Mobile A/V Systems

[Blaze86Vic]

You can't shop *just* by numbers. 1000 watt is not the same across the board. Junk amps will show you peak numbers, good amps show RMS. RMS is "average" or real power. Its also about 1/3 the peak value (peak is actually like 2.8x RMS). Have to be careful what you're looking at. Also, there is the matter of distortion, signal to noise ratio, and other things you can't put into a spec sheet like build quality. Sure, it might have great specs, but is it a piece of shit thats going to die in a month because the solder connections are shoddy? Its a general rule that if the specs are good, the build quality is at least OK. Reviews are a good thing. If its a brand I'm not familier with, I like to see what other people have to say about it.

RMS = Root Mean Square And finding this value is shopping by numbers. If I can't find an RMS wattage, then it's obviously crap.

Also, signal to noise ratio is a numerical spec that can be found on a spec sheet. Sensitivity values too have a direct correlation to the overall sound quality.

[RugerP97DC]

The higher the Signal to noise number the better! Dont forget about Total Harmonic Distortion! USAcoustics makes amps that have .01%-.001% THD!

Tha is fucking KEWEL!!

[RugerP97DC]

[83tc]

my system is mismatched, infinity dash speakers"free", digital audio door speakers"35 bux", eclipse 6x9 rears"120 bux"kenwoods in the trunk"free"no name tweeter, 2 sets, "25 bux"profile amp, not the best, but does the job"250 bux like 4 years ago when i drove rice", bazooka subs, got em when i go the amp, nuy one get one free, "100 bux", sub box"free cause its too big for the g/f's new car so she stole my old one", wiring, free from various sources, capacitor"50 bux", time invested"priceless", im always addin to it and shit, best buy of all, replacing my shitty blown up alpine with a 400 somthing dollar kenwood i got off ebay for 95 bux shipped to my door, never again will i buy from best buy or circuit city, last 2 headunits i bought died within 3 years, this kenwood i cant kill, and for less than 100 bux i cant go wrong, my system rattles my house when the car is in the driveway, yet sounds just as good at low volume or when crusin, any music, any condition, and it sounds good, took me alot of trial and error, but it was worth it, look around for my latest trunk set up on here, yeah, it looks showy, but ive got 2 tool boxes and a tow chain hidden in there too, function and form, i javent carried a spare cause the one that came with the car was shit, thats the only thing missing, and theres a place for it, so yeah, it may be flashy and shit, but it works damn well and im proud of it, y?, because i did every bit of it myself in my garage...

[jasonh]

My stuff is all mismatched too. In my POS Taurus I have Max Fidelity tweeters in the kick panels, Rockford Fosgate mids in the doors and an Image Dynamics IDQ10 sub all run actively X'd over by a Premier 860MP and powered by a 5 channel Alpine amp, 50x4+150x1.


My plans for the CV are my old Sony CDX-C910 HU+10 disc changer, Audio Control 4.1 preamp/EQ, 2 channel Alpine amp 150x2 running 2 of these, Seas CA22RNX, in each door

and these, Seas TBFC/G, in the kick panels

I just need to make crossovers.

[83tc]

id wtch the whole kick panel thing, theres a reason why their called KICK panels

[85crownHPP]

I agree

[jasonh]

You can't get proper imaging without using the kickpanels. There is TONS of room in these cars in the kick area. Don't worry it wont be a problem

[83tc]

You can't get proper imaging without using the kickpanels. There is TONS of room in these cars in the kick area. Don't worry it wont be a problem

BULLSHIT!!!, no car needs kick panels for proper imaging, while it may help it is in no way needed, my car essentially has surround sound, and i have no kick pods, in the towncar, grand marq, crown vic, etc, the speakers in the dash and lower doors make for perfectly fine imaging with the rear providing the fill, kick pods are overkill, why use that area and have to make custom pods, when theres already a hole in the dash and door for speaker placement?kick pods place the speaker low and under the dash, causing high reflectivity of any sound they may reproduce, m 82 monte carlo had em and they sucked, sounded like shit, and it wasnt the speakers, mounting anythng that low is just aiming the speaker at your ear so your fooled into thinking its better, when in reality it just masks out the shitty sound, that, and i gaurenfuckingtee some idiot will kick it and or put their foot through it, door speakers arent much better cause everyone seems to like to kick them as well, stick with dash, rear deck, or doors, want a higher soundstage?, run components up front with the low/mid in the lower door location and drill a hole for the tweeter up by the vent window area and add a good set of tweeters in the rearcorners above the rear window, your ears will ring....

