# How to break in a new sub faster?



## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

Was told 20hrs break in, thats a really long time. Been 6 days since i got it, and only put 3.5 hrs on it so far, playing at 1/4-1/3 volume haha. How long before i can play it at half way? Cause was told itll break in faster when at 50% vs 30%


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## adrenalinejunkie (Oct 17, 2010)

Set the equipment properly and let it rip.  It'll eventually loosen up and perform better.


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## IBcivic (Jan 6, 2009)

x 2

The term "breaking in", relates more to how it loosens up and plays the way it was designed to play, not to when you can finally crank it.....it is not a car.


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## jensclaudius (Sep 10, 2012)

I break in My speakers with dbjams 25hz for a couple hours and it will lose up pretty good


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## MarkZ (Dec 5, 2005)

Mayosandwich said:


> Was told 20hrs break in, thats a really long time. Been 6 days since i got it, and only put 3.5 hrs on it so far, playing at 1/4-1/3 volume haha. How long before i can play it at half way? Cause was told itll break in faster when at 50% vs 30%



If it takes 20hrs at 20Hz, it should only take 2hrs at 200Hz.


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## Victor_inox (Apr 27, 2012)

MarkZ said:


> If it takes 20hrs at 20Hz, it should only take 2hrs at 200Hz.


funny thing is that you`ll have to apply much more powah to get excursion as high as it gets at 20 hz.


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

MarkZ said:


> If it takes 20hrs at 20Hz, it should only take 2hrs at 200Hz.


What do you mean? Louded i play, higher the hz?


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## MarkZ (Dec 5, 2005)

I was being sarcastic. 

I think you're going to get a variety of answers. There's a fairly well-known speaker designer who insists that breaking-in takes only a few seconds. He bases this on having measured the effects in literally thousands of speakers.

I usually just tell people to throw a ball in it and stick it under their mattress.


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## shp24 (Aug 24, 2012)

MarkZ said:


> I was being sarcastic.
> 
> I think you're going to get a variety of answers. There's a fairly well-known speaker designer who insists that breaking-in takes only a few seconds. He bases this on having measured the effects in literally thousands of speakers.
> 
> I usually just tell people to throw a ball in it and stick it under their mattress.


so, will they need some "woofer oil" too?


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## qwertydude (Dec 22, 2008)

Play 20 hz for an hour free air that ought to really loosen it up. Free air would minimize the power required therefore you don't cook your voice coil. I burned out an ID12v3 on 15 minutes at 10hz sealed box on only 250 watts.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

It will however take a few days for it to break in your ears though. That's when you'll really hear how it performs.


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## m3dia_lab (Mar 22, 2009)

what type of sub are you running?


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

qwertydude said:


> Play 20 hz for an hour free air that ought to really loosen it up. Free air would minimize the power required therefore you don't cook your voice coil. I burned out an ID12v3 on 15 minutes at 10hz sealed box on only 250 watts.


Can you send me a link on where i can download the 20hz tone? And how loud would you have the sub when playing it?


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

m3dia_lab said:


> what type of sub are you running?


Kicker compvr 10


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## Hanatsu (Nov 9, 2010)

My old DLS Iridium 8", they had a Fs: 57Hz and Qts: 0,44 when they were new. Re-tested them with DATS after 8 month usage. Fs: 53Hz and Qts: 0,69. Kinda weird, not sure if it's related to break-in or not. But it seem it be consistent between the two drivers. Measured in roughly the same temperature. 

Anyway, if you wanna break them in. Use pink noise or something and put them in the closet/garage/whatever for a few hours or so. A lot of manufacturers recommend break-in periods for like 20 hours.


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## charles.chip (Sep 14, 2012)

thanks !


