!!!Dayton Audio DVC385-88 15" DVC Series Subwoofer $99!!! - Page 3

I scooped up a pair myself and will be building a dual opposed box this weekend in preparation for a forthcoming shootout.

Going to get a chance to see how these stack up against a few of its big brothers and other formidable alternatives… If distortion is in check, 2" peak to peak is sounding pretty good thus far!

=)

Only wish the sale was still on through the end of the year. If our testing yields good results, I'd expect these would sell even better at this current price.

I bought them just for the sake of the shootout, so I'll probably try to off load the drivers right after testing. Or I might ship one off the Ricci for him to take some official measurements. We shall see!

I like this idea. It would be way to see how it stacks up.

I have one DVC that's been pumping away for a couple of months. I need to pull it out and check the tinsel leads. Should have done that first but got excited and threw it in the box.

I've given Santa the hint to bring me a second one.

Awesome! I would love to hear more about your design and how it compares to other subwoofers you have built and designed. I am currently thinking dual front firing in a 9-10 cubic foot box with a slotted port powered by an iNuke 3KDSP.

I would build two of these.

I also would love for RIcci to test one of these, he is one of the people that has inspired me to give DIY a try and data-bass has been an invaluable resource.

Oh, I'm following your build thread buddy… =)

I personally am going with a simple dual opposed sealed design.

Dimensions are going to be:
25H x 17.5W x 23D

My build experience is not extensive in comparison to a lot of other people out there, but I have always focused my builds around simple sealed designs. I've heard a lot of great ported subs, but my specific goals of achieving high output in the single digits necessitate sealed in multiples…


Agreed. Invaluable indeed!

I just popped a second driver into each of my 'sump basin' subs turning them into dual-opposed, and suddenly it seems CRAZY not to do it, if you're doing sealed dual-opposed (or multiples thereof) are so vibration-free it's shocking to me. Especially with a tubular body - I understand why sonotube dual-opposed designs have their fans - there is zero flex, zero vibration coming from the sub. If the drivers weren't pumping and the bass wasn't thumping. As a bonus, there's zero inventive to make my subs 'heavy' now.

I called PE I don't get to keep it

They are taking care of shipping back though. Maybe I can get one with a nicer looking cone, less texture like my other one.

Good they're taking care of you mtg90. The two had different textured paper cones?

Yeah I would take a picture comparing the two if I had not packed the bad one up already.

One had quite a bit more "bumps" in it like this:


While the other was much smoother/flatter even more so then the picture on PE:

mtg,

Any possibility of posting an excursion video of the good driver?

You bet, your going to like it.

i'm pretty happy with MKIIIs. I like Dayton

Here it is,

Hits xmech (I am thinking coil on backplate from the noise) at about 18-19 volts input free air with a 15hz sinewave.

Really cool, mtg! Thanks for putting that together.

Awesome video... Very promising!

Wish someone would bring a cool camera like that to Gorilla's GTG. Would love to seem my LMS in slow-mo. =)

Very cool vid!

Slow video like that really illustrates the forces at work on the soft parts of a driver.

I think your right about the coil on backplate. Ive made my mfws make the same noise and the noise came from the backplate and dust cover.... Thats the only thing i could think of.

Is that a true RMS meter you're using? If not the voltage is probably incorrect given that it's a 15Hz frequency.

Probably not, the Fluke 77 I have also shows the same voltage but that is not a true RMS meater either. It has got to be pretty close though.

OK the noise I thought was the coil hitting the backplate was again tinsel lead slap. There is still more wiggle room for the coil to move but as you can see in the slo-mo to cone goes into unlinear travel at about the point where I noticed the noise. Anyway I pushed it harder and after that you get awful suspension noise, never bottomed it though.

Edit: The coil has a couple more mm of travel before it bottoms, about 25volts on the multimeter.
Edited by mtg90 - 12/1/12 at 10:02am

Lol, just because of your post that's what I'm going to do with it.

