# '04 Mitsubishi Lancer Ralliart - First Build Log



## strakele

I'm now on the 4th and best iteration of my 2004 Mitsubishi Lancer Ralliart build, and I figured I'd share it with you guys. It's nothing fancy, just a solid build with good equipment that I think will sound really good when it's done.

Quick info about the car:

The Ralliart is the step down from the Evo. It's got a bigger motor, better suspension, better transmission, and some cosmetic upgrades as compared to a normal Lancer. No turbo, no AWD. It's got a 110a alternator, and came with an Infinity system with speakers in the doors and rear deck, tweeters in the A-pillars, and an 8 inch sub in the trunk all powered by a small amp under the drivers seat. I started last year with a pair of Alpine Type R 10's, a Kenwood amp, and an Alpine deck. I later changed out the front and rear speakers with Alpine Type S components and coax's, and then finally added a 4 channel amp. I also ran a set of bi-wired Boston SPZ60's for a while.

This semester at college, I decided it was time for a revamp, so here goes:

One of the only things staying is the Alpine CDA-9884 head unit. I chose this deck because of Alpine's great iPod interface, good price, features I wanted, and it almost looks like it SHOULD be there. I like to keep things low key - I didn't want it to be painfully obvious I have any kind of stereo mods. The 9884 matches the color of my interior almost perfectly, and the ability to make the blue buttons light up red matches the rest of the gauges in my car as well.










iPod cable runs to the glove box:










In the daylight, the red LED behind the blue buttons makes them a little purple, but whatever.










The 9884 is also one of the first series to support Alpine IMPRINT, so I picked up one of these processors for EQ, time alignment, and active crossovers. I haven't bought the tuning kit to run Audyssey's MultEQ, but I may at some point. After trying a couple different spots, Ryan (slade1274) helped me pull the head unit and install the processor behind the glove box. (And by helped, I mean I basically watched him do it, then went to wire and install the subs.) I had never pulled my dash before, so it was a great learning experience for me, especially since I had to pull the deck myself a few hours later to flip the 3 little switches on the bottom of the head unit that allow it to do important things like PRODUCE SOUND when the processor is added. Alpine just forgot to tell anyone about them.


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## strakele

I listen mostly to rock and metal, so I wanted a mid that could really pound out the midbass. Typically drivers that can do this tend to give up some upper midrange, so I needed a tweeter that could be crossed low. I didn't want to have to fiberglass pods for large format home tweeters. I considered the Image Dynamics NX30 and XS28, but I finally decided on the Seas Neo textile dome (Prestige 27TFFNC/G) from Madisound for their great price, low Fs, and the fact that everyone here loves them. I'm planning on high-passing them at 2.5KHz with a 12 or 18dB slope.

They're screwed on to the stock tweeter bracket via a hole that Ryan drill pressed in for mounting purposes. They just barely fit behind my A-pillars. They're aimed just behind the dome light.


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## strakele

I also wanted a pair of subs with really good transient response for the type of music I listen to. I scored a pair of brand new Image Dynamics IDQ12v3's from dman for a great price. They're installed in the ID recommended enclosure of 1 cubic foot per sub. No polyfill as of now, may add some later. Just a standard sealed enclosure made of 3/4" MDF. I just wish the terminals were on the back rather than on the sides. 

I haven't decided what I'm going to do for a grill yet, but I'll figure something out because the rifle cases have to fit back there for range days. Also, I can already tell I'm going to need more sound deadening in my trunk. I feel like these suckers could easily shake my car apart if I let them.










The box for the IDQ's says 450W RMS, the manual says 500W, and somewhere on the ID site (or maybe it was woofersetc, I don't remember) it says 750W RMS. So I figured I'd get an amplifier that has plenty of power for when I want/need it. I decided on the Clarion DPX 11551 class G/H amp and picked up a brand new one from KnightWhoSaysNI. Runnin' this bad boy at 2 ohms for around 1500W, not that I'll ever really need that much 



















The factory Infinity sub used to be on the passenger side in the trunk, where you see the small area that isn't carpeted. Not sure what I'm going to do about that yet, but I thought it was kinda lame that Mitsubishi didn't feel the need to carpet under it.










Since I know someone will ask, my previous mono amp took two 4ga power and ground wires instead of a single 1/0. That's why you see two power/ground leads coming from the amp. Overkill? Probably. But I have the wire already run and it saves me from buying a new distribution block and fuses. Works all the same  Thanks again to Ryan for the heat-shrink tubing.

Also, I took out the speakers in the rear deck like most people do to let more bass through. After listening (albeit with only tweeters and subs) I think I'm going to seal off the holes, either with a speaker or MDF or Damplifier or something. I guess I just like the subs to be sealed off from the cabin.


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## strakele

Powering the mids and tweeters is an MB Quart DSC4125. Powerful, solid amp. This is the other component that's staying from my previous install. It had a tiny bit of noise, but I'm hoping that with the 4V output of the Imprint processor vs the 2V output of my deck, it will be cleared up. The amp is mounted on the back of the fold down rear seat.



















I did some more work organizing the wires after I took these pics, so it looks a little better now.

Once I get the new mids in, the Monster 4-conductor wires will be cut to the proper length. There's an old 9-con wire there too which used to carry the power for the Alpine front and rear speakers, but that has been replaced with the thicker gauge Monster cable. The only reason it's still there is for the remote turn on lead. I didn't feel like ripping it out simply to run a single remote wire, so it's probably going to stay for the forseeable future. Both sets of wires were run by shops. I was kinda pissed - when Car Toys installed the 4 channel, they dented the decorative top plate. I might just take that off later.


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## strakele

That's all for now. I'll get some pictures of the better wiring tomorrow, and this coming weekend I should be able to mount the mids and get pictures of the whole door install.

Any comments or suggestions welcome. Another big thanks to Ryan (slade1274) in Lawrenceville, GA for the help with the install and having a well stocked garage full of tools and install hardware.


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## JediMentality

Looking pretty solid, but, did I miss it, or did you not mention what mids you plan on using?


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## strakele

You didn't miss. I haven't said yet (partly cause I'm not quite sure). I actually have 2 pairs coming in to try out, and I'll post plenty of pics then


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## strakele

Here's a couple quick pics of the better wiring. 










I ran the mono amp RCA's behind a trim panel instead of alongside the amp with the speaker wire. 










Added a couple more zip ties here and there so everything is tight and secure around the distribution block. 










Don't mind the staples in the carpet flap thing, that will be replaced with velcro. Just had to make sure that idea would work.










And here's how much trunk I have left.


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## strakele

Both pairs of mids should be in on Friday, so I'll get to show them off then, as well as the install.

That's all for now. As always, comments and suggestions welcome.


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## bigguy

looks good so far. i would suggest cleaning up the install a little bite, but thats not a SQ issue


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## strakele

What exactly would you recommend doing?


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## bigguy

Make an amp rack to hold both amps, so that you could hide all the wiring. the easiest way i could think of would be mounting a board over the pass through, that is set back far enough so that you could still put the seat up and mount the amps there,if it will fit. and drill holes just big enough to pass the wires through. if you get really ambitious then you could make a wall for the sub box so it extends to the sides of the trunk.


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## strakele

I don't think I quite visualize what you're describing. I'd like to do an amp rack at some point though.

When the rear seats are folded up like normal, the only wires that aren't completely hidden are those going to the mono amp. Looking into the trunk from the outside, you just see them disappear behind the enclosure. Once I get the mids installed and the speaker wire cut to length, the only thing you'll really be able to see when the back seats are folded down is the distribution block and the wires going up to the mono amp. The RCA's pop out from the passenger side, and the power wires from the driver's side. It's mostly covered with carpet until the come out to connect to something.

A wall would look pretty cool, but it's nice to be able to stick stuff in the nooks and crannies in the trunk. One of the goals of this install was to not give much, if any, up in terms of functionality. No kick panels, no removing the spare tire to make an enclosure, no taking up the whole trunk with subs. I drive cross country every semester so I need my storage space too


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## bigguy

allow my crappy MS paint job to try and help









the red would be the amps, and the out line is what you are looking at in your picture. it probably does not make much sense, sorry. if dont want a wall on the sub box you could build one on the back of the amp rack to hide all the wires.


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## strakele

And are you suggesting attaching this to the enclosure or the rear seats or what?


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## bigguy

to the back wall of the trunk. its really more of a "for show" type of thing. It wont make it sound any better so its really not that big of a deal.


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## strakele

Yeah I know. Appreciate the suggestion. Something to mess with this summer. Just kinda tough cause there's not a lot of room back there. I have the sub enclosure bolted in as far back as it will go in the trunk to maintain as much space in front of it as possible.


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## redcalimp5

Looks good, man. I've always liked the Ralliarts.


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## strakele

Thanks. I really like this car. I love the way the shifter feels compared to my sister's Mazda 3 and the Miata my dad used to have. I think it looks good too.

Wouldn't mind it being faster though. Oh well - I'm putting my money into audio instead of engine mods. 




[for now]


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## slade1274

I smell a test spin in the STi this weekend......


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## strakele

Mmm sounds good to me. I also want to hear those new tweeters


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## strakele

Alright, so I finally got the install finished since the mids got here today.

I'm using a pair of Usher 8945A 7 inch speakers that I got new from norcalsfinest. For those that don't know, they're a ridiculously low distortion driver sold on PE for about $100 a pop. They're supposedly very similar to Scans that are twice the price.

Anyway, I wish I had taken pictures of these things before I installed them, but I was too excited to get them installed. The magnet on these things is enormous. Each driver weighs about 6 pounds. They just barely fit, but just barely is all I need. 

The drivers are installed onto resin coated 1/2" MDF rings. They're fit into doors sealed and deadened with Damplifier, and non-hardening modeling clay all around the baffle. I don't really have many pictures of the deadening job since it was all done a long time ago. There's plenty of pics like that elsewhere on the forum.

Anyway, here's some pics.




















Here's the Usher compared to the previous Boston SPZ60's. The MDF baffle is the same diameter on the outside, so you can see the size difference.




















After plugging in some rough measurements for the time alignment and setting the crossovers, I let 'er rip.

