I have speced a small subwoofer (Episode Cub 8) to be placed inside custom millwork cabinetry that will have a touch latch door. I am working with the architect to design the overall solution to ensure that the door does not rattle.

We have discussed placing foam at the contact points between the door and cabinet, but fear this will interfere with the touch latch operation.

What can/should we do to mitigate the chances of door rattle? Anything to consider with placement of the subwoofer within the cabinet? Specific placement of slots for sound to exit? Acousting treatment of the cabinet/door? Ways to pad a touch latch door to prevent vibration?

Thanks.

When I am designing a subwoofer into a new cabinet, I have the bottom cut out so subwoofer does not touch the cabinet and sits directly on the floor. This mitigates the cabinet shaking from the subwoofer since the two are now not touching.

FASTLS

OK, so physical isolation of subwoofer and cabinet make sense. I think there are materials I can place between sub and cabinet that would help with this..

What about vibration of the door directly from the sound, itself? Thanks.

It's been valuable to me to know where to buy touch latches and other cabinet hardware, because I can call them up and get the phone number of the manufacturer. Find one. Phone the manufacturer and ask what they would do to eliminate, not just mitigate, noise from the latch.

Foam or anything else you're thinking of has one thing in common: it puts the latch under just enough stress that the door can't move. I'd say the thing to do is to provide enough tightness that there's not a rattle, but not enough to strain the latch; this is where the manufacturer can probably help you.

Also, foam will compress and weaken with time; perhaps small felt dots are a better answer.

take the doors off when listening to anything and put them back on when finished.....or use Blose and keep doors on.

I prefer to have the client open the doors, pull the subwoofer out into the room while using the system and then have them put the subwoofer back in the cabinet when done.

After some training, the client, or a well trained golden retriever can handle this task with ease and get the most out of their system.

If it was me I would do this...

[Link: triadspeakers.com]

or since that is most likely out of budget...

[Link: snapav.com]

Have anyone thought about using a downfiring sub?

+1

And do not place your sub on foam or any other material. It is designed to sit on a solid surface.

When foam was mentioned, it had to do with dampening movement of the cabinet door, not placement or isolation of the subwoofer.

A sub is supposed to be mechanically connected to the floor or some other large mass to help dampen vibrations (sound) from coming off the cabinet walls. That's why we want it on the floor, why we use spikes when it's on carpet -- to keep it from moving.

If it's a decent touch latch, the door won't move enough to rattle. If the doors aren't touching anything other than the latches, they shouldn't rattle at all. If necessary, a second touch latch can be mounted at the bottom.

Remember- a sub in a cabinet won't sound the same/as good as when it's in the open room. The cabinet space will affect the sound, whether it's front-firing or bottom-firing.

RV cabinet latches keep the doors from rattling.

No matter how strong your subs are vibrating, it's not as strong as the vibration of a 4 ton condominium shuffling down the highway.

Two on the latch side, or two on each side you are not using hinges.

[Link: amazon.com]

Or you could do as an alarm installer did when he asked me to check his work... he put the sub under the house in the crawl space. Sitting on a piece of cardboard on mother earth. No port to the listening room. Just planned on shaking the earth, I guess.

no matter if the sub sits in the cabinet or on the floor cut out of the cabinet, it will rattle the door on the front


small felt tabs at Homie Depotie...............works every time!

I hate designs like this. It always brings flashbacks of a system a competitor of mine did. B & W nautilus across the fronts with a big sub also in the front. All 4 of those speakers were in the cabinetry. When you turned the movie on all 8 or 10 doors on the cabinets starting openings and slamming closed. That system could get them to open almost 6 inches. Clients were told to leave all the doors wide open when using system. Piss poor to say the least