# Review: Seas Excel W18NX 7" woofer(~4 month impressions)



## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

I purchased these from a member back in late October as a replacement to my Phoenix Gold Ti Elite woofers. The Ti Elite's were nice woofers with a unique flavor of sound, however, I wanted something with a stronger low end and a more mild top end, basically a flatter frequency response to work with and a capability to get lower. The ability to run up to 4kHz is just a bonus that allows me to work with more tweetrs. I'm pleased to say the Excel woofers did better in all the right points.

*Build Quality:*
I really can't complain. These are beautiful, well built drivers. You get a sturdy cast frame that's very open on the rear side with sort of a hovering spider section. The surround, cone, everything is clean and true, no shoddy work here.

*Sound Flavor:*

Tonality:
Tonality comes out light and airy but manages not to come out sounding sterile or lifeless. It's just there and "right." It doesn't come across warm or bright. It just sort of sits in that magical spot right in the middle. The woofer does start to brighten up a little bit above 1kHz creating a somewhat strong upper midrange, however running off-axis this drops back down to flat, a plus in a car environment. Low end does gently roll off below 100Hz that can remove some low end impact without a little EQing to bring it back up. However, not a lot is needed and with cabin gain, these play well down to somewhere around 40Hz without much of a need for EQing. In fact, any boosting of more than a couple notches just makes that range overpowering.

Detail:
Everything comes across open. Sounds come out sounding accurate and life-like. Nothing comes across too crisp nor too muddled. I have a slight personal liking towards a little extra bite or edge to my music. These don't do that. To me, these come across non-fatiguing. Don't confuse this with a _smooth_ non-fatiguing. The sound isn't smoothed or rounded off. It's just "right" and doing so just makes them unannoying to listen too. They are accurate, detailed, revealing, and have impact but don't bite you in the rear when a recording isn't perfect, yet they don't hide it either. These woofers are detailed enough to make me notice the lower level of detail and smoother sound of my Scan tweeters.

*Usability:*
Usability is quite good. The woofers play relatively flat from 100Hz to 1kHz with a slight upward boost from there up to 4kHz and a slight drop from 100Hz down to 40Hz(including cabin gain) before it sort of disappears. I think the low end could be better if the suspension was a little looser. The speaker has a sense of being constrained upon higher excursion. It's good that it keeps low end response clean, but it also limits low frequency extention and makes the woofer sound restricted in lower frequency. It takes some EQ to bring that bottom end up to regain the fullness of something more like flat. On a plus note, these have no problem playing without a highpass filter. I've been running them full range in my car thus far since my subs are out at the moment till I get some new wiring and build my new ported box. With the tight control, they seem nearly impossible to bottom out without EQing in some low end. They get to what I'd call "screaming" loud and just don't bottom. When I boost the bottom end, I can get them to start bottoming but only at quite high volumes. These have no problem getting low enough and loud enough to pair with any sub and not leave you wanting more.

The upper end rising response may have to be dealt with in a very on-axis setup, but in a normal door setup, they flatten off well enough to not be a problem. They have no trouble running up to 4kHz, allowing them to pair with pretty much any tweeter you want. Above 4kHz, they do gain some noticable distortion that's not so desirable, not horrible though. You could run these with no low pass filter and they wouldn't come across all that annoying. They don't really get noisy or beam. The sound gets a little ragged, but that's about it.

Being a large woofer, they do suffer some off-axis. At very high angles, a lot of top end does disappear, however, this is expected. 30 to 45 degrees off-axis is very usable, and some is prefered to flatten out the top end.

*Power:*
Being an 8ohm woofer, they do ask for a little bit of power. I've run them at 75w x 4 @ 4ohms (30 something watts @ 8ohm), and they did plenty well. They couldn't really belt it out, but they didn't suffer all that bad. Sensitivity isn't all that high in a 4ohm sense. My fade is set to -6 in relation to my tweeters which are rated for 90dB 1W/1M. I've got 300w @ 4ohms available for them, and they just soak it up and make solid use of the available excursion. The drivers are very well controlled and stay clean all the way to their physical limit. Finally I've got a woofer that can keep up with my Scan tweeters, however, they also shows my excursion limits of my tweeters at lower x-over points too forcing me to crossover 1k higher at 2.5kHz to keep the tweeters clean when cranked way up.

