Does the shape of an enclosure matter as long as the internal volume of the box is correct? Or does it not matter?

 

i believe shape doesn't matter, barring a perfect cube. They say a perfect cube is subject to standing waves, but these can easily be avoided using some baffling, or foam/stuffing.

I think material of the box would be more subject to changing the sound. ie. wood vs. fiberglass, etc., although even then the difference may be negligbile depending on your ears and crossover frequency.

 

For the most part no - just make sure you leave enough room between the vent pole and the back of your box. The vent pole is how your sub cools itself.

 

Sorry... the "vent pole" has nothing to do with cooling. It's an acoustic port and it supplements the air movement that creates bass along with the driver movement.

Some enclosures are ported, others aren't (they're sealed). They type of enclosure you need is based on the driver. Some drivers are designed for ported enclosures, and some are designed for sealed enclosures.

Subs don't need to "cool themselves".

 

It might matter to a certain point but enclosure material is more important than the shape it is.

 

What kind of material would you recommend? I was going to use fiberboard. I thought thats what most were made out of but I could be wrong.

 

3/4 inch MDF (medium density fiberboard) you can get away with 1/2 inch but the thicker stuff is better. You can get it at places like Home Depot and Lowes, there are other materials out there but MDF is pretty easy to come by.

 

Sorry but no true. Do a search for "subwoofer vent pole cooling" and you will find lots of references to the vent poles and cooling of the subs voice coils.

 

AcuraX2 - my mistake. I mis-read your post and thought you were talking about the acoustic port in the enclosure. You were obviously talking about the vent pole that's PART of the driver... my apologies.

 

The shape will only matter when trying to max SPL. As others have said, most configurations will not differ based on shape.

 

My two cents. Ive built literally hundreds of boxes over the years and IMO the best sounding boxes are not sqaure. The woofer should not be centered on the baffle board. As long as you have the correct internal volume you should be good. My pesonal favorite though is free air. A lot of people here are so against free air set ups but IMO and speakerworks in orange,ca where i used to work its the way to go. If the trunk is set up properly and sealed there is no reason to do free air. It is never boomy or peaky sounding. It always offers flat response across the spectrum and the best part is it doesnt take up all your trunk space.

 

How would you set that up? Like placement and where would you recommend I attach the sub if I were to do that?

 

Attach the sub or subs to the rear deck where the stock sub hole is. To do it properly you have to really seal up the trunk though. Attach the baffle board directly to the rear deck and add support if needed and be sure it is sealed well to the metal. I have a 3rd gen and will post some pics soon of my set up so you can see it. It isnt difficult but it does take time and in my case cutting parts of the rear deck out.

 

Sounds good man. I'd be interested especially since it would save a bunch of trunk space and the weight of the box. What size sub do you have in your ride? I'd have to check to see if a 12 would even fit.