Holy crap. It sounds great! Twice as good as what I had before. I'm very happy and impressed. I still have a bit of EQ, level matching, and T/A to do, but overall I'm very pleased.

Again thanks to Ryan Slade for the help with the install, the speaker rings, and letting me use up all his spade terminals


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## strakele

Quick pic of back seats now that all of the wires are cut to length and disappear nicely below the carpet.


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## tdiantonio

Looks good....glad to hear you enjoy the sound.


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## strakele

Thanks man.

Also, this is the second set of mids I bought while being impatient for the Ushers. They're a pair of Taiwanese made DVC 4 ohm 6.5 inch drivers that I got from ghostmechanic. We're not sure of the brand. If anyone recognizes what these may be, let me know. I'll be messing with these over the summer and comparing them to the Ushers.


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## strakele

I just recently installed some Second Skin Speaker Tweaker pads, so I thought I'd post an update.

No pics of the pads going in, but I do think they improved the sound coming from the door speakers. The music does sound cleaner.

Can't really say there's less distortion, because there really was none to begin with. These Usher speakers are amazing in that respect. I'm really happy with how good they sound. Even being 8 ohms and not crazy high sensitivity, they can get extremely loud off my MB Quart amp and they just never distort. 

While I was installing the pads, I did have to pull out the speakers so I decided to snap a few shots of the Usher 8945A compared to a 'normal size' 6.5" speaker since there aren't a whole lot of pics of the Ushers around here.

Usher on the left, random DVC 6.5" speaker on the right (and the magnet on this one isn't exactly small...)















































For anyone who can fit these suckers, there's really no reason not to look into the Usher drivers. This A version is just a normal cone, and there's also a P version with a phase plug. Even without the phase plug, these play fine to 2-2.5KHz in my car. I'm happiest with them crossed low at 63Hz and high at 2KHz, with the Seas tweeters crossed at 3.2KHz, all at 12dB/oct. Check out the woofers at Parts Express.


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## chrisb33

any pics of the whole car, motor and the ralliart trims? im so a mitsu guy 

chris b


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## alm001

That suggestion for a wall in front of, and behind the subs sounds like he wants you to have _less_ bass.

I'm not a fan of how the amps are mounted, but I would work on getting more of that bass into the cabin before dealing with the looks.

Good to hear you are enjoying those usher mids, I want to try those (or the 8's) out soon


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## strakele

I'll get some pics of the whole car when it quits raining.

I don't plan on doing a wall - or making basically any changes - at least for a while. I'm happy with how it sounds. The amps may not be ideally mounted, but it's functional and doesn't look bad, and didn't require days of fab work or hundreds of dollars for a custom install. And believe me, PLENTY of bass can get into the cabin. I even reinstalled the old factory rear speakers to plug the holes.


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## strakele

Alright, I know I promised pics of the car months ago. I finally remembered to snap a few the other day with my phone after my girlfriend and I got it all cleaned and waxed after a clay bar treatment.





































I'll get some more better ones later and pics of the engine. I'm resurrecting this thread since I'll soon be receiving the new H-Audio AR duo, and will be installing them soon. I don't have an easy drop in spot for the AR3K's, so the most likely spot will be fiberglassed into the A-pillars. Not sure what I'd do about color or texture though, so I thought I'd get some input. 

They're grey right now:










Was thinking about doing black:










Just a real quick photoshop job to kinda get a feel for it. Could be painted, vinyl wrapped, fabric wrapped, etc. Not really sure at this point. The grey that they are now matched the roof lining, so it may look kinda weird to have a different color. Grey meets black at the dash, or grey meets black at the top of the pillar.

Thoughts, comments, suggestions? Still a few weeks away from doing this, just trying to get it more or less planned.


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## strakele

This Friday I'll be installing the 6's from the new Audible Physics AR Duo. I just got the set yesterday, and according to Mark, I'm the first customer in the world to get them!

Here's some pics for now, more when I install them.


The AR6K:



















The AR3K:



















The Duo:




























The 3's will most likely be glassed into the A-pillars once I determine how I want them aimed. This is my first time playing with a midrange/wideband driver, so I'm pretty excited. Also very interested to see how they compare to the current Usher/Seas setup, which really sounds great.

I finally got the Alpine Imprint software working last weekend, and so far I really like the results. There is a definite improvement in clarity and feeling of space. The soundstage moved up about a foot, and forward about 2 feet. Some funky stuff too though. No matter where I set the gains to start, after an Imprint run, my Alpine headunit maxes out volume to the speakers at 25 out of 35, leaving some more to be desired for softer recordings. After reading the whole Imprint thread here, I see lots of people complain about a lack of bass. This is true to an extent. A few steps down from the current max of 25 on the volume, say 22 or so, there is definitely a need for more bass. However, at least in my system, the subwoofer volume does not stop at 25 as it does for the speakers, but keeps increasing all the way up to 35. So basically, the last 10 notches of the volume control have become a bass control. Maxed out at 35, you could never complain about not enough bass. It is a little bit cool to basically be able to control the bass level without going through other settings, but the downside is that normal speaker volume has to be maxed out before you get to that point. Sometimes it's ok, sometimes it's annoying. I'll play with it more this weekend and see what I can figure out.

As for the Usher/Seas combo that I'm theoretically about to replace, (assuming I like the new Audible Physics stuff more, and probably will, given the rave reviews of the XR's) I'd like to say some more about them. There's quite a bit here on DIYMA about the Seas Neo textile dome tweeter, so I don't have a whole lot to add. I think it's pretty great. Very low distortion, can be crossed quite low for a small format tweeter, good power handling, easy to fit where larger ones won't, and it's only 30 bucks. In my setup, I have them crossed at 3.2KHz. There isn't a whole lot of info out there about the Usher 8945A however. It's also a fantastic speaker that continues to impress me. It's huge, as you can see from the pictures I posted earlier, but if you can fit it, it's great. Lots of people compare them to Scans. I don't have a huge list of speakers that I've heard to compare to, and I'm not going to try for all the adjectives used to describe sound. The best way I can describe them is that they did everything I ever asked them to do without a complaint. No distortion. No mechanical noise. Nothing bad. The only other set of high end speakers I used before this were Boston SPZ60s. The Bostons get the edge in bass response due to their huge excursion, and I could get a really great snare drum crack from them as well. They distorted and ran into some mechanical noise at high volume though, so I sold them. The Ushers are pure and clean up to the limit. Or my systems' limit anyway. They're 8 ohms, so I only have about 65W to them, but they got more than loud enough for me, and always sounded great doing it. Even the version without the phase plug plays fine to 2-2.5KHz in my setup. Highly recommended.


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## Melodic Acoustic

strakele said:


> This Friday I'll be installing the 6's from the new Audible Physics AR Duo. I just got the set yesterday, and according to Mark, I'm the first customer in the world to get them!


Well not the world in the USA. A few of our Asian counterparts had them first.


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## strakele

Ah, well, first in the US is cool too!

Can't wait to get these installed tomorrow.


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## strakele

So yesterday started a full weekend of working on car audio stuff with my girlfriend.

On Friday, I deadened the trunk hatch and underside of the rear deck with some black Damplifier. I held off on this for a while since I didn't want the shiny silver foil all over places where it's highly visible. From a few feet back, you can hardly tell it's there:



















(Atlanta people, recognize the house in the background?)



So yeah, we were up at Ryan's place, since he was helping to install a new 4 channel amp in my girlfriend's '05 Monte Carlo. After that, we went back to my place to deaden her trunk and doors. Not a whole lot of pics, but check out the obnoxiously huge gaping hole in these doors, complete with the door mechanism going through it, so you can't just plug it with a chunk of plexi or something:




























Not to mention, Chevy put the releases for the plugs to the window and lock controls at the absolute worst angle possible, making it nearly impossible to get the door panel disconnected from the car.


Anyway, back to the Lancer. Ryan made some new MDF baffles, and I painted them with several coats of black to seal them from moisture. By the time I finally got all this stuff done, it was getting dark, but I wanted to get the car back together for the night, so excuse the low light pics.

Also, here's the Second Skin Speaker Tweaker pads that I installed last time:



















AR6K installed:




























I used 8 screws for them.. just took a step back to take some pics while there were only 4.


Today I planned on tuning the system, but ended up spending the whole day trying to get a rattling issue with the subs fixed and adjusting all the DSP features on the Kenwood KAC-X4R in the Monte Carlo. Also working on dressing up the interior a little bit. Will post pics of that when it's done.

Tomorrow I'll be actually listening to the new AR's and doing some tuning. I'll also run the Imprint auto tune a few times and see what that comes up with. Can't wait to see how they compare to the Ushers. They have some big shoes to fill.. literally and figuratively.


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## myhikingboots

Wow great work. Can't wait to read your review of the AR's.


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## strakele

First off, I apologize for not having more to say about the AR's at this point. As you can see I have them installed and first impressions are good, but I haven't had time to devote to tuning yet. I ran the Imprint, but judging by the files it produced, it chose a 40Hz crossover point for the AR6K's, so I haven't really cranked it for obvious reasons.

Here's what I have been working on recently. The two things that started this were that the shift knob in my car was scratched to hell, and the 2 trim pieces on the dash that have a soft touch carbon fiber-esque paint on them scratch if you look at it wrong, so I wanted to refinish them both. My girlfriend also wanted to do some carbon fiber accents in her car, so we ordered some 3M Di-Noc carbon fiber vinyl. She got black, I got graphite. We tried it on some of the dash in her car, and on a couple other little things to get the feel for it:










The shift knob was aluminum colored which looked really nice, but there was nothing else in the car that matched it, so when I refinished the knob, I also did the trim ring around the base of the boot. Also notice the carbon fiber ring around the base of the knob:



















You can see the AR6K through the grill in the door panel on that last one.

Today the graphite colored carbon fiber came, so I got to work and finished up the two trim pieces. 

The smaller on the left side of the dash:



















Compared to the black:










And then the bigger piece:





































I think it came out about as perfect as I could do it. I'm very happy with the changes. They're subtle, but I think they add a nice touch.

More thorough review of the AR's coming.


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## myhikingboots

Top notch on the carbon fiber. Are you thinking about competing with your car?


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## slade1274

Great work on the Di-Noc... it's not too bad to work with as long as you can heat it a bit.