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

Hanatsu said:


> My old DLS Iridium 8", they had a Fs: 57Hz and Qts: 0,44 when they were new. Re-tested them with DATS after 8 month usage. Fs: 53Hz and Qts: 0,69. Kinda weird, not sure if it's related to break-in or not. But it seem it be consistent between the two drivers. Measured in roughly the same temperature.
> 
> Anyway, if you wanna break them in. Use pink noise or something and put them in the closet/garage/whatever for a few hours or so. A lot of manufacturers recommend break-in periods for like 20 hours.


Put the sub in the closet? How would i power them? I know theres a way to power it with a Computer POwer supply but i dont have one. If I could find some way to power them in the house, i would do this and let it run over night and be done with it.

So far im only 4hrs into the break in and its been one week haha.


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## 07azhhr (Dec 28, 2011)

Hanatsu said:


> My old DLS Iridium 8", they had a Fs: 57Hz and Qts: 0,44 when they were new. Re-tested them with DATS after 8 month usage. Fs: 53Hz and Qts: 0,69. Kinda weird, not sure if it's related to break-in or not. But it seem it be consistent between the two drivers. Measured in roughly the same temperature.
> 
> Anyway, if you wanna break them in. Use pink noise or something and put them in the closet/garage/whatever for a few hours or so. A lot of manufacturers recommend break-in periods for like 20 hours.


I have seen people talk about this before saying that there is too little change in the specs during this "break-in period" to need a break-in period. From a numbers standpoint I see there point. But I still have questions about that logic since when speakers are tested they are only being tested at 1-8 watts. This is not enough to actually move the speaker very much so in turn the suspensions stiffness is not actually being accounted for in this testing. Since we know that stiffer suspension drivers tend to be less efficient I would think that a new driver with stiffer suspension then when it is "broken-in" would be less efficient at high wattage levels. Yet when tested at 1 watt you would not see this in your measurements. 

Has anyone ever bothered to take db measurements at high volumns of a brand new sub and then again after 20+ hours of play time?


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

07azhhr said:


> I have seen people talk about this before saying that there is too little change in the specs during this "break-in period" to need a break-in period. From a numbers standpoint I see there point. But I still have questions about that logic since when speakers are tested they are only being tested at 1-8 watts. This is not enough to actually move the speaker very much so in turn the suspensions stiffness is not actually being accounted for in this testing. Since we know that stiffer suspension drivers tend to be less efficient I would think that a new driver with stiffer suspension then when it is "broken-in" would be less efficient at high wattage levels. Yet when tested at 1 watt you would not see this in your measurements.
> 
> Has anyone ever bothered to take db measurements at high volumns of a brand new sub and then again after 20+ hours of play time?


The guy at the audio shop told me, the louder you play the sub, the faster it breaks in. He said after a few hours of play, start playing it at 50% volume rather than 30 (which i started out at). Is this true? Isnt 50% too much too soon?


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## NightScreams (Jul 7, 2012)

once i set it up properly, i just play it as normal, listening to my music when i drive and not worry about it. seems to be evidence to show either way about breaking in or not, but i never saw the point in worrying about if the sub is playing its most natural sound or not right off the bat. The important thing is proper setup and tuning. The rest is for nerds without g/f's to debate.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

delete


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

MarkZ said:


> If it takes 20hrs at 20Hz, it should only take 2hrs at 200Hz.





MarkZ said:


> I was being sarcastic.
> 
> I think you're going to get a variety of answers. There's a fairly well-known speaker designer who insists that breaking-in takes only a few seconds. He bases this on having measured the effects in literally thousands of speakers.
> 
> I usually just tell people to throw a ball in it and stick it under their mattress.





t3sn4f2 said:


> It will however take a few days for it to break in your ears though. That's when you'll really hear how it performs.


to the top


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## squeak9798 (Apr 20, 2005)

Mayosandwich said:


> The guy at the audio shop told me, the louder you play the sub, the faster it breaks in. He said after a few hours of play, start playing it at 50% volume rather than 30 (which i started out at). Is this true? Isnt 50% too much too soon?


