Speaker Installation

[talnlnky]

Originally Posted by swidd

Thanks talnk, turning on the hp filter with ~80 hz allowed me to push the volume an additional 3 clicks before distortion. The spx does not distort at all, without any filters, so this will let me to a greater degree match the rear spr to the front spx, for a much louder ride on road trips :)

Reason has to with the way the motor (magnet & voice coil) of the speaker is designed. When A speaker is played to play a note it moves, when it is told to play a lower note it has to move more in order to play at the same volume. The problem is that the further the voice coil moves away from the magnet, the less stable the cones movement becomes.... this means the cones has these micro-vibrations which cause sound... and the created from these little vibrations are not meant to be produced. That means it is distortion.

by setting that highpass @ 80hz, you have reduced the amount of lower frequencies that are sent to that speaker significantly. You get less midbass, but at the same time, you are reducing how much the cone has to move, which means you reduced a lot of distortion.... allowing you to hear the 80hz and up content at a higher level before reaching the same distortion level as before.

Cheers for going deaf quicker!

This limitation of speaker motors holds true for about 99.9% of midrange speakers, and 98% of subwoofers currently made. The JL W7 was one of the first very durable subs that didn't have this limitation because the designers actually tried to make a sub without distortion due to movement of the voice coil. There are a handful of companies now that have subs that use "linear motor" designs... Some seem to be better approaches than others, but all are better than the 100+ year old design that all other speakers use.

[Alien Mantis]

Originally Posted by talnlnky

Reason has to with the way the motor (magnet & voice coil) of the speaker is designed. When A speaker is played to play a note it moves, when it is told to play a lower note it has to move more in order to play at the same volume. The problem is that the further the voice coil moves away from the magnet, the less stable the cones movement becomes.... this means the cones has these micro-vibrations which cause sound... and the created from these little vibrations are not meant to be produced. That means it is distortion.

Very true.
Which is why it is always best to feed specific frequency ranges to the drivers that are designed to play them.

An ideal setup would be to split the signal into 4 separate parts:
Highs, mids, mid-bass, and sub-bass.

Most people do highs, mids, and bass.
That forces the midrange speakers to try and also play some mid-bass.
( which results in distortion at higher volumes )

If you can separate the mids from the mid-bass, you will have cleaner music.
I heard an SQ system that had two tweets, two 5 1/2" mids, two 8" mid-bass, and one 15" sub. Three amps totaling 1,700watts RMS. Crossovers separating all the freq's.
This system was CLEAN. Near perfect sound. The speaker placement, acoustics of the vehicle, and "imaging" kept it from achieving total perfection.
But it was close.

I've heard louder systems, but none that sounded so tightly balanced.
Total system cost was around $3,000.
( which included installation, wiring, and custom enclosures/amp rack )

( WAY more than I ever want to invest in a car audio system )



But you do get what you pay for if you do it right.

[swidd]

So thinking about what you wrote, I turned the rear high pass to about 200 hz, and also turned on high pass on the front speakers, set to just 70 hz or so. The front speakers are rated for lower hz anyway. I thought I would get a lot less bass, but on the short test drive home, I'd say the sound became clearer, with stronger and more defined bass, also the result of turning up bass boost on the head unit - with no distortion up to 4 clicks higher than before these posts. It's so great :) of course I probably should go and get a subwoofer just to fill it out... Perfection ain't cheap....

[swidd]

I never thought I'd say it is worth spending money on car audio, but must admit the feeling of flying down the highway floating in an extacy of omnipresent sound... Makes it worth it. The only limit to the return on my investment in joy, seems to be the constant struggle to chase rattles :)

[sqcomp]

...If the statement from AM above is true ($3K being way too much), I'm royally screwed. All of this started for me because someone insinuated that I didn't know squat about sound systems. Funny.

That being said, I'm working the same idea with the four way cross (H, M, MB, and B). The difference for me is that it's a 4.6" mid, and 8.5" mid bass, and two 15"s. I'm working hard on placement for imaging and soundstage. I'll keep you guys posted over the next few weeks.

I'll post up pics of the amps on Monday hopefully. You should enjoy those.