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## strakele

Thanks guys. It is pretty neat stuff, and I was lucky that the pieces I wanted to do didn't have any super difficult areas.

I hadn't really planned on competing with my car, but I suppose it's not out of the realm of possibility once I get it dialed in just right.


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## strakele

Some quick thoughts about the AR6K:

So far they sound great. They're just mated to my Seas tweeters right now until I have Ryan fiberglass the 3's into my A-pillars. Crossed low at 63 and high at 2Khz. They're warm and detailed, a bit more than the Ushers I had in there previously. Not as much low frequency extension, but those were true 7's, so it's understandable since these are smaller. So far, it's just been my tuning with the PXA-H100 processor. The Imprint software keeps it too quiet for me, but I used the measured response graph it produced for my car to do some EQ, and I'm pretty darn pleased. They get loud and maintain their clarity very well. They have a nice snap to them, and again, I like the detail. Once I get an Imprint run that I'm happy with, I'll post more, since it really did a great job of improving the soundstage and sense of space, but so far, even without it they sound very good. I can't wait to hear them with the AR3K's and see what the Duo can really do together. Will hopefully be happening in the next few weeks.


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## myhikingboots

I'm really interested in the AR3k's, and I almost got in on the deal, but was just too skeptical at the time. I hope you get those A-pillars done sooner than later!


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## strakele

So I've still been dealing with some vibrations around my rear deck, so after checking out some other Lancer build logs and seeing how to get it apart, I took the cover off my rear deck to do some more deadening. Used up the remainder of my black and silver Damplifier plugging up holes that pressurized air from the subs must have been shooting through and vibrating everything.

Also I haven't mentioned it before, but a while ago I installed those DVC speakers I posted at the top of this page in my rear deck. They're wired in series for an 8 ohm load, and connected to the same channels as my front speakers on the amp. All I have to do is open the trunk and connect one wire to each of them when I have rear seat passengers. Just for grins, back when I had the Ushers in there, I ran the Imprint with the rear speakers connected as well. Running off the same amp channels, I figured it would have no idea what to do, but I was amazed at how much it was able to move my soundstage forward. Pretty impressive.

Anyway, here's some pics from today (which turned into tonight by the time I was done.)

Tried to seal up every hole. This doesn't block bass from getting into the cabin, just helps keep stuff from vibrating.










Rear speaker on 1/4" MDF baffle with non hardening modeling clay around it to help further stop vibrations.










Mat back over the Damplifier.



















This worked helped quite a bit. I think it's about time for a new sub enclosure though. This one is from eBay...

I'm considering changing to a single high power 15" sub that's not ridiculously deep and building a long shallow box across the whole trunk to free up some space, and then doing a proper amp rack. Also will start playing with the AR3K's this weekend. It'll be nice to see what kind of midbass the AR6K's can dish out once they're not being asked to play up to 2.5KHz.


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## strakele

Also, I'm realizing I don't have a lot of before and after pictures for all this, so here's just one of the small trim piece that I wrapped with the carbon fiber stuff.

Before:










After:










As you can see, the old finish was more grey than black, so I'm glad I went with the graphite colored carbon fiber instead of black. Here's a pic from by practice run using the black CF. I think it would have made the dash too dark.










All for now.


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## strakele

Tonight I finally got an Imprint run that I'm pretty happy with. It's still quieter, and the last 10 volume notches is still only bass volume, but whatever. It really sounds good. I want to get it so it's the volume I want around 20 or 25 so I don't have to crank it up as much. I get some noise floor issues when the volume is maxed out.

I've said it before but it bears repeating, the AR's are detailed. I heard a thing or two that I hadn't heard in my music before tonight. Didn't mess with it for way too long since it's already really late and I have class in the morning, but I like what I heard. Mark has said that the AR3K's are also very detailed, so I'm definitely looking forward to hearing the Duo play together.

I think I'm going to take that black rubber mat out of the rear deck. It doesn't really serve a purpose and I think that is causing some vibrations. I'm super picky with vibrations. For some reason, A/C noise, road noise, engine noise, etc. don't bother me too much, but the slightest vibration drives me crazy.


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## strakele

I'm posted most of this in the AR Duo review thread, but I wanted to post my initial impressions of the AR Duo here as well.

Tonight I tried out the whole AR Duo with the 3K's magnetized to my A-pillars and towels stuffed around them, aimed about how I plan to have them when they're glassed into the pillars.

Left side:










When they're installed for real, they won't be aiming quite this low.










This was just how they wanted to sit, using the 3K's magnet to stick to the frame.










Right side:




















I don't miss tweeters at all either. They sound great. It took a song or 2 to get used to having so much of the sound coming from one place, but it's really very neat. 

I started out with the AR6K's crossed low at 63Hz / 24dB and high at 315Hz / 12dB, and the AR3K's crossed low at 315Hz / 24dB. I later bumped the LPF of the woofers up to 500Hz to get some more drum attack out of the bigger cones.

Then I ran the Imprint auto tune software in my car and listened to a whole lot of stuff. The soundstage has a great height and had a more open feeling than I was expecting after reading about people still wanting to add tweeters to add that bit of airy-ness to the top end. I was impressed. I can definitely see why people say the 3K's sound great on strings - I definitely agree. Acoustic guitar, electric guitar, or an orchestra sound very detailed and lifelike.

I need to re-run the auto tune with all the EQ and levels turned flat, since I'm not sure if it takes any of it into account when it runs.. sometimes it seems like it does. I'm also going to try a HPF of 250Hz for the AR3Ks.

So far with just a quick tune and some towels stuffed behind them, I'm definitely liking how the AR3K's sound at the base of my A-pillars, and the AR6K's in my doors. Can't wait to get them installed for real. That'll be happening in 2 weeks, probably along with a more compact subwoofer system.


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## myhikingboots

Sweet! Man it must be some sort of torture to have to wait! I just saw "It Might Get Loud," on Blu-ray and I highly recommend it to anyone with any interest in the electric guitar or just guitar playing in general. Anyway it just added more pain to my own torture, until I can start building my own system. Maybe I can afford to sound deaden my doors... that’s a start.


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## strakele

Heh, yeah I can't wait to get this all done. And hey, deadening is definitely a good place to start..


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## strakele

Big updates coming next week. AR3K's in pillars, new subs/enclosure, new amp mounting.

In the meantime... recommend photo hosting with more bandwidth?


----------



## brocken

I use photobucket. I've had the account for years and tons of photo's and still haven't run out of free space.

Where's the pics man! I want to see your AR's in the pillars. 
What subs did you change to?


----------



## strakele

Yeah, I'm not out of space... just bandwidth. I guess I just need to make my pictures smaller so every time someone opens this thread it's not trying to download megs and megs of pictures.

Spring break starts end of next week... that's when all the work will be done.

Highly considering a pair of Dayton HO 12's in a shallow ported enclosure that extends all the way across the trunk. Haven't for sure made up my mind though... but I need to very soon.


----------



## hottcakes

i've used lookpic.com for some pictures, only since i don't upload much. i suppose a drawback may be that there is no account or anything. nor is there a way to see the links to your pics again so you would need to either copy and paste them all to a text file of some sort or take a screen shot and label appropriately. 

at the top of the page it says its for torrent sites, but on the bottom it lists several others. they claim no bandwidth limiting or deleting of pics. as far as i can remember all the pics i've uploaded are through that site.


----------



## strakele

Hmm, I just resized all my stuff so hopefully once it resets on Saturday, my bandwidth should last longer. I do like being able to log in and mess with stuff..


----------



## strakele

Alright, last update before everything is done. This weekend I'll be leaving the car at Ryan's to have a bunch of work done. This will mainly include modding the A-pillars to hold the AR3K's, and building a new custom sub enclosure for a pair of new Dayton HO 10's. This will be my first ported enclosure, so I'm pretty excited.

Some final prep work I did: 2 layers of closed cell foam in the rear deck. This has continuously been a source of rattles at certain frequencies in my car, so I'm hoping the damplifier combined with the foam will stop it. It's compressed pretty tight now and seems solid, so I have high hopes.

Covered the rear deck:



















And the cover:


----------



## aeon

Sweet, can't wait to see the finished a-pillars.


----------



## Mic10is

If Ryan is rebuildin the entire Apillar, save those apillar tweeter grills and I'll buy them from you


----------



## strakele

Nah, it's just gonna be glassing them into the stock A-pillars. They're all one piece, with the tweeter grills molded in.


----------



## strakele

Alright, it's finally done! This evening I picked up the car from Ryan after having the AR3K's mounted in the A-pillars and a new ported enclosure built for the Daytons. While I was there, we made a new floor for the trunk to mount the mono amp on while still enabling access to the spare. 

Build pics will come tomorrow or whenever he sends them to me, and I'll put up several pictures of my own as well. But for now, all I can say is it sounds great. After finally getting a solid Imprint run (the damn thing keeps throwing errors at me) I went through my usual demo tracks and can definitely say this is the best sounding version of my system to date. More details to come, it's late and I have class in the morning, but for now I just want to say I'm extremely pleased. And another thanks to Ryan for the great work.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

strakele said:


> Alright, it's finally done! This evening I picked up the car from Ryan after having the AR3K's mounted in the A-pillars and a new ported enclosure built for the Daytons. While I was there, we made a new floor for the trunk to mount the mono amp on while still enabling access to the spare.
> 
> Build pics will come tomorrow or whenever he sends them to me, and I'll put up several pictures of my own as well. But for now, all I can say is it sounds great. After finally getting a solid Imprint run (the damn thing keeps throwing errors at me) I went through my usual demo tracks and can definitely say this is the best sounding version of my system to date. More details to come, it's late and I have class in the morning, but for now I just want to say I'm extremely pleased. And another thanks to Ryan for the great work.


Glad your enjoy the system, can't wait to see the pics.


----------



## slade1274

I'll go ahead and put in the pics with fabrication commentary, I don't have the carpeted box nor the pillars with the grills installed as they are quite a tight fit and didn't want to remove them to show off the drivers at the reveal. I'm sure Grayson can add a few pics once he places the grills.
Right, now the commentary:

First needed some rings. Grayson wanted to have grills, so the rings are 3 pieces, the mounting ring, the recess ring, and the one for the grille cloth.


































