Go with the most cone area you can fit

is this a trunk? suv? hatch?

Space a concern?

 

Its a trunk of a middle size car, space is not a BIG concern, but I would like to keep some trunk..I was thinking of 2 10" with a well build sealed box...

 

sealed and little power is the opposite of what you want to do if you need output.

I'd go with 10's in a ported enclosure.

SSA dcon and sundown E series come to mind

 

do you think a 10" 450 RMS sub will have better sound and output in a ported enclousure compared to 2w3v3 in a sealed enclousure??

I will look into your brand suggestions..

 

It depends on what frequency you need said output at. Below 50 Hz, I had a single ported Digital Designs 1010 outperform a pair of 10w6v2s sealed. From 50 Hz to 80 Hz, the sealed 10s were louder, but that wasn't where I wanted my output. Even with more power going to the sealed 10s, they still couldn't hold a candle to the ported 10.

 

Do a little research on Toby bandpass enclosures. I own the sheriff model (which is a single 10" 200watt sub) and am very happy with output, plus they now have a 15" model called "outlaw" and I bet with one of those and 500watts you'll be more than happy.

 

the most efficient use would be large drivers, 15" or better, and in an IB alignment.

 

Unless you are going for SPL....a single 12", high sensitivity, rated for @300-350watts RMS and with say 13mm to 17mm of one way excursion...will dig deep (plenty of power for those lows) and play rather loud, while having kickass SQ.

Two 10" will do better, but at the expense of space. Don't forget about the sensitivity rating...a sub with 3db higher sensitivity will only need half as much power as the sub with 3db less, to play just as loud.

 

keep it coming as this interest me as well. My build will have 500 watts to a 10 or 12" that will fit a fox body spare tire well.

 

My trunk sub, recessed into spare well, in a 1.44 ft³ net sealed enclosure. Infinity says 1ft sealed, but a bit more seems to suit this sub, it digs deep, isn't boomy, and is very nice sounding when EQ'ed. The sub is 91db sensitivity and rated at 350w rms. My V9 drives it very nicely and with 500w on tap, it can drive it low where the power is needed.

 

This Infinity Kappa 120.9w is a good performer. I have mine in a 1cu ft box stuffed with polyfill. Tight, "fast" bass with good lows. I power it with 600watt amplifier, but even with a 250watt amp I had before it sounded pretty good. For $150 I paid, it's a good value. It's not a "stealth" sub. It's just screaming look at me, but I like it. You can also take a look at Alpine's "thin" Type-R subwoofers. They're supposedly very good SQ subwoofers.

Instead of a 12 inch subwoofer in sealed box, you can also go with something like a 10 inch sub in a ported box, which can add a bit more to the low end below 50Hz. Subs that can work in a reasonably sized ported box could be the 10 inch Kappa, Peerless XXLS, Hybrid Audio I10SW.

 

This Infinity Kappa 120.9w is a good performer. I have mine in a 1cu ft box stuffed with polyfill. Tight, "fast" bass with good lows. I power it with 600watt amplifier, but even with a 250watt amp I had before it sounded pretty good. For $150 I paid, it's a good value. It's not a "stealth" sub. It's just screaming look at me, but I like it.

LoL...it wants to be BLING, I feel like I need a fat gold chain on when I look at it. The only way to "stealth" it is to have it hidden in the trunk. But it's fine, if a bit different. It does perform much better than the MTX I had. Modeling it, my larger box gains very little if any output, but it gets a bit more cone excursion below ~35hz. Meh, not enough for me to build a new smaller enclosure, and I do have 1.5# of polyfill in it as well. $150 bucks hell yeah, I like that part too.

OP-the install is everything, 500w will get you prodigous SQ with plenty of output, go KISS on it and make it technically correct and good looking, any decent sub will get you what you are after. What kind of music do you listen to? Give your sub some headroom, i.e., if it's rated for 250w rms, you need an amp that can deliver at least another 100w on top of that so you can have some dynamics when you start twisting the volume knob up. Subs that keep the amp maxed out can't provide anything more when asked to and SQ suffers horribly, clipping, etc. ZAKOH noted he ran his on 250w, and that is fine, it just depends on what you are after and to be aware of it's limitations. I like to revert a little to my old basshead days, and when I twist the sub level up...I want it to respond haha.

 

Transmission line enclosure with your sub. If you can fit it. I know of a DD6.5 in a TL enclosure that you would swear is two 12's. It is powered by only 150 watts.

 

TL's certainly aren't easy. And not suited to a typical spare tire well. KISS method says a solid pair of sealed 10's or a single 12" will be plenty and easy.

 

500 watts to a single 12" IDMAX or W6 will but just fine unless you're trying to blow your trunk door off with SPL. Depends on your budget though. Get a good class D amplifier, make a proper box (or buy one), and slap it in a deadened trunk area.

Those Infinity's that are mentioned above are nice! I'm actually thinking of grabbing some 10" versions but hoping for some comparisons between them and Image Dynamics IDQs... which it doesn't seem anyone has done. Hmmph.