Calling all subwoofer owners!

[Varick]

Greetings,

I'm contemplating locations for a 29gallon FW tank. My wife and I prefer the game room in our house, which houses a full blown home theater with 15" subwoofer, foosball table, dart board, and various other noise-generating activies that are in fair use during the weekends.

The aquarium could sit either on the same wall as the subwoofer or opposite, I imagine the same wall would be best. The side wall is also available. The floor is poured cement and transfers little vibration. It could also sit on a ledge (cement block base) but the top would sit at around 6 feet high. Cleaning would require a stepstool.

I've searched these and other forums and have turned up either conflicting advice or the "let us know how it turns out" post being the final one. Certainly someone has an aquarium near a large subwoofer such as mine. We watch many action movies, ie explosions out of nowhere. Even at low volumes, a 15" sub moves a ton of air.

My gut tells me the fishies will flip out, or the glass may crack 8O

We do have other locations in our house available, but as I stated, the game room is prefered. Please share with me with your real-world experiences.

Scott

 

[Psyhampster]

Firstoff, Welcome to AA!
As far as the placement, i'd say, if you really want it in that room, farther from the woofer would be better, as the vibrations wouldn't be as strong. Think of an earthquake, it gets weaker as it moves away from the epicenter.

Where in MN are you?

 

[bound_for_obx]

Just how hard are you driving that Sub???!!! 8O You could place the tank on a piece of styrofoam if you are concerned about vibrations going thru the concrete. But like you said, concrete is really good at dampening vibrations. Styrofoam is available from Home Improvement Centers in 4x8 sheets. Personally, I'd be more concerned about a stray foos ball hitting the tank.

 

[youronlysin]

I dont think you'll have any major issues. Sound pressure will load in the corners of the room, so the bass will sound and feel stronger there...you might want to put the tank against a wall a few feet away from the corner if possible. A very good friend of mine owns a stereo shop in Idaho and, as you would expect, he has quite the home entertainment system as well. He has a single 15 inch subwoofer located in one corner of the room and also has a 75 gallon reef tank against the same wall about 15 feet away from the sub. He hasn't had a single issue with obvious fish stress or tank cracks. The tank has been maturing for about 7 years now.

 

[Varick]

Well, it is a 15" sub! Even at low volume it vibrates the floor above during explosions and etc. We have a 90" diagonal screen, so the volume does get turned up proportionally for movies. No worry about foosballs though, we're all decent players.

If the consensus is the floor transmitting the vibrations is the issue, then I'm not concerned. Concrete's concrete. I could put a sheet of styrofoam under it easy, and maybe build a stand and throw bags of sand in it to deaden it?

Psy - it probably wouldn't matter too much, as the room is small rectangle, 17'x30'. There are other locations available in the house that would be ok.

We live in Shakopee btw, though I've lived all over the south metro.

 

[Varick]

Thanks Youronlysin, that's certainly encouraging to hear.

My bass sits directly under the screen (not ideal but that's more of an avs-forum thing) so the corners aren't as 'live' as they could be. I think the least vibration would be on the same wall as the sub, and the added benefit would be having the tank visible from the screen viewing location.

 

[kukerdan]

ehehehhe, i know your proud, but 15" isnt that big of a sub.... 29 gallon is a relitivly small tank.. and if you plan on putting skittish fish in it, like, catfish, be prepared for them to smack into the sides of the tank. I usually drive my new fish home from the store in my car, which has 2, 10" subs pushing around 1500 watts...

I dont think they mind it to much,

I do suggest putting the tank stand on another dampener, as sound gets into water through solids, not air..............

Try this experiment...

Fill up the bathtub, and sink your head in it... have your wife yell at you while under water... then have her lightly tap the tub.... what do you hear louder............


the tap i hope, unless shes really really loud....................

so just make sure it isnt touching anything that is vibrating, and you should be ok

 

[youronlysin]

Your wife probably doesnt emit sound in the region of 30 Hz. either. Lower frequencies travel through water better than higher frequencies. The vibration of course can be minimized, but I cant say that you wouldnt hear a subwoofer with your head under water.

 

[Varick]

Kukerdan, this isn't an electronics boast thing, but a powered 15" sub is the largest mass-produced subwoofer class manufactured for home theater. The throw on such a sub dwarfs a 10", even if it's a long-throw model. It also reaches much deeper, and the resulting sound waves are proportionately longer, rattling larger surface areas as they do so. I relayed the information to portray my dilemna, not to impress. If I chose my words poorly, that was not my intent.

The tank would feature small, skittish fish. And my wife does get very loud

I may use some goldfish as guinea pigs. Hope it's not too cruel and unusual?

 

[Drake]

I have a 8" subwoofer in the same room as my 46 gallon tank and it can get pretty loud. I have had no problems with it though even though they are on other sides of the room.

