This is directed more at you Aaron since you're an engineer and everything, but I also wanted to see other people opinions are.

I recently had 2 shotguns in hard plastic cases in my trunk, somehow the surround on my subwoofer got punctured/worn and it leaks a bit. Alpine says the surround material is neoprene, is there some sort of neoprene patch out there that uses a solvent weld rather than adhesive? You know like the same way PVC pipe is joined by bonding them with solvent cement...

 

Even if it bonds well it will probably tear later. What ever you bond it with may change the flexibility. If there is a spot where it is less flexible it will tear with time. What kind of sub is it? God I hope it's not a type-R. If your going to have things your trunk you should use a grill.

 

I've completely rebuilt the surrounds on a pair of late 90's JBL competition GT 12's with black silicone caulking by hand and they actually sound awesome! These had the foam completely falling apart though and I did the entire surround evenly with the caulk as opposed to fixing it. If the neoprene is just ripped a bit, but the pieces meet up to a tight seam, I'd think that you could seal them decently with silicone caulk, but as toofat mentioned, it may fall apart or change the sound quality by throwing off the balance of the speaker. If I were you, I'd give the silicone a shot making sure to keep it very thin so it's light ...... and get a pair of grilles! They're like $20 for a pair of Radio Shack ones.

Next time you want to break a speaker with a shotgun, make sure that it can't be fixed!!!

 

hahaha thanks for the advice guys. No, thank god they're not Type-Rs, just crappy Type-Es, but I like my system and don't feel like upgrading it, so I thought I would try fixing it or just leaving it, it doesn't affect the sound really.

 

It's not going to hurt to try, the damage has already been done lol. Maybe now you can take this opportunity to get a Kicker CVX lol. One of these bad boys puts out more bass than two of your Type-Es, and their not bad on the wallet.

 

How much are they? And do you think my alpine MRP-M350 amp can handle it? I think it's 700W peak @ 4 ohms... It will have to wait a while, I just bought a full set of Koni Yellows yesterday, but MOAR bass and MOAR trunk room is appealing!

 

They are about $180, some places a bit less. They are rated for 750w RMS and 1500w max, so that amp is under powered. It only puts out 350w RMS at 2 ohms. My kicker amp is rated at 750, but came from factory tested at 900w. I've seen people giving these subs 1000w and some even 1500w, they are not DDs but they will take it. It's really nice having only one sub, you get a bit of trunk back. And it puts out more bass than I need, and I used to have 15"s. But bass SQ is more important to me than output now. There are subs with better SQ, but in this price range I think it's the best mix of SQ, output, and reliability.


EDIT: If you want a new cheap sub I have one from a friend he wants me to sell. It's a kenwood, I forget the model. It actually sounds pretty darn good for the price. I'm going to be putting it up on ebay with a few other things sometime this week if your interested. I have a couple amps I'm putting up on ebay, one is a kenwood I forget the other one it's some crap brand.

 

If you have a JBL/Crown BPX550.1 lying around, hit me up!!!

I have a pair of 12" RF's that I'm going to sell soon as well. They'll be pretty cheap.

 

Nah, that's okay man... I usually don't buy cheap stuff, I just don't feel like spending more money on a system I have been 100% content with for the last 4 years or so. I might get a 12" or 10" Type-R or JL or that Kicker you mentioned and run it off the amp I have for now... and then bump that up after a while... my buddy has a Alpine 1000WRMS amp and 2 12" Type-R's... and no car to put them in, maybe I'll borrow them for a while.

 

LOL ... by cheap, I mean in price. I bought them new and only ran them for about 2-3 years off of an Alpine V12 amp at about 125WRMS, so they've never actually seen much power. I had them set fairly low so there wasn't any noticible distortion ...... then I killed the amp pushing the JBL's with it. The Fosgates have been collecting dust in my basement for 6 years or so ....... but there's no hole in the surrounds!!!

When you get the new speaker, get a grille!!!