The only way to break in a suspension is to actually use it. If you keep the volume low you aren't exercising the suspension, which is actually counter-productive to the goal of "breaking in" the driver. The idea that the driver needs to be played at some arbitrary low volume for some arbitrary period of time doesn't really do much good if you want to exercise and loosen the suspension.

The only reason to keep the volume low is to make sure the driver is properly functioning (i.e. no odd scraps/buzzes/etc). Once that's verified, push the driver with a low frequency sinewave at or near Xmax (high excursion) for a period of time to fully exercise the suspension.

Or, has been mentioned multiple times.....just play the driver like you normally would and it will "break in" over time naturally with normal, regular use. Don't keep the volume low, don't track your use time. Just use it like you normally would, every else will happen naturally with normal usage.


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## 07azhhr (Dec 28, 2011)

Mayosandwich said:


> The guy at the audio shop told me, the louder you play the sub, the faster it breaks in. He said after a few hours of play, start playing it at 50% volume rather than 30 (which i started out at). Is this true? Isnt 50% too much too soon?


 
Like IBcivic said this is not a car. He means the motor lol but we are talking speakers. Nothing needs to seat properly like the piston rings do in a motor before cutting it loose. The suspension of a speaker is equivelant to the springs/coils in a car and they will compress and expand faster and farther as they loosen up. That is the only part of "breaking-in" for speakers imho. My thought of it is it is all about getting the suspension to loosen up. But I am far from an expert so keep that in mind.

When I got my 2 Polk 8's I built a temp sealed box and installed one of them only. I was building a ported box to use one of them in which is not recommended by Polk so I wanted to hear it in a proper sealed box first to be able to have a point of reference on how they should sound. It took several weeks to get any real output out of the sub. I then played that sub in a temp ported box of the same size and tune as the perm box I was still building. When I finally finished the perm box I pulled out the temp box and put the perm box in. Only when I mounted the sub in the perm box I inadvertently placed the new sub (never saw a single watt of power) in the box. Guess what, I was back to very little output. To me this was not a case of my ears adjusting but of the need to loosen up the suspension. 

Now my new SB Acoustic tweeters, on the other hand, sound the same today as they did 3 weeks ago when I installed them. With tweeters the suspension is not the same as with subs thus the difference.


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## Hanatsu (Nov 9, 2010)

Mayosandwich said:


> Put the sub in the closet? How would i power them? I know theres a way to power it with a Computer POwer supply but i dont have one. If I could find some way to power them in the house, i would do this and let it run over night and be done with it.
> 
> So far im only 4hrs into the break in and its been one week haha.


Unless the load is lower than 4ohms a standard home audio amplifier will do. In free air you don't need much power applied.


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## Mayosandwich (Sep 9, 2012)

Well ok i guess i wont worry about it or track time and just use it normally. Im only 4hrs 15mins into the break in anwyays.


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## legend94 (Mar 15, 2006)

jimmy alert!


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## ChrisB (Jul 3, 2008)

legend94 said:


> jimmy alert!


Am I the only one who purchases a new sub, installs it, then let's it rip? If it fails, it needed replacing anyway!

Seriously though, I performed a test on another forum, using a woofer tester 3. 

Here was a Credence BN10-8 prior to break in:









Here it is after breaking it in with a 25 Hz test tone for 8 hours at 10 volts of output to get that cone moving:









​


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## Richv72 (May 11, 2012)

Me myself I go by whatever the manufacturer says. I could throw it in and let it rip, but I plan on keeping my stuff a long time. So even if its a myth about breaking in subs for 20hrs to keep the volume moderate isnt a big deal to me. Im all for people letting it rip on their own stuff, but on mine ill break them in per manufacturers recommendations.


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## legend94 (Mar 15, 2006)

Chrisb, let it rip! Lol. Im just pointing out the op is likely jimmy...again. 

I dont know about breaking a sub in to be honest. I usually use the sub modestly for the first week or so before i spl test it


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