I have a bit of a delima. I am going to have two 8" subs and planned to put them in my truck, but I now realize I have quite a bit less space than first anticipated. My question is, would it be better to place one sub in more space, or to put both of them into quite a bit less space? The subs are soundsplinter rl-i8's, and I have about .72ft^3 total to work with. That would be about .28ft^3 per driver after displacement. Or I could put just one in about .64ft^3 after displacement. So which would produce more output, one with more space or two with less. I will be pushing it with a memphis amp which gives 1100 rms at 1 ohm.

Well, for one, dont run that amp full tilt to 1 of those 8s, hehe.

Ok, now to ur question-

Don't run 2 ported in that size.

Either 1 ported or 2 sealed i can see happening.

If you run both ported, it will be VERY hard to reproduce low end response like they may be meant for.

If you want some loud boom, i'd say do 1 ported.

IF you want some nice smooth sound with some higher up boom boom, go sealed.

Yeah, I forgot to mention that either way, Im going to be doing a sealed box. And yeah, I dont want to see one of those 8's go poof, so if I do run one, I will be VERY careful lol.

a sub in it's maximum recommended sealed enclosure does just fine off of max rms rated power.

IF you got more power than what's recommended, put the sub in a smaller box to control excursion, it does not control thermal limits.

So, even though you are using sealed box, 2 of them would be recommended for that amount of power.

Taken from their website-

Optimal Car:

0.5 cu ft net volume sealed

Acceptable:

0.2 - 0.65 cu ft net volume sealed

See? You can go all the way down to 0.2 per sub(do a common chamber) and run that amp to them and you'll be set.

The cost of building this box is nothing!

You could prob build 3 sealed boxes with 1 sheet of MDF.

IF you just so happen to not like the outcome, build another one for just 1 sub.... or build a sealed box for both subs but only hook up one and use the other as a passive radiator.

I'm pretty sure that's possible.

Well, for one, dont run that amp full tilt to 1 of those 8s, hehe.

perhaps you forget that with only one sub the impedence will be twice as much so he'll only get about half power. so each sub will see ~550 watts whether he has one or two.

and I'd do two. You will gain peak output. Might have a tad less low end since the rolloff will start higher, but that will probably only be under 40 hz and only a couple db's.