*Design comments:*
The rubber magnet boot is a nice touch, too bad the magnet's so big I had to take it off to get the woofer in my door, lol. Oh well. The cast basket is sturdy and designed thin and open. The floating spider is a unique touch I've never seen before. I really like the design. I was kind of curious to see that the wire leads weren't sewen into the spider. I guess it's just something I'd expect considering the good amount of excursion. I know it's common in subs, but maybe it's not so feasable in smaller drivers. There's no wire slap, so there really isn't a need anyways. A very clean looking driver.


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## bdubs767 (Apr 4, 2006)

how were they compared to the ti elites you had before?


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## npdang (Jul 29, 2005)

Very nice review. Exactly how I feel too.


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## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

bdubs767 said:


> how were they compared to the ti elites you had before?


Very different...in all the right places.

The Ti Elites had more impact. I always like to say that Morel somehow manages to create a razor sharp and lively(sorta bright) that comes across non-fatiguing and smooth all at the same time. The Ti Elites started rolling off pretty high at 150Hz and took quite a lot of EQing to flatten out their low end repsonse. By the time you get any low end authority, you already ran out of available excursion and you were getting a somewhat muddy sound sitting far outside of the linear range. The high end detail was nice, but it was overpowering for the most part. It had a wonderful lively presence...if you wanted it, but I didn't. I came from much warmer, deeper sounding speakers. It was neat but not my flavor. The overall sound came across detailed but not ultimately clean. The Ti Elites offered a lot of impact and punch to the music and with real bite. They were aspects I actually liked. However, I'd prefer a flatter response and more low frequency capability, two things the Excel does a whole lot better, that and the Seas offer a cleaner, more accurate sound, something the poly cones of the Ti Elites could really do despite coming across suprisingly crisp.

If I were to ask something more of the Seas Excels, I'd like a little more open bottom end for a little easier depth and extention. You sort of have to EQ and physically power the low end out, and it would be nice if you didn't have to do that. It is nice that you _can_ actually do that with the Excels though, with pretty minimal EQing to boot. I've also gained some liking to the strong impact of the Ti Elites, so I wouldn't mind a hair more bite/knife-edge to the music, but that's just nit-picking.

I can't wait to get my sub back in. I haven't used these with a sub yet with solid power to the fronts.


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## bdubs767 (Apr 4, 2006)

since I've owned a mw160 and ti elite 6m the w18nx should be quite a change for me, but I think I will enjoy. Doesn't surprise me about the low end w/ the low QTS, so expected low end needing to be EQed but nice to hear only needs a little, as I was a little worried about only having a few bands in the midbass region w/ the 880prs.


Couldn't agree more with the 6m, low end no matter what you did was horrid if no in an enclosure and very very warm.




great review.


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## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

I never found them warm...smooth yes, but not really warm. Their strong top end and weak low end really just created a lively presence. I know a lot of people describe them as warm, but I guess I'm used to more of an extreme with growing up using Pioneer and old GM Delco decks, lol. I've had a liking towards Alpine speakers and JVC HUs(liked their BBE better than other brands) for the same reason. I've grown a bit since then  Still, warm isn't quite the right word for the Ti Elites. If they had a fuller bottom end, they could be a smooth, warm speaker. Vocals always had a hint of fullness and warmth, but there was just no midbass to back it up, not without a ton of EQing. It's tough to get bottom end authority when your woofer starts rolling off, quickly, at 150Hz.

The W18NX will be a big difference, yes, but they will be in all the right areas. The amount of EQing will depend on the install of course. The cabin gain and intall will get you to a certain point, not really sure where that will be for you. Once I get my sub back in, I probably won't use any boosting. I'll have to see when I get to that point. Right now, they're doing full range, so I'm really only boosting the bottem end up some to compensate. Still, they do roll off slowly and cabin gain boosts it back up some. In the end, for me, it could stand to gain a tiny bit of bottom end fill.


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## crazyder (Mar 3, 2007)

Thanks for the review, I am looking into these for my mid range/woofer.

Wondering,


> I've run them at 75w x 4 @ 4ohms (30 something watts @ 8ohm), and they did plenty well.


and 


> I'd like a little more open bottom end for a little easier depth and extention. You sort of have to EQ and physically power the low end out, and it would be nice if you didn't have to do that.


Do you think if they had more power, that the bottom end would come to life a little more?


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## npdang (Jul 29, 2005)

In my install I got flat response to 30hz with no EQ. More power really just dirties the sound in the lowest octaves Imo... I'd still cross over at 80hz. Then again, I usually run a more aggressive gain matching structure than some.


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## kappa546 (Apr 11, 2005)

it definitely would. honestly i can stand any mids with under 100-150w. midbass is just never up to par and it craps out awful early. music is highly dynamic (up to 10db peaks depending on music) and you need power on tap for those transients... some of the best sounding setups i've heard all had upwards of 600w on the front stage alone.