As they are HUGE and have the magnet from a 7” driver, I couldn’t use them mounted for mock up. The magnet kept pulling to the sheet metal- so I had to simulate the driver on the baffle.


----------



## slade1274

Then covered them with cloth:









Test fit

















Resin Coat









Then did some layers of fiberglass to make sure they were solid to hold these drivers.


----------



## slade1274

Drilled holes round perimeter to ensure solid mating to the pillars and poured in a couple small batches of duraglass milkshake

















Filled and sanded (yes, great day- sorry about the sun)









Covered in black vinyl and used some Back to Black product to match the shine of the dashboard

























Despite what the shooting angle of the pictures may imply, they are both aimed across at the opposite window, about 4 inches behind the sail panel at ear level.

Grayson will shoot some pics of the grills inserted. They are flush mount and covered in black material to hide the drivers.


Next: Box


----------



## slade1274

Grayson spec'd a box that was in line with Chad's recommendations for the Dayton HO 10" sub, but double it. We went with a 1.4 ft^3 volume tuned to ~29cycles. Port mach was a challenge with this, but I was able to go with a pair of 3 x 2" ports and achieve a mach of ~.13 at 20 cycles- something he probably won't get down to often to observe the ~150fps in the port. At the tuning frequency it is below a .1 mach.

Wedge shape to match the seat angle of ~18^. 3/4" MDF with center brace to reduce box resonance that could play with tuning frequency.



























































It was wrapped in trunk matching charcoal carpet, but PIC FAIL once again.... my typical MO.

Also finished with a pigtail wire and an Anderson PowerPole connector.


----------



## JayinMI

I use Powerpoles on my RC cars, and Deans connectors on my speaker wires.
Nice job on the box. For my Dayton's I went with .605 (+port and displacement), tuned to like 33Hz. Port mach stayed pretty low, bass stays up front most of the time (unless I'm cranking it...and then I don't care  ),
My port was 10x12.5x46...

Jay


----------



## bertholomey

Great job with the pillars! Those ARs are great looking drivers. I really hope to hear a set at some time in the future. 

I bet that Dayton's will sound fantastic in that box - if I didn't like my IB sub so much.....of course that box would take up every bit of my trunk.

Fantastic work!


----------



## boricua69

very nice lancer; i have one of those and modify everything. you can see the thread LANCER RALLY ART PROYECT.


----------



## strakele

Yeah man, I've been following your build log as well. I really like your door panels.



Anyway, here's a couple pics. I'll put up more tomorrow when I get the new trunk carpet cut, but for now, here's the box by itself:





































Nice and shallow, just how I wanted.



Now for a couple quick shots of the pillars with the grills.


----------



## strakele

Now for some before and after shots of the pillars.

Before:










After w/o grill:










After w/grill:











Other side:





























I think they look great and I'm very happy with them. The vinyl wrap is extremely close in color and texture to the dash and door panel.


----------



## strakele

New trunk floor pieces and amp mount. Not meant to be flashy, just functional, and allow spare tire access. Made with some spare 1/2" MDF Ryan had laying around.










Small piece just there for cargo support. Removes easily:










Larger piece with spacers for the amp can be easily pivoted up for quick access to spare tire and tools:










The wires will be zip tied and organized nicer when I have some more time.


No pics of the finished trunk till I cut the new carpet, but here's what the new enclosure looks like from inside the cabin.



















That blue power wire will be shortened so it's not just sitting there like that. By the time I was connecting everything up that night it was getting dark and I just wanted to get everything hooked up so I could hear it and make sure everything worked before I left Ryan's.


----------



## bertholomey

I agree on both counts - the pillars really came out well - fantastic job with the vinyl wrapping. The ported box looks really good as well - how do you like the sound with the two Daytons ported?

Are you going to Erin's?


----------



## JediMentality

Wow, I really like the pillars. i like how they aren't really that obtrusive and blend nicely into that corner. Excellent work. The sub box is nice too. I wish I tried a similar box design when I was running my Daytons. Listening impressions with the revisions?


----------



## strakele

I like the Daytons a lot. I wasn't sure about going back to 10s from the 12s I had, but the added efficiency of the ported enclosure makes up for it. In the model, they actually surpass the 12s in output up to around 50Hz. 

I also wasn't sure about going to a ported setup. All previous subs I had were sealed. For a while it was hard to get rid of the "ported boxes are boomier" idea, but I'm glad I did. The ported Daytons are loud, clean, and take up a lot less space. I don't think it's any less detailed and accurate than the IDQs, and it sounds much more solid now that theres no box flex. (the old sealed box was starting to leak..)

Yes I'm going to Erin's.

Unobtrusive and well blending is exactly what I was going for with the pillars, and it's exactly what I got. I wanted them to stick out as little as physically possible - no small feat with smallish sedan pillars and the deep, beefy AR3Ks, but Ryan did a great job with them and I'm very pleased.

Haven't had a lot of time to listen, but so far I love it. A combination of the solid new enclosure and the CCF in the rear deck got rid of basically all the rear rattles I had, so now bass sounds right up front. The pillars sound great how they're aimed, and having so much of the content being played above the dash is great for stage height and depth. The doors still need CCF and some more deadening, but overall I'm loving it.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Grayson, I love those pillars and the trunk. I saw those massive AR3Ks drivers when I went to pickup my car. I'm going to Erin's as well, I'm looking forward to getting a listen.


----------



## strakele

Alright, got the new carpet in for the most part and cleaned up some wires, so here are some pics. Weather was crappy today so low light in the parking garage..

Trunk before:










And trunk now:








































Wiring cleaned up a little. I'm either going to paint the metal bracket black or cover it with carpet.. not sure yet.




















Looks very unassuming, and takes up less space, leaving maximum cargo room and no subwoofer cones to worry about. I'm very happy with how the box came out. I'll probably post up some better pictures once Atlanta is no longer completely enveloped in a cloud.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Another job well done, Ryan. I continue to recommend anyone in the greater Atlanta area to come to your "shop".


----------



## wdemetrius1

Everything is much cleaner. Enjoy!!!


----------



## Mic10is

wdemetrius1 said:


> Another job well done, Ryan. I continue to recommend anyone in the greater Atlanta area to come to your "shop".


um, he moved to Tampa


----------



## strakele

wdemetrius1 said:


> Grayson, I love those pillars and the trunk. I saw those massive AR3Ks drivers when I went to pickup my car. I'm going to Erin's as well, I'm looking forward to getting a listen.


Glad you like them. I saw your car as a work in progress when I went to drop mine off. Seeing yours actually played a large roll in convincing me to go with black for my pillars rather than trying to find something to match the original light grey.


----------



## strakele

Mic10is said:


> um, he moved to Tampa


Not unless he packed up and moved everything in the past 48 hours


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Not unless he packed up and moved everything in the past 48 hours


Ok. hes moving to Tampa. I thought he started moving this week for some reason


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> Not unless he packed up and moved everything in the past 48 hours



Agreed.:laugh::laugh:


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> Glad you like them. I saw your car as a work in progress when I went to drop mine off. Seeing yours actually played a large roll in convincing me to go with black for my pillars rather than trying to find something to match the original light grey.




I'm glad that I was able to help. You have to see the finished product.


----------



## strakele

Alright, one last thing. Hope you guys don't think I'm crazy, but I swapped out the AR6K's for Peerless SLS 6.5's.

Allow me to explain. First, I'm a sucker for great midbass. That's one of the main things I've always been trying to improve since I first got into car audio. So now that I have the awesome wideband AR3K's, I'm finally able to do something I've wanted to do for a long time: use dedicated midbass drivers. The Peerless SLS 6.5's are regarded as some of the best midbass speakers you can get, especially for the money. They are, to the millimeter, the deepest speaker I can possibly fit in my doors without heavy modification.

Let me clarify... the AR6K's are awesome speakers. They have a very wide usable range, and are very detailed. They do not suck at midbass by any means, but they're not designed to play much lower than 80 or 63Hz with a steep slope. Which brings me to my main reason for this change:

I now use the Imprint processing. Say or think what you want about it, but it's what I have, and it's what I'm going to use until I get something better. It does a great job adding clarity and spaciousness to the music, making it less fatiguing, and making the stage higher and deeper. Things I simply cannot achieve with a 5 or 7 band EQ. However, one of the problems is that when using the software tune, the HPF for the midbass speakers is no longer user selectable. And for whatever reason it continues to think that 40Hz is a great crossover point. The AR6K's don't like this, and it doesn't surprise me one bit. They weren't made to play sub-bass frequencies. The Peerless SLS's were however - they'll take whatever I throw at them without complaining. Therefore, at least for now, the SLS's will be the dedicated midbass drivers in my doors.

Mounted to a black painted MDF baffle just the right thickness to keep the magnet off the window and keep the surround from hitting the door panel.




















Like I said, the AR6K's are not deficient in the midbass range, but just looking at my two other most recent speakers, they have some tough competition in the low frequency area. They're by far the most versatile, but for my current system, the new Peerless drivers thrive where almost any other 6.5 driver wouldn't.






























So there you have it. Once I get some CCF in the doors I should actually be done messing with it for a while. Future plans include an MS-8, H800, or similar processor that is more tweakable than my current one. But for now, I'm thoroughly happy with this setup.

Version 3.0 is just about complete. For reference, here's the changelog from previous versions:


----------



## bertholomey

I'm sure I would speak for at least one person 'out here' - you are not crazy at all. You used very sound reasoning for your decision, and the AR3K's provide you the opportunity to use the SLS's (that many have wanted to use, but really couldn't in a 2 way set up), and they will accomplish a goal in your system that the 6K's didn't. You were also cool to compliment the 6K's and endorse them to other people even though you are not using them in your system. 

I remember when I was using Imprint - it did some things extremely well, and others...not so much. I remember the snap of a snare was incredible - my installer at the time said he could never 'tune' for that using a normal processor, yet the midbass was non-existent. I hope the SLS's work out for you, and I look forward to hearing your car.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

I would have to agree with Jason and you sir, if the imprint is crossing the mid-bass down to 40hz, the Peerless SLS6 is the better choice as it is more of a woofer then a mid/bass unit. And man the SLS6 does dig deep. That is what i have liked about the SLS6 and SLS8. Seems like the imprint is trying to fill in a problem with mid-bass tuning by crossing lower. I have had the same issue with it myself before and have talked to some other people that has had the same issue with the imprint. 

