Behringer Wing Aux-Fed Subs: Give Your Subwoofers Their Own Fader
If your subwoofers just hang off your left-right mix, everything you send to the mains goes to the subs too, and the only way to get more low end is to push the whole mix. On the Behringer Wing you can give the subs their own main and their own fader, then decide channel by channel what goes to them. Some people call this aux-fed subs. Here’s exactly how I set it up.
What you need
- A Behringer Wing. I’m on the full size console.
- Somewhere to patch your outputs. Mine live on my stage snake, a Behringer S32; here’s how I set up the Wing with an S32.
- Separate amp or processor inputs for your mains and your subs, so each can get its own feed.
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My whole console setup is in my Wing front-of-house kit.
Two ways to feed your subs
You have mains, typically your left and right speakers hanging up in front of you, and then you have subwoofers, the low end on the ground.
Some systems let you push a left-right feed out of the board and let the processor do the work: it sends everything to the subs, uses a crossover to take the highs out, and only sends the low end to the subs.
The other way is to have a separate fader on your board for your mains and a separate fader for your subs. Then you control what goes to those subs based on how you set up your board. That’s what this post walks through. I’ve run my Wing this way for a long time; it’s how the mains are set up in my real-world Wing layout.
Step 1: Set up Main 1 and Main 2
The Wing has four mains, and each one can carry its own mix (I explain that in creative routing with the Wing’s four mains). I use two of them here:
- Go to your mains layer.
- Main 1 is my mains. Main 2 is my subs.
- Select each one, go to Name, and name them mains and subs.
Now you have two dedicated mains, one for each.
Step 2: Patch the outputs
- Go to Routing, then Outputs.
- Find wherever your outputs live. Mine are on my snake, on AES50 A.
- Unlock your outputs.
- Patch outputs 13 and 14 to Main 1 left and Main 1 right, and outputs 15 and 16 to Main 2 left and Main 2 right.
Now the mains go to one spot and the subs to another spot physically on the snake, on different physical faders.
Step 3: Decide, channel by channel, what goes to the subs
Having the faders set up is only half of it. Now you control what goes to them, and you do that channel by channel.
- Select a channel. I start with channel 1, a vocal mic.
- Go to the second to last tab on the touchscreen: the main sends.
- For a vocal, turn it on in the mains and off in the subs. I also leave the send at unity in the mains and pull the fader all the way down on the subs. You don’t have to do both, but that’s how I have it.
- Work through every channel, line by line: this one on the mains, that one on the mains and the subs.
This is how you say, “I don’t need, you know, my vocal mics in the subwoofers. I don’t need my acoustic guitar in the subwoofers.” You don’t even take the chance that those instruments or vocals are being sent to the subs.
Isn’t the low cut already doing that?
Partly. My normal vocal EQ has a low cut at about 100 Hz, and my sub crossover is at 80 Hz, so that EQ shouldn’t be sending much to the subs anyway. With the main sends set up this way, the channel isn’t even trying to send to the subs.
The bass guitar: on in both, subs below unity
The bass guitar is where you see the difference. On my bass channel the mains send is on and at unity, and the subs send is on but not at unity. I set it at a volume I’m happy with.
If you put them both at unity, maybe that sounds right to you. You just have to use your ear. I don’t want as much in the subs as I do in the mains, so when I push the fader it sends a little more to the mains than to the subs, but it still sends to both.
So each channel gets two decisions: whether it goes to the subs at all, and how much of it does.
If you’d rather start from a working file, my free Wing console file is built the same way: Main 1 for left and right, Main 2 for the subs, and only certain channels like the kick drum, floor tom and bass guitar sent to them.
The gotcha: turn Pre off
While you’re in each channel’s main sends, check one more button: Pre. You do not want it lit up.
Pre means pre-fader. It sends that channel to the subwoofers at the same level no matter what you do with the fader.
Say Pre is on for the bass guitar’s subs send. You pull the bass fader all the way down at front of house, and it’s still cranking that bass guitar to the subs. You have no actual control of it.
You want it post-fader: when you turn the bass guitar down, it gets lower in both the mains and the subs, and when you turn it off, it’s off in both. Anything you send to the subs should be post-fader so your fader still controls it. If pre and post are new to you, start with pre vs post fader on the Wing and tap points explained.
Ride the subs on their own fader
Once every channel is set up post-fader, in the mains and/or the subs, you have separate main faders for the mains and the subs. One is your sub volume and one is your main volume.
Now you can say “a little less subs overall” or “a little more subs overall”, or at one point in a song you need more energy, so you boost the subs. Before, the only way to do that was to boost your mains to also boost the subs, which pushes the whole mix with them.
This gives you much more granular control over what goes to your mains and what goes to your subs, and the volume of each, so you have that dynamics when you need it.
FAQ
What are aux-fed subs?
Your subwoofers get their own feed from the console instead of hanging off the left-right mix. You choose which channels go to the subs and control the subs on their own fader. On the Wing I do it with Main 2.
Which channels should go to the subs?
The low-end sources. My vocals and acoustic guitar are off in the subs. In my console file only certain channels like the kick drum, floor tom and bass guitar go to them, and the bass sits below unity in the subs.
Should the subs send be pre or post fader?
Post. If it’s pre-fader, pulling a channel down at front of house won’t take it out of the subs. Keep Pre off on every channel you send to the subs.
Can I still use a crossover in my processor?
Yes. My sub crossover is at 80 Hz. The main sends just decide what is even sent to the subs in the first place.
Related tutorials
- Creative routing with the Wing’s four mains: why a main can carry its own mix.
- Buses vs mains vs matrices on the Wing: which one to reach for, and when.
- Pre vs post fader on the Wing: the setting behind the gotcha above.
- Tap points explained: where in the chain a send is taken from.
- My real-world Wing layout: how my mains, subs and live stream main are laid out at church.
- Free Wing console file: start from a file with the subs already on Main 2.
Gear I use for this
- Behringer Wing (full size): the console in this video.
- Behringer S32: the stage snake my mains and subs outputs are patched to.
Everything else I recommend is on my product recommendations page.
Got a question I didn’t cover? Ask me in the chat here on the site, or leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to help.