Just ordered 2 of them so I could do something with it too. Btw, he's 15 so I'm sure he'll get a lot of use out of it.
Edited by ovrrdrive - 12/1/12 at 9:23am

That is awesome. I've never seen any of my MFWs do anything close to that.

Well mine came in last week. So over the weekend I bought my wood and started my cinema F20. Hooked it up to break it in today and the spider rattled against the frame something awful!! Turns out the glue was only holding on by about 20%!! So much for being glad it was made in america!! Sorry to bitch I'm just really peeved about this and parts express is closed today. Has anyone else had issues?

Guess I should've read the whole thread first. That picture that was circled was the exact same thing only mine was worse. I'm glad they paid for return shipping too. They certainly should.

Yeah I would call that ring that supports the spider a major design flaw with these drivers. Dayton/Eminence need to redo the basket so that the spider mount is part of the stamped steel frame which would make the whole driver a lot more durable and I am sure cut the number of faulty driver returns down to almost nothing

I called PE on Friday about 2pm they said a shipping label would be sent to my email, over 48hours later and no shipping label. The tech I spoke with verified it so i know they have the right email address. I am going to wait until tomorrow if it still does not show up then I'll be gluing spider back down myself.

Major bummer, sorry to hear that man. Especially disappointing after all the effort/love that goes into the box building. I'm sure they will resolve it ASAP tomorrow though.

Thanks for the warning. I was going to order one of these today. That's a real bummer having those defects like that. I have decided not to order it. A worthy substitute for my sealed 3.3 cu ft box is a Dayton Audio RSS390HF-4 15" Reference HF Subwoofer 4 Ohm. I think it is better made and should perform better too. Fc = 31 Hz according to my calculations. The RSS390HF-4 should do quite nicely. I am willing to pay more for something better made.

Depends on how you define better made. Better design maybe but all drivers have defects, this and that one no different.

That spider ring should never come off if glued down proper during normal to extreme use. However if not glued proper...... the same goes for the spider to basket and surround/cone/basket joints they will come loose if the assembler doesnt get the glue right.

Congrats on the purchase!

Ok, here's how I define it based on the specifications given by PE:

Two common types of subwoofer frames are cast aluminum and stamped steel. If cost were of no concern and I had my choice between them, I'd choose cast aluminum. It is more rigid and provides additional cooling since Al dissipates heat more efficiently than Fe or steel. I am not saying that stamped steel frames aren't good. Of course the best stamped steel frames can undoubtedly be made just as rigid but one would be paying at least as much as if not more for them and still not gain the advantage of better cooling. The stamped steel frame is suggestive of the fact that the manufacturer is cutting costs and passing those on to the consumer as a lower priced alternative. The RSS390HF-4 15" has a cast a aluminum frame.

The Al cone and Al voice coil former of the RSS390HF-4 are desirable features to me also because here again those can help cool the driver through better heat dissipation than paper/kevlar cones and Kapton / Polyimide formers. The voice coil is larger too at 2.5" diameter with a much heavier magnet. But teamed with the better heat dissipation of the Al voice coil former, Al cone, and cast Al frame, it all adds up to greater power handling: 500/1000 vs 350/700 (watts rms/watts max).

The foam surround of the DVC385-88 vs the butyl rubber of the RSS390HF-4 has no disadvantage except for looks. It's just that foam surrounds look cheap to me. I like to leave by speaker grilles off. Butyl rubber surrounds just have a higher end look to them.

Despite the higher end construction of the RSS390HF-4 15", I still would have gone for the DVC385-88 15" just for the lower cost. In a 3.3 cu. ft. cabinet the performance between the two aren't night and day at lower power levels. However, during very loud action scenes having low bass below 30 Hz , I think the RSS390HF-4 15" would out perform it due to better heat dissipation. I don't have any data to back that up though.

The defects in the DVC385-88 15" reported here by a few were the deal breaker for me.

Aha you meant material quality. Agree 100%

Wasnt sure if you meant build/assembly quality, on which topic im biased toward american assembled. Maybe misguided but certainly biased.

Cheers
Nicholas