IB Enclosures?

[husdz]

I have four Fi 18” drivers from a previous installation.

My new house has vaulted/exposed ceilings and there is no suitable location to mount a new manifold. I love my new house but very sad to give up the infinite baffle lifestyle.

I’m considering building sealed enclosures for the drivers and using them as regular subwoofers. Obviously the drivers are designed for IB but I don’t want them to go to waste.

I could try to sell them and buy regular subwoofer drivers but I feel silly doing that when I have these four ready to go.

Am I wasting my time/will they sound terrible? Not sure if anyone has had success doing something like this. 

Let me know if you have any suggestions, thanks!

[ThomasW]

Hi,

Not a big deal to do a box sim using one of many freeware sealed box modeling programs. I'd use one driver per box, that way you have the greatest flexibility regarding placement.

What you'll see is limited output down low, that can be fixed with a bunch of EQ boost to flatten the quick rolloff. Since the Fi drivers have a beefy motor and tons of displacement there's no problem 'fixing' the output with EQ and ampflier power.

HTH
Thomas

[husdz]

Ok I will give it a shot, thanks!

I knew about WinISD but also found this online for quick estimates:

www.loudspeakerdatabase.com/Simulators/ClosedBox

I compared a 20” cube to a 40” cube and the difference at 20Hz is less than 10db (although the rolloff/slope - as you anticipated - will need some EQ help). 20” cubes will be much easier to deal with/place so I guess I will start with that and see what happens.

20” cube



40” cube

[ThomasW]

Actually 10dB is quite a bit. Since you have 4 drivers to work with try cutting the output ~50Hz to help flatten the curve.