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Sub Woofer Question


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My band has a number of outdoor gigs this summer that are not really big enough to warrant hiring a PA. Our own PA consists of 4- 450 powered Mackies on top and a pair of Mackie powered Subs on the bottom end. Most of these gigs are on either a flatbed trailer or some other type of makeshift outdoor stage.

 

This probably sounds like a dumb question, but even though our combined experience totals 150 years!!!!!, we aren't sure of the correct answer. Perhaps one of you has enough live sound savvy to help us out. The question is: Do we put the subs on the stage or should they go on the ground? Or does it matter? These new generation subs are different than our old 7 1/2 ft wide Olsen W cabinets that pretty much had their own built in acoustics and resonated so low and loud that some claimed it losened their bowels. Any clues?

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I remember back in my Stereo Review days that placing a subwoofer in the middle of a room, suspended in the air, gave the least bass response; putting it on the floor increased it somewhat, pushing it over to a wall increased it further still, and placing it in a corner gave you maximum bass response. Since an outdoor venue has no walls or corners, leaving the bass bins on the ground should give you the best bass response/least power requirements (plus you don't have to lift them heavy *#^%$'s up on the stage!)

 

If you have the time, it would be interesting if you could put one bass bin on the stage, leave the other on the ground, hook them up and play some music through them, panning to see how much difference there actually is between the two positions. We'd all be interested in hearing about the results!

Botch

"Eccentric language often is symptomatic of peculiar thinking" - George Will

www.puddlestone.net

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I'll do that. I'm thinking they would be better on the ground, myself. But I have independent control over them via the sub mix sliders on the Mackie board. That is a good idea, though. I'll experiment and let you know.
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