 

[kukerdan]

hehe....... I have a very nice set of 10's in my car, they are dual voice coil, each coil handles 300 watts RMS, so thats 600 RMS a sub, with the box / amp combo i set up, i impress people with twin 12's and single 15's..... Hers what you need.. they made 18 ' car subs... hook one up in your house, lol..... and speaking of rattling, they rattle the mirrors, the seats, the doors, etc. and the hair on my head, and i drive an 80' s american steel box, lol, and im to cheap to get the dynomat
hehe, if i wasnt so poor id get one of those 15's for my house


If thats what your going to use, small skittish fish, either isolate the tank from surfaces very well, or choose another room,
plus, if its a high energy game room, its also increases the chance of somthing / somone flying through the tank, lol,

goldfish arent very skittish, try an irredecant shark, if he doesnt kill himself, and hes still eating when the music is on, id say youve got your self a tank!

 

[xray]

Maybe you could put a piece of styrofoam behind the tank. That would at least insulate it from any sound traveling in the walls.

as sound gets into water through solids, not air

kukerdan sound traveling in the air will amplified when it hits the tank and the LIQUID inside.

I usually drive my new fish home from the store in my car, which has 2, 10" subs pushing around 1500 watts...

I dont think they mind it to much,

Do you really think your fish are not stressed out on the ride home from the LFS. You're probably right they are not so much worried about the sound of your blaring radio as they are about the next bump in the road.

Any way back the question at hand, I wouldn't get any skittish fish. Maybe even put some styrofoam on the side of the tank facing the sub. Stryofoam on the bottom and one or two sides should be fine.

 

[kukerdan]

Glass is an insulater of sound buddy, and sound has a hard time going from air to water... but easy easy time from solid to water.... it travels faster in solids and liquids than it does in air

 

[draX]

I'm running four 12" - front and rears - an 8" center and a 12" sub. Movies, music and games get cranked pretty damn loud, and fish don't seem to have a problem. I rattle the windows in my room, but putting the tank on a piece of styrofoam seems to have minimized all vibrations. As long as you avoid the corners, it doesn't really matter where you put it in the room...
Last party I had I ran all my speakers plus two 18" speakers and a 2kw amp, the speakers were in my room and my fish still didn't seem affected...

 

[Billsgate]

Your right about sound travelling faster in liquids and solids then in air, but I wouldn't go as far as stating that your tank glass is enough insulation to keep sound waves from entering the water. Some percentage of the waves will be conducted by your glass, and reach the water. As they enter the water there will be reflections between the glass of your tank (small, but still....) making the amplitude increase and thus increasing the amount of volume. Take it from someone who studies audiovisual techniques.

I don't know much about the hearing organs of fish, but I do know that when someone smacks the front door shut at my house, my fish are startled by it. But when I put on loud music in the same room as my tank is in, they don't seem to disturbed by it, maybe because it's constant noise.

Back to your question, I would keep the tank as far away as possible from your woofer. And I would get some small schooling fish like danios, my gut feeling is that they aren't bothered as much as bigger fish like cichlids. I would not get goldfish to test, it's not worth it, and what are you going to do with them afterwards???

 

[Varick]

Tie 'em to some clay pigeons?

Seriously though, thanks for all the replies. We're leaning toward a swordtail - tiger barb tank, with some cories and red tail black shark. I've read the 'constant noise' theory before in multiple forums, so I think there's something to that.

Drax, sounds like we have similar systems. What's in your tank?

 

[Vehl]

For what it is worth I work at Bose and we kept a pair of Goldfish in our store for 4 years. They were happy and healthy, then we moved one of our subs to the same wall as the fish, about 15 feet away, and the fish went belly up. Went through 4 more fish before we gave up on trying to keep some.

Now I am not saying it will not work in your setup, just that the only thing that changed was moving the sub and then the fish started dying. Same water change schedule, same feeding schedule, etc....

 

[draX]

I have two dwarf gourami's, a clown loach, a SAE, 4 neons, and two red wagtail platies...It was my first tank so fish choices a bit weird.

 

[rhetor]

I use to keep my 10 gallon in my room. About five feet away i had four 8" woofers with 200-250wrms going to them. In the 10gl is one Jack Dempsey. When the music was firsts turned on he'd get a little spooked but then more curious than anything else and didn't seem to mind.

The glass on my 10g is very very thin. I'm suprised it will hold the 10 gallons of water. It was a $15 tank.


I wouldn't worry about it.

One question - how much power do you have going to that 15"? In my experience it takes a real lot of juice to make them sound decent, but if you have plenty of available power, and the thing can actually produce usable frequencies, they sound good. I'd still go with a 3 10, but thats my personal preferance.

 

[Varick]

Hi Rhetor, 600 continuous, 1000 dynamic; it reaches down to 23 hz. I run floor-standing towers for all three front speakers, so I have the crossover set to bring the mains and center pretty deep, and let the sub do the real heavy lifting.

I decided to choose a different location than the game room for this tank. I'm going to move the 10 gallon quarantine tank down to the game room to test it out, or maybe a betta tank? I'll report back on my experience with it.