature after several hours:

Fs: 49.9

Re: 5.5

Qms: 2.01

Qes: 0.35

Qts: 0.299

Cms: 1.58

Mms: 6.41

BL: 5.60

Vas: 19.99

SPL: 90.50

Le: 0.32

The driver he used had these parameters fresh out of the box:

Fs: 50.47

Vas: 18.64

Qt: .314

The greatest amount of change will occur right at the beginning of break-in, but the parameters will stabilize and show almost no change at all from continued use.

So what does all of this mean? For the end user, simply use your subwoofer normally. After a week or two everything should settle into a constant and you shouldn't see any change in the performance of the driver after that.

 

[hispls 5,000+ posts]

Here are the parameters immediately after a very long and hard break-in:Fs: 46.9

Re: 5.5

Qms: 1.86

Qes: 0.33

Qts: 0.28

Cms: 1.64

Mms: 6.99

BL: 5.84

Vas: 20.69

SPL: 90.12

Le: 0.32

And here are the T/S parameters after it cooled back down to room temperature after several hours:

Fs: 49.9

Re: 5.5

Qms: 2.01

Qes: 0.35

Qts: 0.299

Cms: 1.58

Mms: 6.41

BL: 5.60

Vas: 19.99

SPL: 90.50

Le: 0.32

The driver he used had these parameters fresh out of the box:

Fs: 50.47

Vas: 18.64

Qt: .314

Looks to me like playing a speaker while it is heated up makes more of a change than anything. We can safely say that prolonged hard play will change the performance of a speaker (possibly noticeably?) until it cools down.

The "before" and "after" break in TSPs look within a couple percent of eachother. As I said before I suspect most woofers right off the assmbly line have more varience.

 

[Buck 5,000+ posts]

Unless you are doing strict SPL, who the fuck cares? Just play your bass and be happy.