JL Subs

[Ciapd]

Well currently I have 2 12 inch JL 12w3's run by a jl 500/1 amp. I was curious will a JL 13w7 hit harder and sound better then my 2 jl 12w3's with the same amp? Thanks for the help in advance.

[HENRY]

No, but then i dont really know :)

Youve got 2 12's moving massive amounts of air.

No way one 13 can equal that.

You want more bass, get a separate amp for each.

[Ciapd]

Thats not always true especially when the 13 takes more power then what the 2 12's combined take.

[TR02Yukon]

THere are only two things you need to calculate to get a pretty good generaliztion of how a sub will perform and that is how much air it can move or in otherwords displace. To get this you need to only know two things about the sub and that is the surface area(sd) and the amount of stroke the cone(ie. piston) moves(xmax). The only catch here is a lot of companies overstate these values for instance audiobahn is famous for this, the only accurate way is using independent third party DUMAX measurements or using companies that are somewhat honest about them, lukily JL Audio is one of those fairly honest companies at least up to the W7 series imho.

Maximum power handling has nothing to do with it other than needing to know how much is needed to actually drive the sub to its excursion limits. Who cars if a sub can take 2000W without damage if it only needs 1000 to reach its mechanical limits before it distorts.

If JL Audios SD and XMAX specs are accurate then I'd wager a "calculated" guess that that the 13W7 will out displace the two 12W3's.

My calculations:
12W3's can displace anywhere between 1.23 to 1.36 liters according to the SD and Xmax figures on JL's site deoending on the VC arrangement which I'm guessing to be pretty accurate since they've been out for a while and tested by many.

13W7 says its SD is 693cm squared which I don't doubt much but its likely a little smaller, but I do doubt their XMAX figures. So I'll give both what they claim and what I guess to be real as they seem to be overhyping this sub. My reason for this is their 32mm XMAX spec to which my knowledge nobody has come close to:
Theirs with 32mm XMAX=4.43liters
Mine with a conservatrive but still extremely high 24mm XMAX=3.32liters

So either way the 13W7's minimum 3.32 liters still out displaces the 2.46 to 2.72liters a pair of 12W3's give.

PS- Remember if the SD is lower it can make a big differecne to these calcs even is XMAX is a few mm higher.

[HENRY]

Now all you need to figure out is if you want clean bass or just bass :)

[TR02Yukon]

12W7's are known to be clean sounding subs so far.

IMHO I wouldn't spend that much for a sub, you might want to consider IDMAX, Brahma or Mass subs instead....

[HENRY]

What do those JL's run?

I think an ID sub is about $130.00