i read that if you have good bass or i guess strong mid bass? up front, it will pull the sound from the subs up front. i purchased some 6.5 memphis coaxials last year and it doesn't do that at all. What would be some good front speakers with good bass response? the speakers are in the door, powered by a JLaudio slash 4 channel amp i mean to say, i want my subs to sound like their in front of me, how do i do that?
What kind of car do you drive? What sub amp combo and h/u do you have? What type of box do you have? What direction is your box facing? We can help you,but we need all of this info.
Bass up front, we need a few thing for that to happen. First, make sure the speaker is well mounted. This is a must so that the speaker can reproduce its entire range. A little dynomat (or equivalent) will definately help. Turn off any high pass filters (crossovers). The more sound we have coming from the front speakers, the more blending we get from the subs. We don't need high pass filters on a 6-1/2 inch speaker but if you insist, then use something with a shallow roll off. A 199 microfarad cap should be more than enough. Set you sub crossover lower, 90 is a good starting point. A little lower might help even more.
05 Civic. but plan to get a Honda fit this year. W6 JLA 12" sub. MTX Elite 1501d (800-1600 watts ohm depending) Sony ub400 something HU...its crap imo, but its newer model MAXXbass processor for the front 6.5's. 3/4 MDF sealed AtrendUSA. 1.25 ft3 per chamber as recomend by JLA (only 1 sub currently) Facing rear in trunk, but no difference can be noticed either direction in this particular case. 6x9 rear deck openings are empty, so bass can flow through it better. MTX amp has variable xrossover freq. i tried them all. currently frequency is set at 80hz, i have also tried 60hz and 30hz with bassboost to make that range loud enough. On the plus side, no setting distorts the sub, it handles it well. But most of my music is Rock and i'm sure doesnt hit those low notes often. Not using a crossover on my 6.5's. full range amped from a JLA 4 channel slash amp. I also messed with all the HU settings, all the bass controlls still effect the sub outs, even though its seperate. When i added the maxxbass processor, it made a huge difference in giving my fronts better sounding bass, err, illusion of bass anyways, works as advertised, however, i still cannot make the subs sound like their comming from up front. Subs overpowering them? My fronts to me don't sound all that, honestly i don't think it sounds any better than the OEM with maxxbass off, maybe its me, my HU or install....i blame the HU mostly.
Blues Car Audio BL6.5CP component set has dramatic low end response and does not have to be rolled off on bottom end or top end. The Fs of the 6.5 is 36 Hz and can produce usable response as low as 28 Hz.
OK sounds like you've got most everything covered. If I remember right, the civic has the speaker mounted low in the door, that is probably the main problem. Please consider a kick panel with the speakers positioned better. I think that you may be right. Personally, if this were my car, I would add another set of 6-1/2's. Just like what you have in a set of Kick Panels. But there is an easy way to tell if the woofers are overpowering everything. Turn the gain on the woofer all the way down. Now sit in the driver seat and turn it up a little at a time. The bass Should sound like its coming from the front. But as the gain gets higher the bass will move to the rear of the car. If this is the case, adding another set of speakers will help Something Like This In this Honda picture, there are two 6-1/2-inch drivers. One in the door and one in the Kick Panel. And one component tweeter in the Kick Panel.
Bass in the front stage can be a hard thing to achieve. Bass is generally non directional in its qualities. But what comes into play is our mind, and our ears. This gets into the realm of physcho-acoustics. the way the mind percieves the sound your ears hear. Time alignment and x-overs, along with speaker placement all help to achive that golden sound. Very difficult to do in a mobile enviorment indeed. One of the best sounding installs I ever did back in the early 90s was a 57 vette convertible for Alpine. Using nothing more than a set of 5 inch component drivers, a single 10 inch sub, and 2 amps of 140 watts each. The mid/tweets were up front, in the kick panel area. slightly modified for fibrgalsse enclosures for the midbass and on slight axis to the center of the car. The glovebox compartment (made of heavy grade pressboard) was removed, and I fabbed a glass enclosure for the 10 incher firing down at the passengers feet, vented of course. The overall sound was phenomanal from such a basic system. Bass was literally in your face and the stage was front and center. This was due to the fact that the arrival times of all frequencies were VERY close together when they hit your ears. It wasnt a SPL sytem by any means, but the SQ was to die for.......... Just a somethin to think about.........
thanks for the help guys. i'll check into some kickpanels. but would a free air speaker work well in those? theres no room behind them. do they make a 6.5 inch sub? what if i used such for the kick panels? i can't mod or build worth crap to do anything else. not finding much info about Blues components other than their site. any reviews i can look at?
A free air speaker will do fine in even the smallest of areas. the idea is to seperate the front of the driver from the back of the driver....with as much space between the two as possible. Also, they need to be mounted in a firm and non resonant manner.....
It sounds like you have the sub set up properly, position and all. You may not notice a difference on sub position from moving it and listening but if you do any test tones and metering you can see major differences in cancellation due to positioning. But unless you have a major dip caused by this, that is not the problem. The fronts might not be adding that much due to covering too much range. If you added them as mid-basses then they need a full compliment of drivers above them to cover the mids and highs. But if you were just replacing the speakers to get a nicer pair capable of more bass, they might still sound better with a tweeter aka a component set. You can put them together, you don't have to buy a package. The biggest problem is imaging. As stated above "golden sound" is not easy to achieve. If you have "enough" bass which you should, the frequencies are non-directional so the only thing that would cue you to the bass being behind you is too many high frequency artifacts. Your crossover should be fine, I use 80hz myself. 60 could help. Since you aren't likely hearing high frequencies from the cone itself, it might be the distortion of air through the old speaker holes. Maybe put some foam across them. I know you left them open to let the bass through but damping them shouldn't cost but a dB or two. Many people live with full back seats and never get that consideration. There is something cuing you toward the back or you are missing a frequency range that is appearing directional.
thanks sfhellwig. i'm gonna try for more speakers up front, perhaps a different brand with a low fs. After that i'll just live with however it sounds for now. all it shows me are a list of dealers, non of which have an actual site i can order from, the only one with a site has shop info only. but i'm intrigued by their claims, just can't find any i can actually order. been googling and nothing.
