subs and rattle

dnewhous

If I were to get a sub in the back of my van, say a Polk db1212 with one of Polk's 500 watt amps, wouldn't that cause my van to rattle something gawdawful? Even assuming I only use a fraction of the power, say nothing over 125 watts.

I have a hypothesis that unless you are willing to spread Dynamat all over the interior of your vehicle, subs aren't a good idea. Am I on the right mental track?

MacLeod

Youre a little off there bro. A sub is almost a requirement for optimum SQ and is a must have if you want good SPL. The only way youre really going to make the sheet metal rattle and buzz is if youre using a lot of wattage, say in the kilowatt range. 125 watts definitely wont do that.

However you would likely encounter loose interior panels thatll buzz a bit. Thats where the Dynamat will come in. Itll take you a while to track down all the offending panels but when you do, take it off and slap some damping on the back of it and it should take care of it.

Case in point, I just traced a rattle to my passenger door's window/lock controls. Take that panel off and the jacks where the window and lock controls insert were rattling inside their housing along with the bass (which the SR's seem to be making more of the more they break in). Slapped some duct tape around the housing and over the top of the jacks and presto, no more rattles.

PoweredByDodge

ya, we've got a 250 watt sub in my grandfather's truck, and 4 speakers running off about 50 watts each... i crank it up and nothing rattles except the stupid cup holder thingy because he leaves nickels and dimes in there.

my truck, however, rattles something fierce because i'm juicing around 3,500 watts. but i'm still not going to dynamat the whole thing, i'm just going to trace down the "problem areas" and lightly dynamat them and then see how it is. i bet you i won't have to spend more than 50 bucks on dynamat to get er all quiet enough for me. not quiet enough to compete, just quiet enough to make me happy.