I also feel not many 6.5-7" driver can match the SLS6 on the lowend, point blank no matter what the specs say. If it is a true mid/bass unit the SLS6 will more then likely kill it in upper sub-bass to lower bass range. 

Glad you found a driver that suites what your needs with your current setup and as long as you are smiling and enjoying your system that is all that matters. 

NOW GIVE Me my AR6K back!


----------



## slade1274

Mic10is said:


> Ok. hes moving to Tampa. I thought he started moving this week for some reason


Sorry Mic, we did drive down last weekend as the wife started the new job on Monday. I flew back to Ga to finish up some stuff and get the house ready to sell. I'll probably be around town till after Easter.


----------



## Mic10is

slade1274 said:


> Sorry Mic, we did drive down last weekend as the wife started the new job on Monday. I flew back to Ga to finish up some stuff and get the house ready to sell. I'll probably be around town till after Easter.


Ok so I get a partial credit for being right


----------



## strakele

Well damn, I guess I didn't hear Ryan mention he was moving. I'd better think of all the stuff I'll need for the next few months and get some last minute stuff!


----------



## slade1274

I thought you knew; but I guess that makes sense as Ally appeared surprised when when found out on Monday..... sorry bud.


----------



## strakele

Hah yeah I hadn't heard you say that before. Planning to do the same thing down there? I have a lot of family in Tampa. My uncle is starting to do some custom stuff on his 997. Not sure if stereo mods are in the plans, but we'll see.


----------



## slade1274

I'd like to, but we are looking into going the condo route so I would need to find actual shop space- which would be a good thing. We'll see how that all pans out once I'm down there.


----------



## strakele

Ah ok cool. Well good luck with that.


----------



## strakele

Trunk in daylight:










Old box vs new box:


----------



## bertholomey

That is a great before and after shot....and more output to boot.....win!


----------



## Vitty

Score, picked up your AR6K's! Can't wait to get them and see how they match up with my vehicle and setup.


----------



## strakele

Today I refinished my shift knob again. Mounted it to a drill and sanded it down and just left it bare metal, no more paint to get scratched. It looks really nice.

Then I painted the metal bracket that holds the sub box in place black. Forgot to take pictures, so I'll do that tomorrow.

Also in the process of painting the brake calipers red. Will have pics of this and the whole car after a good detail.

System sounds awesome right now. Can't wait to get my hands on an MS-8.


----------



## mcm308

Looks really good ! I can wait to get going with my Evo.


----------



## strakele

Couple updates:

Quick pic of new red brake calipers vs old:




















Black painted sub mount bracket:










But later decided that it looked better with a piece of carpet covering it running all the way across the opening. Agree?











But also... bad news. After I did that, I turned on some music and kept the back seats down to watch the subs move. However, I noticed they seemed to be firing out of sync with each other. As I got closer, I noticed the one on the right side of the car was making a kind of scratching noise. I pulled it out of the box and found that it wasn't working at all - it was only moving because of the pressure from the other one, acting like a passive radiator. I haven't really pounded on them very hard... trying to let them break in first. So I now have a dead sub and only 2 weeks till Erin's GTG. I sent it back to PE today, so hopefully I'll be able to get a replacement by then. 

Bleh.


----------



## slade1274

Sorry to hear that.... guess that 1550W at 2 ohms may in fact be accurate


----------



## strakele

I have no doubt it's accurate. But I don't think I was beating on them very hard. They're rated at 700 each anyway, so an extra 50W really shouldn't hurt..


----------



## Cruzer

the ho 10s are only rated for 600 watts, but even with the 1550 watts it shouldnt have been able to do any damage as long as u were smart.

did u have a SSF on?

i love the box, and the fact that u made them fit and look like an IB setup yet its ported!

plus u gained trunk space, no need for grills, etc.

i hope u get the replacement in before Erin's gtg, i wanna hear this setup!


----------



## strakele

Yeah that's right, the 10's are rated for 600. But still, the way the Imprint does gain/level matching, I don't think there should have been enough power to hurt them.

I run a 15Hz subsonic filter. Nothing I listen to comes anywhere close to that low though... it's all rock/metal.

And yeah, I love the way the new enclosure setup looks. Soooo much better than before.


----------



## brocken

Any more feedback on going to the SLS6 from the AR6K?
I love my AR3K's too and wouldn't think of replacing them but I do find myself looking for more midbass punch.
The SLS doesn't look too much deeper... just that button on the magnet.
Hows the kick response and low end detail? What power are they getting in your final build?
Do they blend well with the AR3K?

p.s. seeing your progress is getting me motivated to finish up some details on my car. Got side tracked fixing my old terd Bronco.


----------



## strakele

With the sub being blown, I haven't spent a whole lot of time tuning. However, it did give me an opportunity to listen to the system with just speakers and no subs playing.

There really is a substantial difference in midbass/bass response between the AR6K and the SLS. The SLS has huge excursion and woven tinsel leads, so they don't make any mechanical noise no matter what I throw at them. With the AR3K's playing such a wide range, the SLS's only have to worry about bass, and they do it well.

With the bumped back plate, they are quite a bit deeper than the AR's but if you can fit them, then cool. Kick response is very good (and is one of the most important things to me). With the Imprint tuning, the kick is well centered and punchy. You'd probably think I had a nice sealed 10" subwoofer. Bass guitars sound good and there is clear separation between a bass slap and a kick drum. Drums in general are great. The toms in the beginning of Down with the Sickness by Disturbed or Trust by Megadeth are very impressive. The SLS's are getting 125W from my MB Quart DSC 4125.

I do think they blend well with the AR3K. I think one of the virtues of the AR3K playing such a wide range is that it makes it pretty easy to blend. I currently have somewhat funky crossover settings - the 3K's are highpassed at 250Hz with a steep slope, and the SLS's are lowpassed at 500 or 615Hz (if I remember right, I just upped it to 615 to test) in order to get some more of the drum attack from the larger cone, while still staying within the SLS's usable range.

I spent a while a day or two ago just listening to Dream Theater's Systematic Chaos album with no subs, and was very impressed. Image was nice and centered, stage was high, and the sound was very open and clear. This is a very dynamic album. Several songs have slow, soft intros where you can really hear the detail in cymbal taps and the guitars. Drums and bass guitar are very punchy and aggressive and sound highly realistic. Vocals also sound very real thanks to the 3Ks and image well too.

Really hoping I get my sub back by next week. And glad I could be some motivation! It's been pretty easy to make good progress on this stuff, mostly with having the fabrication work done while I was on spring break, but my girlfriend is awesome and into car audio and cars in general as well, so we basically spend every weekend working on our vehicles.


----------



## brocken

You're lucky you have a gf that shares your interest. My wife is really supportive about my hobbies and helps me when my daughter is sleeping.

Thanks for the feedback on the SLS and the comparison. The AR6K sound great but they don't have enough 'feel' for me. Kick is super important to me too. Followed closely by a good bass guitar.

I'm just wondering if the 90watts per channel from my Rainbow amp will be enough to get the same 'feel'. That, and I'm scared to see if they'll fit in my doors. The Impreza doors aren't roomy either. 2.75" mounting depth is about as deep as they go without doing a bunch of modding.


----------



## strakele

Sounds like we have similar tastes. I think 90 watts should be good to get them moving, then I suppose you could add more if you really wanted it. Going from 90 to their rated 150 wouldn't give you a whole lot of gain.

I had to space these so the magnet is like 1mm away from the window when it's rolled down and trim every last bit of unnecessary plastic from the door card to get them to fit and not hit the window or the door. It works with how it is right now. They are, to the mm, the deepest speakers I can fit. And if I really maxed out their excursion the surround may still be able to touch the door panel since it's quite tall.


----------



## slade1274

brocken said:


> The Impreza doors aren't roomy either. 2.75" mounting depth is about as deep as they go without doing a bunch of modding.


I think you're shooting low with that figure... you have room for ~1.5" of baffle ring on top of the inner door skin without risk of the door card. You may need to trim the plastic on the door card a bit, but that's easy enough to do....


----------



## strakele

I wish the Lancer doors were like that. I can't fit much more than .6" of baffle.


----------



## brocken

slade1274 said:


> I think you're shooting low with that figure... you have room for ~1.5" of baffle ring on top of the inner door skin without risk of the door card. You may need to trim the plastic on the door card a bit, but that's easy enough to do....


Nice! That's way improved over the early imprezas I had. My 2.75" SEAS were pushing it and that was with trimming the plastic door card.

Good point on the power strakele. 90-150 isn't even doubling it. I could even sneak another amp in there at a later date. Wife understands the mid swap but would kick me if I said I need another amp now.
I'm surprised how cheap the peerless are. For that price I have no excuse not to try them.


----------



## voltij

Question: Are you running into any issue with the sub box?

I find it odd that not only are the sub and port not on the same plane, but the subs are firing into the cabin and the port into the trunk.

Wouldn't you be almost better off with sealed at this point?


----------



## slade1274

voltij said:


> Question: Are you running into any issue with the sub box?
> 
> I find it odd that not only are the sub and port not on the same plane, but the subs are firing into the cabin and the port into the trunk.
> 
> Wouldn't you be almost better off with sealed at this point?


the cabin is not sealed off from the trunk, so the cabin and trunk are effectively the vehicle interior; therefore, the subs and vents are firing into the same space.

As far as not on the same plane.... not critical

Just one example:
HSU VTF-3 MK3 Subwoofer


----------



## strakele

brocken said:


> Good point on the power strakele. 90-150 isn't even doubling it. I could even sneak another amp in there at a later date. Wife understands the mid swap but would kick me if I said I need another amp now.
> I'm surprised how cheap the peerless are. For that price I have no excuse not to try them.


$102 shipped to your door for some of the best dedicated mibass speakers is a steal for sure. If you can fit them, go for it.



voltij said:


> Question: Are you running into any issue with the sub box?
> 
> I find it odd that not only are the sub and port not on the same plane, but the subs are firing into the cabin and the port into the trunk.
> 
> Wouldn't you be almost better off with sealed at this point?