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## kappa546 (Apr 11, 2005)

how could more available power dirty the sound? especially in midbass/subbass region... very counterintuitive and not true in my experience. to each it's own tho of course


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## 300Z (Mar 20, 2005)

Power compression.


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## npdang (Jul 29, 2005)

Anytime you increase power output to a driver, you generally increase distortion, noise, etc. as well. With lower frequencies, the demand on any driver is going to be significantly higher than at higher frequencies for an equivalent output level.

It's more intuitive if you think of it as the driver having to work harder with the more power you dump into it. With less power, obviously it isn't as loud but distortion, compression, linearity, mechanical noises, etc. are all going to be better.

I do think having more power is great and it certainly gives you alot more flexibility... but I think it's also important not to make a lot of the incorrect assumptions that people do about their driver's powerhandling and performance with such large amounts of power. In other words I think there's a big difference when describing the output capabilites of an amplifier in your system and driver performance, and actual power usage and driver performance.

For reference, the Klippel device often uses under 50w power to achieve maximum displacement for a typical 7" driver... and when doing multitone distortion testing rarely do I use more than 20w power.. and you can really see how poorly some drivers perform at that level not to mention how loud(depending on frequency).


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## andthelam (Aug 9, 2006)

I have a pair of these and also have some impressions. The W18NX are great speakers with lots of great accurate snappy midbass, detailed and pretty transparent sound. The midbass needs a liitle boost in my setup and the frequency response seems to rise a little at the upper end, but I wouldnt call it bright. As another reviewer said these mids are great for instruments. Drums, bass, and guitar sound great and sometimes wow! 

Now for the not so good. At high volume, I found these mids to be a little scratchy w/ vocals esp. male vocals. Just wondering if anybody else has encountered this?


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## npdang (Jul 29, 2005)

There is a pretty severe rise on-axis that requires a bit of upper end correction, but in a car it could really be anything.


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## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

Crazyder, you misunderstood my available power. As it stands now, I have two Cadence Z4000s bridged, basically giving me a max available rms wattage of 300w x 4 to work with. I basically have double the power I'd ever need. Before I got my seconds Z4000, I was running the system active off the one amp at 75w x 4 @ 4ohms. I was essentially at half rms values for the speakers. My impressions as it stands in the review are off my current setup with more than enough available power.

Andthelam, I'd start fiddling a little bit with the blending between the tweeter and woofer. A lot can go wrong when they aren't blended smoothly. Just play with x-over points, slopes, and attenuation levels to get the two dialed together. You mentioned it occuring only at high volumes. Well, it could be a tweeter issue or perhaps a resonance issue. I know I had to raise my x-over point for my tweeters just so they can keep up with the capable output of the woofers.


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## andthelam (Aug 9, 2006)

Def. good explanations and very good advice. Ive tried basically all those things. And all those suggestions have helped but still not satisfied. Played mids sep. and its def. in the mids. Tweet loud, no prob. 

For those who have had resonance issues, what is the best way to relieve that? Already have mdf, deadner, deflex, clay and egg carton.


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## crazyder (Mar 3, 2007)

mvw2 said:


> Crazyder, you misunderstood my available power. As it stands now, I have two Cadence Z4000s bridged, basically giving me a max available rms wattage of 300w x 4 to work with. I basically have double the power I'd ever need. Before I got my seconds Z4000, I was running the system active off the one amp at 75w x 4 @ 4ohms. I was essentially at half rms values for the speakers. My impressions as it stands in the review are off my current setup with more than enough available power.


I see, thanks for clearing it up. Since your impression was based on your current set up, what did you think of them when they were only at 75w a channel (33w @ 8ohms)?


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## mvw2 (Oct 2, 2005)

They did fine off less power. You are limited in capability, but they don't sound like they _really_ need more power. Some speakers very noticably need a lot of power to work in a normal fashion. These don't have that need. They'll play fine, just in a limited capability. It's nice to have more power when you crank them up, but they just aren't power hungry like some speakers.


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## cvjoint (Mar 10, 2006)

npdang said:


> For reference, the Klippel device often uses under 50w power to achieve maximum displacement for a typical 7" driver... and when doing multitone distortion testing rarely do I use more than 20w power.. and you can really see how poorly some drivers perform at that level not to mention how loud(depending on frequency).



I'm guessing the tests are done full range though. With a steep 80db slope these woofers should be able to take a lot of beating.


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