Alright, so I finally got around to swapping out the sub in my setup. The old one was okay, but I felt like I needed something with a bit more… well, punch. Heard good things about this particular model for a while, so I decided to give it a shot.
Got the box delivered the other day. Pulled it out, and gotta say, it felt solid right away. Heavy magnet, sturdy basket, the cone looked pretty tough too. You can usually tell right off the bat if something’s built decent, and this felt like it was.
Getting Started
First things first, safety. Popped the hood and disconnected the negative battery terminal. Learned that lesson the hard way years ago, don’t want any sparks flying where they shouldn’t.
Then I went to the trunk and started taking out the old sub. Just a few screws holding it in the box, nothing too crazy. Disconnected the speaker wires. Bye-bye old friend.
Wiring It Up
Now for the new guy. Checked the wiring instructions that came with it. Mine’s a dual voice coil model, so I had a couple of options on how to wire it up to the amp. I decided to wire it down to match my amp’s stable load. Just needed a short piece of speaker wire to connect the terminals on the sub itself before running the main wires from the box terminal to the sub.
- Stripped the ends of the speaker wires.
- Connected the positive to positive, negative to negative on the sub’s dual coils first (for parallel wiring).
- Then connected the main positive wire from the box terminal to one of the sub’s positive terminals.
- Did the same for the negative wire.
- Gave ’em a little tug to make sure they were secure. Polarity is key here, gotta double-check red goes to positive (+) and black goes to negative (-). Mixing these up sounds terrible.
Mounting and Testing
With the wires connected, I carefully lowered the sub into the enclosure. Lined up the screw holes. Put the screws in, tightening them in a star pattern, like you do with car wheels. Helps seat the sub evenly against the box, prevents air leaks. You don’t want leaks, kills the sound quality.
Okay, time for the moment of truth. Went back to the front, reconnected the negative battery terminal. Tightened it down.
Hopped in the driver’s seat, turned the key, switched on the stereo. Kept the volume low initially. Put on a track I know well, something with some decent bass lines. Eased the volume up slowly.
First impression? Yeah, definitely different. Felt tighter, more defined than the old sub. Even at low volume, you could tell it wanted to move some air.
Fine Tuning
Now, just dropping it in isn’t the end. Had to fiddle with the amp settings. The gain needed adjustment because this sub has different power handling and sensitivity than the old one. Played a test tone, tweaked the gain carefully using my ears – didn’t want to clip the signal and damage anything. Also adjusted the low-pass filter crossover point a bit, just trying to blend it nicely with the rest of my speakers.
Spent maybe 15-20 minutes just listening and tweaking. It’s kinda like tuning an instrument, takes a bit of patience to get it sounding just right for your ears and your car.
Final Thoughts
So yeah, that was the process. Took maybe an hour, hour and a half, taking my time. The end result? Pretty happy with it. It hits hard when it needs to, but it’s also pretty clean sounding. Still needs some break-in time probably, most speakers do. But right out of the box, it’s a definite improvement. Solid upgrade, glad I went for it.