Well as I mentioned before, this is my first ported enclosure, so to be perfectly honest, I don't know if I'm missing something I should have with the box configured the way it is. That being said, even with the trunk being somewhat sealed from the cabin, I have more bass than I did with a pair of sealed 10s, and more low bass than the sealed 12s I just replaced. Going off the model, the IDQs I swapped out overtake the Daytons past around 50Hz, getting about 2dB louder. The current subs/enclosure sounds great, takes up much less space than either of the enclosures I had before, doesn't require a grill, looks better, allows access to my spare... just a huge overall improvement.

So I'd say no, the box works fine as is. With the depth requirements I imposed for the box, doing a port large enough to tune where I wanted and not have port noise was basically impossible.


----------



## strakele

Also, good news. My replacement subwoofer will be here Monday, so the whole system will be ready to go for the 16th at Erin's!


----------



## slade1274

strakele said:


> Also, good news. My replacement subwoofer will be here Monday, so the whole system will be ready to go for the 16th at Erin's!


*whisper* And I just got a package from Mark that should be installed by then too!!!


----------



## strakele

Cool, I'm interested to hear the XR's compared to the AR's.

Some stuff for this weekend...

I added hinges to my 2 piece trunk floor so it's not just 2 boards sitting there, and painted them black with paint I had laying around. Lighting does kinda funny things and shows spray lines, but it looks a lot better than the bare wood, and for something that's not visible basically 100% of the time, it's fine.



















Also, I found an MS-8 for a great price, so I had to pick it up. I mounted it next to the mono amp in the trunk under the floor. With the width of the tire well and leaving room for wires, it JUST BARELY fits. But just barely is all I need.



















Still need some short RCAs. I'll borrow some long ones for the GTG, but hopefully I'll be able to find some short ones for a reasonable price.

Also, the replacement Dayton HO got here today, so I'll be rockin' a full sub system this Saturday as well.


----------



## decibelle

How much clearance are you getting between the spare and the MS-8? Or are you going to put some CCF or some other padding in between the amp and processor later?


----------



## strakele

I'll probably put a layer of something in between for when I actually have stuff in the trunk and going over bumps.


----------



## strakele

Quick update cause I'm pretty excited.

Today Ryan CNC'd me a mount for the MS-8's display. It goes in place of the ash tray on my center console to easily allow messing with all the settings. I have a bunch of stuff in the glove box and storage under the arm rest, so I didn't want to put it in either of those places. It wouldn't fit in the actual ash tray that has a cover, so it's flush mounted with the rest of the console.

The piece was CNC cut from 1/2" MDF to fit exactly in the opening.










Wrapped in black 3M carbon fiber.










Display press fit and then lightly secured from the back.










And installed in the car. I'll get some better light pics tomorrow, but I'm really happy with how it turned out so I wanted to post it now.











Here's the tray before:










Hole:










After:










I'm really happy with how it turned out. I only got a bit of a listen with the new MS-8 today, but so far I'm really liking it. I'll have it all tuned up by the weekend.


----------



## Cruzer

beautiful


----------



## The Drake

Very nice stuff. I really like how you integrated the MS8 display there.

Wish I could make it to Erin's meet, but its just too far for me


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. I'm really happy with how it turned out. Will get more pics and hopefully some listening impressions this evening.


----------



## JayinMI

I really like that. Nice job.


----------



## strakele

Thanks. Didn't have time to get better light pictures today unfortunately. Was learning how to make RCA cables..


----------



## strakele

Ok, quick update for today.

New sub is in (has been in for a few days, actually), new shorter RCA's going to the MS-8, and trying to make all the carpet around the wires in the trunk look better. Also put the washers for the screws that hold the sub box in under the first layer of carpet so they're not visible.










Random shot of the passenger side SLS while I had the door apart.










And made some real short RCA's for my mono amp. The connectors I got from Ryan were too long for the clearance between the amp and the MS-8, so I got shorter ones for one that side, hence the two different connectors on the same wire.

First the short one. Just some simple set screws and it's done.



















Other end with multi-piece setup.










Solder it!










Clamped down. Also tried to get some heat shrink in there.










Done.











Also finished painting the brake calipers and started working on tuning. And of course managed to drain the battery while we were working on all this...


----------



## peg_legs

I was super impressed when hearing your car at Erin's. You may have convinced me to try the 3" Audible physics drivers in the A pillars and the Dayton HO 10's. Both were perfect for what I am looking for. Thanks again for the time alignment help too. If you ever need anything, let me know


----------



## Cruzer

very nice sounding car. two ported 10s off 1500 watts and it wasnt at all overpowering and very clean. well done


----------



## strakele

I really appreciate the compliments, guys.

Peg_legs, glad I could help. For a new system in your car, I think you chose some great drivers and it sounded good with no tuning. That little sub really impressed me. Does the sound and punch change at all when you close the ski pass? Once you get some vibration deadening in the car, it should be pretty great. Glad you liked the AR3K's. Using a wideband midrange will definitely help eliminate the issue you said you had about hearing multiple sources of the vocals.

Thanks Cruzer. Those little 10's are pretty impressive. Being ported, they can really get loud, but at normal levels they're easy to integrate and do sound very clean.


So after Mark's little tuning session, I'm going to lower all the crossover points a good bit and see how that sounds. Also, thanks to pionkej for the CLD, butyl rope, and MLV that'll be going in the doors to further reduce vibrations from the SLS's. I just gotta get some ensolite first. After that it should be pretty much good to go.

I was really expecting to be the low guy on the totem pole at Erin's meet, but everyone really seemed to like how the Lancer sounds, so I'm pretty thrilled. Has made me kind of start to consider throwing it in a competition every once in a while.


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> I really appreciate the compliments, guys.
> 
> Peg_legs, glad I could help. For a new system in your car, I think you chose some great drivers and it sounded good with no tuning. That little sub really impressed me. Does the sound and punch change at all when you close the ski pass? Once you get some vibration deadening in the car, it should be pretty great. Glad you liked the AR3K's. Using a wideband midrange will definitely help eliminate the issue you said you had about hearing multiple sources of the vocals.
> 
> Thanks Cruzer. Those little 10's are pretty impressive. Being ported, they can really get loud, but at normal levels they're easy to integrate and do sound very clean.
> 
> 
> So after Mark's little tuning session, I'm going to lower all the crossover points a good bit and see how that sounds. Also, thanks to pionkej for the CLD, butyl rope, and MLV that'll be going in the doors to further reduce vibrations from the SLS's. I just gotta get some ensolite first. After that it should be pretty much good to go.
> 
> I was really expecting to be the low guy on the totem pole at Erin's meet, but everyone really seemed to like how the Lancer sounds, so I'm pretty thrilled. Has made me kind of start to consider throwing it in a competition every once in a while.


I would completely agree with what peg legs and cruzer stated - I really liked the sound (and of course I liked the install, but I am biased ) Those AR's were wonderful, and as we discussed, perfect for your application. I was also impressed with the Dayton's -wonderful sound out of the ported enclosure - I'm glad they were able to get that replacement out to you before the meet. I really look forward to hearing the car again - I'll be down in Atlanta about once per month, so I'd like to see if we can meet up so I can get another listen.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

I really enjoyed listening to your car sir, it is very dynamic. I wish I would have spent i bit more time in it as I would us to lower the crossover point and see what would happen. But there where ours who want to listen and I didn't want to listen hog. LOL

Great job sir.


----------



## strakele

bertholomey said:


> I would completely agree with what peg legs and cruzer stated - I really liked the sound (and of course I liked the install, but I am biased ) Those AR's were wonderful, and as we discussed, perfect for your application. I was also impressed with the Dayton's -wonderful sound out of the ported enclosure - I'm glad they were able to get that replacement out to you before the meet. I really look forward to hearing the car again - I'll be down in Atlanta about once per month, so I'd like to see if we can meet up so I can get another listen.


Thanks! Shoot me a PM when you come down here next and I'll see if we can meet up. It should be sounding a bit better by then too 



Audible Physics said:


> I really enjoyed listening to your car sir, it is very dynamic. I wish I would have spent i bit more time in it as I would us to lower the crossover point and see what would happen. But there where ours who want to listen and I didn't want to listen hog. LOL
> 
> Great job sir.


Thanks Mark. I've been reading through some of the MS-8 threads and have a few more things to try today. Yesterday I tried lowering the crossover points and it did bring the bass forward more. I feel like I'm still missing some of the punch. But after some reading, I think I may have been running the calibration with the volume too loud - it seems most people get better and better results as they turn the volume of the test sweep signals down more and more.


----------



## mcm308

Did you have any issues with the woofers in the door being too close to the factory grill/panel? I got my panels back on yesterday and the Rainbow on a 3/8" spacer is a little too close for comfort. I was wondering if you had issues ?


----------



## strakele

Yeah, there definitely are clearance issues. I'm really jealous of all these cars I see where guys fit 1.5" baffles in their doors with no clearance issues.

I cut all of the plastic ring on the back of the door panel down and shaved off as much plastic as I could to get ~.6" baffles to fit.

This week I'm getting putting in some Rammat and Ensolite in the doors, so I'll take pictures of the back of the panels as well.


----------



## strakele

Just something really minor for this weekend.. I put a double layer of closed cell foam across the dash where it meets the windshield to kill a rattle I had there.










Waiting on some peel and stick ensolite to finish up my doors with more CLD, the ensolite, and a layer of MLV.


----------



## wdemetrius1

I can't wait to get another listen as well.


----------



## strakele

wdemetrius1 said:


> I can't wait to get another listen as well.


If you have time Tuesday evening, PM me.


----------



## strakele

Today was the first day of a 2 day door treatment. This first part was just adding more CLD, (Raammat this time, courtesy of John) to some open spots in the doors and removing the factory vapor barrier in preparation for Ensolite and MLV.

Door before:










After vapor barrier removed:










This little pocket used to fit around a piece of styrofoam on the door panel. Both are now removed.



















Full coverage:










Same treatment was done on the other side.

Tomorrow my order of peel and stick Ensolite should be here. A full sheet will go on the door, and probably quite a bit on the door card as well, with the MLV ending up sandwiched in between.


