DIY and....car audio?

[aud19]

Now Obviously I could DIY a sub box...that's obvious. Whatt I'm wondering is, with all the mid bass drivers, tweeters, crossovers etc that you guys use for DIY home speakers, if some of those could be applied to car audio as well and might offer a better SQ/dollar factor than some of the better car audio brands?

Any thoughts or reccomendations there?

[cobbpa]

I have seen some applications of this before. Usually it's using a small home audio tweeter or woofer as drop-in replacements. Both of these being modifications for the front speakers...many car audio enthusiasts remove the rear speakers. It also assumes that the factory speakers are seperates and in decent positions. Possibly the most laborious implementation I have seen was the use of ported mids in kick panels. I believe the couple of installs that I'm remembering used Seas woofers of some kind. Since then, PE has released their 4 ohm RS speakers and those would probably be some great bang for the buck car drivers, be it as drop-in replacements or for heavy modification. The more advanced designs either spent money on quality passive crossovers using PE/Madisound parts or multiple amps for active setups.

I should add a couple disclaimers:
It has been a few years since I did anything car audio related. I'm just recalling from memory and my knowledge begins to get limited beyond the vague information I provided. Also, there are a lot of obvious obstacles to overcome the car environment as it relates to sound. Road noise / deadening, speaker position, reflections, off-axis response, off-center listening position...I'm sure there are more that I don't even realize. All this means is that money spent in a car will probably not give as good results as that money could create in a home environment.

These things said...yes, I think that some of the DIY concepts discussed here could result in some great SQ/dollar installs. If you are thinking about doing so, maybe give some specifics about your vehicle, ambition, and budget. Some experts around here could probably answer a lot of questions better & more specifically than myself. Car audio is what got me eventually into home audio...so I'm interested to see if this goes somewhere too.

[Jim85IROC]

Of course some of this stuff can work in car audio. Often people look for higher Q woofers for use in doors, and a 4 ohm version is always a benefit in the car environment since that's what all car amps are designed to push. Where you tend to run into problems in a car install is finding space for a large format tweeter. Most of the popular drivers out there in the DIY world are stiff cone drivers that tend to work better with lower crossover points, but the small-format Neo tweeters usually don't perform well down to those needed frequencies. This results in some sort of comprimise. Environmental conditions will be a consideration too... moisture in the doors, sunlight on the dash, etc.

The car world also has a lot more acceptance of active filtering than the home world. Some of the higher end head units even offer 3-way active control. Some of this can get tricky if you don't have the proper measuring equipment and/or a very good ear. A lot of it is going to be somewhat different than the home world because of the drastically different environment (reflection issues, off-axis issues, and cabin gain come to mind), but overall it's a lot of the same design considerations, just with a re-arranged set of priorities.

check out www.diymobileaudio.com/forum for more info. That site is devoted specifically to what you're interested in doing.

[aud19]

Well it's actually for a car I don't plan to buy for another year.....what can I say, I like to plan in advance

Thread on the Suzuki SX4 here.

It actually has (albiet crappy) 1" tweeters and 5.25" mids (might be able to squeeze in some 6.5") and the respective mounting spots for them both front and rear with the tweeters mounted high on the door angled towards the passengers. So positioning should be good (for a car).

As for budget, I'd probably want to spend not much more than ~$600CA for the four tweeters/mids/crossovers. I was thinking of trying to get better front speakers though so something like $400CA'ish fronts, $200CA'ish rears.

I hadn't thought about environmental factors, good point Jim. I would imagine crossovers would have a decent hurdle there too if not designed for a HIGHLY varrying car environment. Being that you can get pretty good car audio "seperates" with included crossovers for between $200-$500 pairs....it might not be worth the hassle I'll have a look at that link though, thanks :T

[Scott Simonian]

I wanted to ask everyone here if they could help me make a 2-way with the RS Dayton drivers for my little Neon. But I was too scared to ask about that here.

Its really the x-over I need help with.

[peterS]

most car audio "audiophiles" use active x/o as all sq decks have dsp
many fabricate dedicated midbass too
while it is the trend to use seas and ribbons
it is hard to beat some of the mid range priced component sets (especialy at internet prices)
i personaly "regressed" to an alpine type r component set run passively and dont miss a thing. they are actualy one of the best tweets ive ever heard (vifa built i believe)
imo opinion anything beyond is not worth the trouble especialy hear where resonances are unbarable in winter


fyi only one pair of tweets is used and dynomat is very necissary

[JustinSC]

I would recommend using active x-overs as well due to the shape and location of speakers. Depending on where you place your speakers the x-over will most likely vary to get the best sound from the your speakers. Sound in car environments are difficult to design.

The problem with going active is you need an amp channel for each speaker.

Going with the I've used both active and passive x-overs (madisound). Both have their advantages and disadvantages. I cannot give a good review because they were different applications and different setups. Active was a 3-way and the passive was a 2-way as well as different speakers. If you want more info about my setups I can give them.

[tf1216]

Finally, a thread I can post in.

https://www.diymobileaudio.com

If you have any questions from amplification, equalization, crossovers, raw drivers, companies, installation advice, etc. ask at this forum. The people are great and I frequent it myself having an active 4-way DIY stereo in my car.

[Finleyville]

I agree with the above poster. I have learned a great deal about car specific applications on that site. There are some very nice install threads to get inspiration.

tf1216, good to see you here!

[heebee-jeebee]

check out the technical thread at elitecaraudio they are pretty knowledgeable about the auto stuff.

[aud19]

Actually went to the popular-for-us-western-canucks Creative Sound Solutions web page and came across these :P :

http://www.creativesound.ca/products.php?make=Mpyre

http://www.mpyreaudio.com/products.htm

Look to be awesome products at pretty darn good prices but the only thing that worries me is that it's not a very long established or well known company/product.... though they seem to be based off Adire parts....

[Jim85IROC]

the high resonance of that tweeter combined with the inevitable breakup of that carbon woofer make me wonder just what kind of comprimises they made with the crossover selection.

For what those drivers cost, I think you could do a lot better. Seas aluminum, Dayton RS, Peerless exclusive and other woofers seem like they should perform very well for a lot less money, and one of the new small format Seas tweeters or small format XT25 seem like another place to get better quality for less money.

[aud19]

Looking at the frequency graph the "mids" do trail off quite a bit around 10k....

[Bent]

These days the way Adire has seemingly abandoned their clients w.r.t repairs, parts and re-coning, I'd consider elsewhere.

[Jim85IROC]

Looking at the frequency graph the "mids" do trail off quite a bit around 10k....

I don't see any graphs to look at, but a rolloff at 10k isn't what I was referring to. That rigid coned mid is likely to have some pretty significant breakup that's going to require specific crossover considerations, and unless the breakup is high enough in frequency, could have an impact on your ability to cross high enough to keep the tweeter happy.

[aud19]

Here's the graph:



But I hear what you're saying now.

[Dennis H]

That curve looks like it's been heavily smoothed (averaged) to me. Usually carbon fiber cones will have some strong breakup peaks and dips similar to metal cones. Smoothing can hide a lot of sins.

[ThomasW]

That curve looks like it's been heavily smoothed (averaged) to me.

Oh no, say it isn't so.... :B