[fnkngrv]

Originally Posted by talnlnky

make sure you have a highpass crossover set for 80-100hz. If you still have distortion issues.... make sure your gains are set correctly (do a google search on gain setting).

He is right on this one. I took about 2 hrs one day fiddling with getting the gains and cross over freqs set for the cleanest sound while pushing the speakers to the limits without them distorting. The biggest challenge is finding what you consider the sweet spots for crossover/gain for all input methods as of course they all very. That is where on a good HU your gain per input comes into play as well as providing seemless volume levels when changing inputs. I will take clean over loud any day. talnlnky is right on the deaf statement earlier...I can't really say how "loud" I push my system on normal usage because of course it is all relative to setup. I can tell you that with a store bought CD it is rare that I push my CD3200 above 50 which is pretty loud with my setup. I cannot recall where the CD3200 tops out at however I am thinking that it tops at 7o perhaps....

[Alien Mantis]

Originally Posted by sqcomp

...If the statement from AM above is true ($3K being way too much), I'm royally screwed. All of this started for me because someone insinuated that I didn't know squat about sound systems. Funny.
That being said, I'm working the same idea with the four way cross (H, M, MB, and B). The difference for me is that it's a 4.6" mid, and 8.5" mid bass, and two 15"s. I'm working hard on placement for imaging and soundstage. I'll keep you guys posted over the next few weeks.
I'll post up pics of the amps on Monday hopefully. You should enjoy those.

I am sure everyone on this forum respects your knowledge of audio.

And I would expect you to spend much more than $3k on the competition system you are building.
( I was not referring to a "competition" system. )

It costs big bucks to compete. The devil is in the details. The details take time to sort out.

Those Audison amps you have are NOT cheap, but they are primo quality!
Years ago, one of our local car audio shops was looking at being an Audison dealer. The stuff is really too "high-end" for our little town.
They ended up NOT getting them. They are a dealer for Planet Audio.
Planet Audio makes good stuff too, but I have never been a fan.
( Seems to be a little pricey for what you get. )

[sqcomp]

The thing is that a lot of people think Audison is out of reach. It really isn't. That SRx line is sweet. I'd put it on the same level pricewise as the PG Ti, Exile Xi, ID Q and the like.

The speakers we're talking about...you guys are going to find that when you have the ability to play with the crossover settings, much like Taln is talking about, that those can "make or break" a system in overall performance. You'll see a lot of competitors haveing at least quasi-active setups just for the flexibility of adjustment. Most of the time is spent sitting in the car...just listening. Listening again, making a change, noting that change, changing back...listening, and so on.

As for my knowlege, Taln has already councelled me about "letting things go" and not dwelling on what people say. He's right. I'm simply too far into it to keep myself back. I've dusted off the gears and have apparently been accepted into the Team Hybrids flock. Not a bad group of guys to learn from and be around at competitions.

...this whole thing with the challenge started when I was told I couldn't make great SQ from an inexpensive system. Well, my vehicle has COMPLETELY busted the inexpensive part. My wife's tacoma on the other hand...I'm still looking for the YW memeber so I can meet with him over a beer and have him audition her truck. Less than a grand into it and I think I've got a winner in the category of bang for the buck.

...I just partially hijacked this thread...

I apologize. Back to speakers and spacers, which BTW are very easy to make and can be made adjustable...

[talnlnky]

bah... audison is nothing.. take a look at Zapco, or Brax/Helix... those are spendy amps... If I had a $15,000 budget for my stereo... i'd spend probably 2-3k on sound deadening, then buy zapco amps and have the rest be crazy fiberglass work.. the speakers themselves would be the cheapest part of my install, the amps, deadening, and signal chain (deck/eq/xover) would be about 90% of the cost.

Originally Posted by sqcomp

Less than a grand into it and I think I've got a winner in the category of bang for the buck.

...I just partially hijacked this thread...

dude... the best way to get that best bang for the buck... get a decent set of comps that can play down to 60hz, but cross them at 70-80hz... get an entry level 10" sub... and put it in a ported box to limit the mechanical movement (read: distortion), and run it off a small amp... say 150-250rms.