----------



## strakele

So after many hours, sunburns, and sore fingers, I think my doors are finally done.

For both sides, a sheet of MLV was cut to fit on the door:










The same pattern (but reversed) was traced and cut out of the Ensolite:










Ensolite stuck to back of MLV to go against the door:










Used Gorilla tape as per pionkej's idea to hold the piece in place, as well as the metal bracket for the door pull grip thing:










Also added the foam to spots on the door panel to compress against the MLV and sandwich it tightly:










And finally, added 4 more screws to hold my speaker baffles in place (the black ones are the new ones)










Upon listening, I don't notice any rattles or vibrations in the doors at all anymore. I think there is still at bit of resonance at a certain frequency, but it's only really noticeable if playing test tones. Overall, I'd say very successful day.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

great job sir!


----------



## strakele

Thanks Mark.. Can't wait to get this thing really tuned in!


----------



## strakele

Went down to Mark's yesterday for some tuning, and as he can attest, it sounds amazing. No door rattles, even when playing a stand up bass with the volume maxed. I'm very happy with how everything has turned out.


----------



## myhikingboots

Hey man sorry for the long absence, but I've been going through some personal turmoil that has taken most all of my attention for the last month or so. I was really impressed with your system at Erin's gtg, and had a few questions about your setup. For now I want to keep everything in the stock locations and was wondering about the mounting depth of the Peerless SLS woofers. They are listed at 84mm which converts to about 3 5/16", and I was wondering if you could comfirm that? Also curious about your crossover points since you had Mark do some retuning.

Sorry about the pics I took. I was really just taking some snap shots for install ideas. The pics you have posted are much better!

Chuck


----------



## strakele

Hey, sorry for the late reply, I've been at Air Force training for the past month.

The listed depth for the SLS's is accurate.

I'll have some major updates here in the next day or so. While I was gone Mark completely redid my trunk and I added a third amp. I'll let you know the final tuning specs when it's done.


----------



## myhikingboots

Hey awesome news. It's good to hear from you, and I can't wait to to find out more about your updates. I've been out of town working for the last 3 weeks, but I just bought my first amp and getting ready to start piecing together the modest first stage of my system. You''ll have to read about it in the design logs when I finally get around to posting about it. I'm actually considering ID 6x9's for the doors now, but worried that the mounting depth on them will be to deep. Also probably a lot more sound deadening to keep the vibration down will be a must.

Anyway thanks for the reply and what's this about Air Force training? Hope you're not headed over seas!

Chuck


----------



## myhikingboots

Hey awesome news. It's good to hear from you, and I can't wait to to find out more about your updates. I've been out of town working for the last 3 weeks, but I just bought my first amp and getting ready to start piecing together the modest first stage of my system. You''ll have to read about it in the design logs when I finally get around to posting about it. I'm actually considering ID 6x9's for the doors now, but worried that the mounting depth on them will be to deep. Also probably a lot more sound deadening to keep the vibration down will be a must.

Anyway thanks for the reply and what's this about Air Force training? Hope you're not headed over seas!

Chuck


----------



## strakele

I'll definitely check out your build log when you post it.

I've heard nothing but good things about the ID 6x9's, so if you can fit them, I'm sure they'd be a good choice. Vibration damping will definitely be a must.

And no, not headed overseas (yet anyway). This Air Force training was just to get into the Professional Officer Corps so that when I graduate I'll be commissioned as a 2nd Lt.


----------



## slade1274

strakele said:


> While I was gone Mark completely redid my trunk and I added a third amp.


Pfffft.... pics or it didn't happen.


----------



## strakele

Leaving now to go pick the car up. Pics will follow shortly


----------



## stereo_luver

Looks good. I just got some IM's on my phone of the finished product.

Chuck


----------



## wdemetrius1

^^

Me to. I'm sure he will be all smiles!!!


----------



## strakele

Heh, so I guess everyone else knew what it was going to look like before I did.

Anyway, here's the breakdown of the changes:

- Added a third amp, an MB Quart Q4.80 bridged to the AR3K's
- Bridged the MB Quart DSC4125 to the 
- Distribution block and wiring relocated to the trunk
- All amps, MS-8, and wiring under false floor 
- Amps inverted, covers removed, and red LED's installed under plexiglass
- Carbon fiber trim around each amp
- CF Mitsubishi logo on the sub box
- Spare tire still accessible

I took some low light pics with the LED's tonight and will upload them along with the daylight pics that I take tomorrow. 

I think it looks great and am very happy with how it turned out. Will be doing a lot of tuning the next couple days and will be going to the show in Cummings this weekend. Hope to see some of you guys there.


----------



## stereo_luver

Audible Physics said:


> I really enjoyed listening to your car sir, it is very dynamic. I wish I would have spent i bit more time in it as I would us to lower the crossover point and see what would happen. But there where ours who want to listen and I didn't want to listen hog. LOL
> 
> Great job sir.


I aspire to receive a comment like this. LOL

Chuck


----------



## stereo_luver

strakele said:


> I think it looks great and am very happy with how it turned out. Will be doing a lot of tuning the next couple days and will be going to the show in Cumming*s* this weekend. Hope to see some of you guys there.


No 's'. Cumming, GA.

Home

Chuck


----------



## eviling

good stuff.


----------



## strakele

Had to add a couple cooling fans below the false floor today. Pics tomorrow, I promise.


----------



## slade1274

Better be today or it'll be too late- I'll see it in person tomorrow in *Cummings* (  that one was for you Chuck)


----------



## ErinH

In for pics!

Not sure if you saw this or not, but if you can make it it'll be a great time. 
http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...yma/106596-meca-vinny-july-10th-2011-a-2.html


----------



## strakele

Alright, so I know I said pics today, but rain dictates otherwise. I'll get some at the meet tomorrow for reals.

Also, I'm going to be back home in Texas till mid August, so unfortunately I won't be able to make that meet Erin.


----------



## aV8ter

Got a gander at this thing today. Had the pleasure of getting a listen from the driver seat and found myself in love with the endless midbass definition provided by the SLS6. Also caught myself asking the owner if he had implemented tweeters in the install after I got done listening to it.

Clean install. Trunk looks real nice and proper.

Thanks for the listen.


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the kind words. It was good to meet you today and it sound like you're going to have a pretty nice system going as well.

As promised here are some pics of the trunk from the meet today. I took first place in modified class despite some heavy competition... or maybe I was the only one in my class...

Anyway, pics:

The new trunk in stealth mode:










Carbon fiber Mitsubishi logo:










Lift the carpet off and you see this:




























Fuses and wires under the left panel:










MS-8 under the right panel:










Red LED's at night, tough to get a good picture:





















Overall I'm real happy with how it turned out. I'm going to switch out the Q4.80 for another DSC4125 to match, and because the Discus seemed happier to play in the heat. The Q will have a new home in Ally's car.

Other than that, I might check out some of the new processors that are supposed to be coming out, and maybe see if I can squeeze 8's in the doors. But really, there shouldn't be any huge changes for a while now. 

People seemed to like the car today, and I now have some judges' feedback to continue working on the tune, so I'm happy. Thanks again to Mark for all the hard work.


----------



## myhikingboots

Real sweet man. Wish I could have been there to check it out. Oh and congrats on your commission!


----------



## myhikingboots

epper:Oh and congrats on your 1st place finish!


----------



## wdemetrius1

I agree your cars sounds great.


----------



## strakele

Thanks Chuck, thanks D. 

So now that I'm back home in Texas, all the cosmetic issues on the exterior of the car are going to get fixed. Next time I'm back in Atlanta, the Lancer should be looking real nice.

Other than the amp change tomorrow and possible midbass change, there's not a whole lot more I can do hardware wise. Will just continue working on the tune. I might also paint my valve cover red.

Also, just so you guys know, my highest scores in the show were in midrange and high frequencies. So to anyone unsure about running speakers like the AR3K's without tweeters.. don't be. They work great.


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> Also, just so you guys know, my highest scores in the show were in midrange and high frequencies. So to anyone unsure about running speakers like the AR3K's without tweeters.. don't be. They work great.


I don't guess you have any computer graphs showing the in car frequency response? I think you may have helped me make a decision on the AR3K's. My current system plan is to put the AR3Ks in the dash and two 4" HAT LSs for center speakers with ID 6x9 midwoofers in the doors. And move the Infiniti 6x9's to the rear doors for surround duty all processed by a MS-8 and powered by JL HD amps. Oh and just one JL 10" sub under the rear seat.


----------



## strakele

Sounds like it'll be a great system. Do you have room to use a single larger speaker for a center channel or is the car already set up with a pair of 4's?

I don't have any graphs, but before the competition we did RTA my car and with a few tweaks it produced a very flat response.


----------



## myhikingboots

I think I have room for a larger one speaker width wise, but depth in the location is minimal. I may have to rethink the doors, though. The 6x9 IDs are 3-5/8" deep and the other day I pulled the door card off and the Infinitis which are 3-1/4" have a checkered pattern meshed into the surrounds from the door card speaker grill.


----------



## strakele

Door depth is a pain. I'm really hoping Mark's 8" comes out to the depth he was talking about so it works for me. The SLS's are crazy deep and I actually have a scratch on my tint from the window rubbing the magnet as I was trying to find the right baffle thickness.

I guess you'll just have to figure out the max depth you can safely fit and start looking from there. Unless you want to build out the door card.. but that's a pretty big project.


----------



## myhikingboots

I was trying not to cut the door card, but I was looking at it today and I may have come up with a stealthy solution. The stock grills which are part of of the door card (and hideous IMHO) could be cut and I could make a MDF or fiberglass ring and then cover in leather or vinyl to match or contrast with the interior. It would have 6x9 speaker grills, painted to match and recessed into the fabricated ring. I would still mount the IDs to the original mounting holes with a proper spacer to clear the window track. I'm pretty good with that kind of detail, and unless you own a truck like that you probably wouldn't know it was not stock. 

Would love to put 8"s in there, but it just would not look right with the shape of the door panel. I hope these IDs are worth all of this trouble!


