Question for those with a sub under console
 

I'm ditching my slot port enclosure I used with a 15" sub. The sub and port were both firing at the hull which caused too much flexing. Due to the size of the box, I could only fire the sub and port towards the hull.

I'm rebuilding my box with PSP or Aeroports to reduce the overall size of the enclosure, and allow me to fire the sub, ports, or both into the cabin. I recall a few members here who have done both with a 15" sub. I was wondering how much different the outpout is? And any opinion on sub/port firing direction (i.e. sub to the hull, port to cabin)

With each and every reinforcing plane you pick up an extra 3 dB of output, at least initially until the bass radiation escapes the impact of those immediate surrounding planes. So a side-firing woofer/port will gain a little acoustic leverage in the lower bass. However, there is a little storage and filtering of the midbass transients as a result of loading into the under helm cavity. With direct radiating you will pick up some articuation (depending on how low/high your crossover point is) and sacrifice a bit of the low bass reinforcement. There is always going to be a slight trade off. Generally with a 15-inch you can always use a bit more transients so the direct radiating method might sound better to you in some respects. Also, it's hard to get a sidefiring woofer/port when using something as large as a15-inch, stood off the hull surface by enough distance so that the bass-reflex tuning isn't affected. So that might be another area, depending on how tight things are presently, where you might see an improvement.

David
Earmark Marine