[83tc]

In my POS Taurus I have Max Fidelity tweeters in the kick panels, Rockford Fosgate mids in the doors and an Image Dynamics IDQ10 sub all run actively X'd over by a Premier 860MP and powered by a 5 channel Alpine amp, 50x4+150x1.....


you dontmount tweeters low, mid and low frequency is always mounted lower than tweters, unless in a truck setup with those overhead speaker bars like in a jeep, tweeters down low are pointless, as the sound will be lost in the carpet, your legs/feet, etc, use the upper door area by the armrest or on newer cars the trim near where the mirrors mount on each door, look in a newer chevy suburban/tahoe/pickup with the bose system, lows are way in the bottom of the doors and tweeters are in the whindshield pillars abpve the dash, most newer cars with seperate tweeters use a similar setup, while most stock systems suck, the idea is the same....

[jasonh]

The idea of kickpanels is to get equal distances between you and the drivers, thats how you get proper imaging. The only downgrade to mounting them that low is stage height can sometimes suffer. You really need time alignment if you mount your drivers as far apart as most car manufactures do it now, door+Apillar. Without TA it causes all kinds of peaks and dips in the frequency response. I use WinMLS 2000 software to tune the car. It basically turns my laptop into a mobile RTA. Sound is subjective though, our goals maybe different, my goal is home audio quality in the car and that can't be gotten by your methods without some major tuning. Even then too many speakers playing the same frequencies are a bad idea.

BTW I'm not trying to start a war, just a friendly discussion I have been doing car audio installs for 12+ years.

[83tc]

good deal man, no war, always good to find another audiohead

[85crownHPP]

Maybe I dont know what Im missing, but I cant imagine a fuller sound stage than I get with these:

the angled baffles made a HUGE improvment



Alpine soft dome tweeters, mmmmm

[jasonh]

Heres a couple of aiming techniques I've used. They work very well. If your not into making kicks the DOOR/APILLAR one is easy to try...


KICKPANELS
1) Put your front seats where you intend to either drive the car or where you will have them if you plan to compete, this is very very important. I am talking about fore and aft, height, seat back tilt angle. If not competing then where you will drive the car at and the passenger side the same.
If you are competing in car audio comps, then all the way back and low but even with the passenger side for height, lean the seats back a bit but not real far to make them uncomfortable.

2) Sit in your seat as you would driving or listening as per above, make sure you are correctly placed, if you tend to drive leaning way forward like some do, you should adjust how you sit, better for your posture anyway, lol, lean back in the seat.

3) Have somebody you trust to do this correctly, critically important. Roll the windows up, have them look very very carefully at where the entrance to your eardrum is on your window side ear, left ear, mark it on the window or on the pillar with a small spot of tape.

4) Move to the other front seat and do the same except of course on the right ear this time.

5) Ok to get out of the car now Measure 5" forward and 1.5" down from the spot marked for your ear entrance points on each side of the car, should be two marks on the car now, one for your ears and one forward and down as above.

6) Build some temp baffles for the speakers or the ones you will use, what I do. Have the tweeters mounted very low and to the door side of the baffle, the woofers go furthest forward and low as well.

7) Aim the woofers(midbasses) exactly at the forward and down spot on the glass you marked.
This is the sweet spot, instead of fighting the glass reflections you are using them to your advantage. The right speaker will reflect off the left glass into your left ear and help equalize the sound you hear from both speakers, seems odd but it works, exceptionally well.

8)Take a kitchen towel and put it behind the baffles can cover the back of the speakers, then do some serious listening tests to see if you need to align them differently but this should be pretty darn accurate.

9) Be very careful when glassing the kicks as the glass can pull them out of alignment when drying as tends to shrink so mount the baffles very well before glassing.

10) Wire the midbass on the passenger out of phase with the drivers side midbass, you may lose some midbass output but the sub can help make up for that quite well when tuned properly, better yet to have some midbasses in the doors. Try all the phasing setups you can, sometimes the drivers side is best, sometimes but not often, both in phase works)

DOOR/APILLAR
1) use the door locations for the midbasses, both in phase.
2) tweeters in the A pillars firing directly at each other, as wide apart as possible, both at the same exact height and about 2" above the highest point on the dash. Wire both tweeters out of phase(pos and neg wires reversed but this may have to be reconsidered depending on the midbass wiring, take your time and try them all! Make sure to try many different aim points as well.
3) Use a dash mat, fugly but they work.

[85crownHPP]

im gonna have to try this out