More tower bass: project/questions/ideas

[Billy John]

I've spent one season with our single pair of tuned Wet Sounds Rev 10s running off of a SYN-DX 2.3 HP amp. Don't get me wrong, they are very loud and have great mid and high range sound, but we're looking to get more bass behind the boat for wake boarding and sandbar floating (swimming/playing 25 to 50 ft behind the boat). Inside the boat and close to the boat, we have plenty of bass, but we are finding we want more bass outside the boat without cranking up the whole inside of the boat. I know we could load the boat up with more subs, but I don't want to drill a bunch of holes in the boat, or take up more storage space.

An idea crossed my mind, (bear with me here...) which would be to see if I can get two empty Rev 10 cans from Wet Sounds (I emailed them to ask if this is possible) and put a Revo 10 sub in each can, because I want just more bass, not mids or highs. I know that bass is omni directional, and the subs could use a larger volume enclosure (anyone know what the actual volume of the Rev 10 cans are??), and that subs do better when there's surrounding walls to reinforce the bass, but the idea has crossed my mind. I'm just thinking on the principle of more surface area, and more air displacement should produce more bass, even from a tower in a less than ideal environment. Anyone ever try anything like this? Do the Revo 10s fit inside the Rev 10 cans?

The set-up would be running 2 Revo 10 subs in Rev 10 cans on the tower powered by a Sinister SDX-2 amp on my tower zone sub output from my Fusion headunit.

All thoughts and experiences are appreciated and welcome!!

 

[212s]

I've spent one season with our single pair of tuned Wet Sounds Rev 10s running off of a SYN-DX 2.3 HP amp. Don't get me wrong, they are very loud and have great mid and high range sound, but we're looking to get more bass behind the boat for wake boarding and sandbar floating

There's a few problems with this - first off apparent volume follows the inverse-square law where volume drops 4x for every doubling of distance in an open environment. Second deep bass propagates in all directions as you said unlike mids and highs which are more directional, and without walls or structures to keep the bass focused, it will drop off much quicker over distance than the mids and highs which is why you can hear the mids and highs clearly at distance. Third is power requirements - in order to get loud bass focused out the back, you would need massive horn-loaded bass-reflex enclosures and lots of wattage to drive them, think of PA speakers with big amps. Inside the boat, vehicle, or home, good bass is easy to accomplish. Outside the boat it drops off like a stone in water.

Unless you have lots of money to throw at speakers, amps, and batteries to run it all, I think you should just accept the fact that bass outside the boat is going to be less than ideal. You can't cheat physics...well at least not in this universe.

 

[Billy John]

There's a few problems with this - first off apparent volume follows the inverse-square law where volume drops 4x for every doubling of distance in an open environment. Second deep bass propagates in all directions as you said unlike mids and highs which are more directional, and without walls or structures to keep the bass focused, it will drop off much quicker over distance than the mids and highs which is why you can hear the mids and highs clearly at distance. Third is power requirements - in order to get loud bass focused out the back, you would need massive horn-loaded bass-reflex enclosures and lots of wattage to drive them, think of PA speakers with big amps. Inside the boat, vehicle, or home, good bass is easy to accomplish. Outside the boat it drops off like a stone in water.

Unless you have lots of money to throw at speakers, amps, and batteries to run it all, I think you should just accept the fact that bass outside the boat is going to be less than ideal. You can't cheat physics...well at least not in this universe.

Thank you @212s ! Yeah, this is the reality of it all unfortunately, and I really appreciate the reality check. I was hoping someone else may have said f$#% it and tried it anyways, lol.

 

[84rzv500r]

I get by with a couple of 10" kicker subs in the boat using the boat hull as a box for cruising and floating

You can do it but it requires a pontoon to put the speakers and gensets on... 6000w of subs and 3000w of mains, 2200w of monitors... held up well on the open water... I have another 3000w of mains however it wasn't needed.
All Behringer EuroLive Class D low end pro grade stuff...

 

[Ronnie]

I upgraded my swim deck speakers to 8” kickers and powered them with a 200w (engine 100w per channels kicker amp and was surprised by how good the bass sounded in the boat and on the swim deck. No scientific observations or analysis just going what I heard before and after the new equipment was installed but I do believe that the capacity of the enclosure created by the hull and engine compartment around the swim deck speakers had a lot to do with why the bass sounded so load and deep.

 

[Cambo]

I wasn't into cutting holes and like the sound produced from a sealed enclosure so I added a JL W7 and 500W JL amp this is in addition to the stock 10'' and another 10'' in the helm storage The sealed enclosure fits perfectly under the seat when on the beach I just prop the seat open and the bass waves travel long distances. These were car audio products purchased used so they were very cheap in relation to the original price. Even with the seat down during wakeboarding it sounds great. Bottom line is open air requires a lot more power than in an enclosed car and the basic building blocks of all of this equipment is still created around car audio equipment for an enclosed vehicle . The best part of the build is the two equalizers that allow an incredible amount of tuning, balance and frquency seperation I have two distinct ways for setting it up the sound distribution one is in the boat driving or relaxing the other is off the boat on the beach and then just some minor tweaks based on the music recording.



10'' 3 ohm massive motor assembly on the W-7

 

[Sotally Tober]

Another option is to upgrade your Rev-10s to the new Rev-12s. I personally have not heard them in person; however, the reviews I've read all report a lot more bass. You'd probably need to upgrade your amp to unlock the full potential of the speakers though.