Tuba HT 12" and 15" review

[kylelovesbass]

I had posted on here asking if it was ok to use an Eclipse 88120 in the Tuba HT and it seemed like it would be fine, so I went ahead and built it. I bought a Dayton Wt3 woofer tester and measured the sub and it happened to be well within spec. I'm happy to say that the sub turned out great and sounds excellent. Very articulate and punchy for music and loud and deep for movies. Lots of impact and very low distortion. Great output down to 25hz, but drops like a rock below that. No big deal though.

I liked the sub so much that I decided to build the 15" version with a Mach 5 audio MAW 15 I had lying around. This driver was within spec for the enclosure and its higher FS spec meant that it could be used in a narrower cab, bonus! I decided on 19" wide because it worked best with two 4x8 sheets of plywood with minimal waste.

I have listened to both cabs beside some of my other subs and I can say that they sound as good or better. My other subs are some Eclipse 88120's in a sealed box, a Peavey low rider 18" in a large ported box and a TC Sounds Pro 5100 in a large ported box. These tubas actually keep up with the sound quality of the TC 5100 driver... amazing! I'd say the 15" Tuba gets about 80% as loud as the TC 5100 in ported box, which is pretty amazing considering the cost difference. EQing the Tubas is a little tricky and it's hard to use them with non horn subs because of the horn delay, but hey, still can't complain. I still think I prefer my Peavey low rider 18" for music because it has a little more upper bass detail (80-150hz region) and doesn't have the horn time delay, but i'll have to spend some more time listening to both. Sorry I don't have any measurements for either sub, just using my ears and trying to give a decent review here.

Both enclosures were finished with Duratex, which is awesome stuff and looks great in my opinion. I would recommend building one of these if A) you don't mind having a huge box in your room B) you want excellent sound quality and output for the lowest price. Thanks Bill for the plans, they did not disappoint.

Pics of the Tuba HT 15":

http://imageshack.us/g/1/10020843/

Pics of Tuba HT 12":

http://imageshack.us/g/1/10020847/

[Bas Gooiker]

Lovely. I like the 45* corner "roundover".

[LelandCrooks]

Nice.

I just switched to 45 roundover yesterday. I really like the way it looks.

[Harley]

Lovely. I like the 45* corner "roundover".

It takes away a bit more meat from the joint though compared to radius.

[LelandCrooks]

Set it a tad shallow.

[myn]

Yeah that 45 degree roundover is gorgeous. Great job on these THT's

[kylelovesbass]

Yeah that 45 degree roundover is gorgeous. Great job on these THT's

Thanks Myn

[shawn_g]

Nice looking cabs and good review. Have you compared the max output of the 15" vs 12" THT? Since the topic comes up once in a while, it'd be interesting to hear your first hand experience.

[kylelovesbass]

Nice looking cabs and good review. Have you compared the max output of the 15" vs 12" THT? Since the topic comes up once in a while, it'd be interesting to hear your first hand experience.

It's a bit of an unfair comparison because the 12" Eclipse driver is better than the 15" used, but I actually found the max output to be pretty close. I'd say the 15" only beat it by a few db across the board in this case. The 15" has maybe 3-5db more output from 20-30hz though. The 12" drops off fast below 25hz. If I was to build another I'd stick with the 12" in the same size cab, the 15" just gets so big for only a little more output in my opinion.

[lancemhorsley]

The 45 corners are pretty sweet looking!

[Radian]

I've got a 12" Dayton DVC in a THT narrow width cabinet, wall-loaded and while watching Transformers (the Dolby Digital soundtrack) at +6 dB REF the highest level the sub ever goes throughout the entire movie is 5.87V. Right around 7 watts nominal.

That's good for ~103 dB SPL across my sofa in the 20-40Hz region. The best part is the sub is only mid-stride, and because of that, the distortion levels are so low that the neighbors ( living only 15-20 feet away on the other side of the apartment wall) can't even hear it.

Over 5 years of stupid loud horn-loaded bass (in one form or another), and never once have I had a complaint from them. During movies, the LFE is so real sounding, they'd be more inclined to look outside than believe a sound system can do that...at least me, the GF, and the cat have been convinced otherwise at some point.