Subwoofers - Grille off or on?

I have never had a pair of full range speakers that sounded better with grills so I never use them. 3 of the 4 pairs of subs I have have no grill over the speaker, being either upward firing or downward firing. I do have grills on my Nelson Reed 1204s. Considering the frequencies involved I doubt that the grills would be audible; usually the problem with grills is treble attenuation, which of course does not apply here.

Wrong. It depends on the baffle design. Many speakers will definitely sound better with the grill on.

A grill on or off is irrelevant for a subwoofer and makes no difference.

I'm going out on a limb and siding with Shadorne on this one.

Marty

I don't know the answer but perhaps Tpreaves objected to the word "always" in the statement.

It could be some speakers are designed to be accurate with grills in place and removing them may be pleasing to some and worse for others.

Experiment and decide for yourself is not a bad suggestion either.

Just which speakers do you have in mind? Are you saying that the ones I have listened to really sound better with them on? What I said was that I had never heard one sound better. I have not heard all speakers and I doubt if you have heard the ones I listen to. My Mini Utopias did not COME with a grill, did Focal screw up their sound? All the grill can do is attenuate the treble, do you want that done? The only really transparent grills ever made were the old foam ones like JBL use to use, effective but looked cheap. Even the Quads were considered to sound better uncovered.