----------



## Mic10is

I have a 1/2" birch baffle for my AR6k
I removed some of the plastic ring on the back of the door panel bc there was a slight rub on the speaker. If you remove all the plastic around the grill area, you can prob get away with up to a 3/4" baffle which would be unnecessarily thick IMO for the application.
1/2" Birch or equivalent is plenty


----------



## strakele

That sounds like a good solution. While I have never personally heard them, I've never read anything bad about the ID XS69's.


As stated before, I swapped out the Q4.80 for another DSC4125 since it plays in the heat better. And now, in theory, I have more than twice the amplification power as the car's electrical can actually produce. Hooray for onboard capacitance and playing dynamic music..

It all looks very similar since the two amps are close to identical, but I figured I'd get some pics anyway. The new amp is the one on the right, so now the right and left are matching. 

I also took the opportunity to get a couple pics of the fans mounted under the board to blow along the amp's heat sinks:





































Anybody with some photography skills want to give me some tips to get good pictures of the LED glow at night?


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> It all looks very similar since the two amps are close to identical



"... but I would notice..."


What kind of settings do you have on your camera? There should be something to capture the LEDs more clearly if done in the right lighting.


----------



## Gonadman2

You want low ISO, mid F stop say F7 - F13 and a lowish shutter, say around 1/5th of second. Also, mount your camera on a tripod or at least secure it. Even if it isn't level, you can later rotate and crop, and this will always result in better images than a blurry, noisey image.

At the very least, use spot metering and point it at the bright bits of the image.


----------



## myhikingboots

Gonadman2 said:


> At the very least, use spot metering and point it at the bright bits of the image.


Good tips and if you don't have a spot meter you can "bracket" the exposure until you get a decent image. Depending on your camera you'll want to be in "manual" mode and while leaving the aperture setting the same, vary the shutter speed until you get a good exposure. It may take several shots until you get something acceptable. Tripod a must. 

Oh by the way your amps look fantastic with all of their guts exposed!


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the tips guys. I guess I should have specified that I have a little Nikon point and shoot and a cell phone camera. The Nikon has almost zero options, and my cell phone camera has several different light settings that seem to help a little bit.

Using a tripod should surely help though. I'll try that soon. I took about 10 pics of the red glow before I had a couple I was happy with...

Anyway, thanks for the compliments guys! Starting in August, I'm going to try to make all the shows reasonably close to Atlanta. Hope to see you all there.


----------



## MTopper

so you have two mb quart dsc4125 and the clarion amp running now?


----------



## strakele

Correct.


----------



## strakele

Well, I went out and played the system hard for quite a while today, and no heat issues!

Probably gonna play some pink noise and get the gains matched as close as possible and rerun the MS-8 calibration and see if I can't squeak some more volume out of it without actually having to turn up the gains. It gets 'darn loud' right now, but I know the MS-8 is preventing it from being 'stupid loud.'


----------



## Thrill_House

Dude this install is so so nice! I love your attention to detail and I love that you didnt use tonnes of fibreglass and **** but rather you went with a nice clean install, I love it!


----------



## strakele

Awesome compliment, thank you sir!


----------



## pyropoptrt

strakele said:


> As promised here are some pics of the trunk from the meet today. I took first place in modified class despite some heavy competition... or maybe I was the only one in my class...
> 
> Anyway, pics:
> 
> Lift the carpet off and you see this:


Mark did a great job on your trunk! My only suggestion would be to take the carbon fiber trim ring on the left amp and turn it around so that the grain is going the same direction as the other two trim rings. Btw, I would love to get a listen next time I see you at a gtg or a show.


----------



## brocken

The final build with all of the trunk work looks awesome! It looks custom but not flashy which is what I like.
Icing on the top of a good sounding system.


----------



## strakele

I'm not sure if Mark had the left trim ring wrapped the opposite way on purpose or not, but I am going to re-wrap them at some point so it's all going the same way like it is in the interior. Good eye seeing that!

This trunk build was really just supposed to be a way for me to be able to fit 3 amps. With my budget I didn't think there would be any flash. But Mark really did a great job making it look good while being functional. Really cool, but like you said, not over the top.


----------



## strakele

Just something since I haven't updated this in a while...

Before the show I went to, I added some Ensolite to the rear doors. I didn't have a whole lot, and didn't do any Damplifier or MLV, but they don't really make any noise so I didn't have to do much. There was an occasional buzz at a certain frequency though, which is the whole reason I did this.

Left the vapor barrier in place but put some lines of butyl tape behind it to stick it down more and make sure it couldn't buzz against anything, and added foam around pieces that could touch each other.





























I'm hoping to get to a show in Oklahoma next weekend too. Once the next semester of college starts and I'm getting paid again, I'll hopefully be playing with some 8's in the doors and/or another processor.


----------



## strakele

Second place SQ and install at the OK meet yesterday, as well as "Phat Car." 

Got to see/hear Mark's NASCAR and meet Rob and Todd as well. Great time. Thanks Todd for the tips for the MS-8!


----------



## wdemetrius1

Congrats on the win.


----------



## bertholomey

I bet that was a good time. Congrats on the 'Phat Car'! I'm looking forward to hearing / seeing the changes during one of my visits to Atlanta once you get back.


----------



## strakele

Absolutely. Perhaps at the Atlanta G2G that's in the works?


----------



## bertholomey

That would be great.... have to look at the date when it is decided on to see if I can swing it.... otherwise, NC Fall Meet....


----------



## rhannahs

nice build!


----------



## strakele

Several updates coming.

First, got the scrapes on the bumpers fixed so the car actually looks good again. I'll post a couple beauty shots once I get it clay barred and waxed.

Next, the car has been sitting quite low in the back for a while now. Even when I had sold the IDQ's and had no audio weight in the back at all. So I took it to Mitsubishi and asked why it was so low in the back. They said it's probably just from your stereo, all the parts look fine. But one of your front struts is leaking so we can fix that for $1k...

Sooooo natually I said screw that and ordered new shocks and new springs for all 4 corners, along with a rear sway bar for the same price. The springs are lowering springs, so the front will drop about an inch, but the back will actually be raised compared to how low it has been sitting recently, so it should have a good looking stance, and handle quite a bit better too. This will be done in a week or two.

Lastly, I'm probably going to change out the one piece of my system that has remained from the very beginning - the head unit. My always reliable 9884 will likely be upgraded to a 9887 for the better display, tuning abilities, and output voltage. Maybe even see how good I can make everything sound with just that and sell the MS-8 and hope the Mosconi processor is everything it's touted to be.

So there's the updates for the coming few weeks. I'll get pics of everything worth looking at.


----------



## myhikingboots

So you're not liking the MS-8?


----------



## strakele

I do like the MS-8. It's so easy. Being able to control everything with the remote and small display is awesome compared to having to bring out a laptop.

I'm not exactly sure what the future holds for it. I'm a high tech guy I guess, so when something new like the 6to8 with Mindmap type software comes out, it's intriguing. That, and having full control of crossovers as well as independent L/R EQ would be really nice. 

When I first got into this, I thought the 31 band EQ that the MS-8 leaves you with would be more than I could ever possibly need, but I am starting to wish I had just that little bit more control.


----------



## PottersField

We always want more, don't we? I think it's in our nature, dude. I don't compete so I thought for sure the eq and crossovers built into my Pioneer would be just fine, but I find myself wanting more. It's like I listen to my car and say, "Yep, for as little as I have invested, it sounds damn nice. But I just know I can make it sound better. Where's my credit card..."


----------



## strakele

Haha exactly!

Anyway, here's some pictures of some stuff, since that's what these threads are supposed to have.

Got new front and rear floor mats:



















Here's how low the rear is sitting right now:










Used to have a solid 2 finger gap, now it's just 1 at an angle:










Whole interior as it stands now:










Cleaned up the engine bay too:










Almost want to get a red top battery to go with the sway bar.










Been thinking about powder coating my valve cover... what do you think?


----------



## wdemetrius1

Powder coating it may not be a bad idea...


----------



## PottersField

I say have it hydrodipped to match the eyelids. For that matter, get the strut brace dipped too.


----------



## strakele

I'm not familiar with hydrodipping. I'll have to look that one up.

I can get a carbon fiber cover to replace the black plastic cover behind the valve cover..

I like the red brace though, hence considering making the valve cover match.


----------



## strakele

Some pretty pictures..


----------



## Mic10is

Unless your doors are drastically different from mine. an 8 will not fit in the door. It fits depth wise easily (up to 3" with no baffle) but will hit on the front of the door panel.
If you find a way to fit an 8 without modifying the door panel itself, please post very detailed pics.
I spent a day last weekend attempting it to no avail


----------



## strakele

Weird. There's no way I could get 3 inches of depth with no baffle. I need over 1/2 inch of baffle to get the SLS's to BARELY fit.

Most 8's are more like 8.6 - 8.9" in outer diameter. The ones Mark was talking to me about were true 8's in diameter. If I remember, I think like 8.1" is possible before it starts to hit stuff. I'm not sure though, and it remains to be seen if they actually fit.

May be that 7's are as big as can fit in Lancers without modification. Though I did find someone selling some door panels...


----------



## Mic10is

mine hit the front part of the door panel. a 7 would probably fit.
But even test fitting with NO baffle, the door panel would not go on in the front.
if you try and move the baffle back more, you start hitting the window motor and map pocket area.


----------



## slade1274

strakele said:


> Been thinking about powder coating my valve cover... what do you think?


I like the red...

I'd probably cheap out though and just go for some rattle can engine paint.


----------



## strakele

I was originally thinking about that too, but back in Texas when I was originally looking, I found a place that would do it for around $30. $15 bucks for high heat spray paint, or $30 for super durable powder coat... I'll have to see what places in Atlanta charge though.

Mic, I used Usher 8945A's for a while on a half inch baffle, and they were fine. 7" diameter. They were awesome too. Check the first and second pages of this thread. I believe the outer diamter of the baffle was 7.7 or so.


----------



## strakele

Another trunk shot:










Hopefully will be adding to the collection this weekend...


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Mic, I used Usher 8945A's for a while on a half inch baffle, and the were fine. 7" diameter. They were awesome too. Check the first and second pages of this thread. I believe the outer diamter of the baffle was 7.7 or so.


Good to know, bc an 8 with no Baffle would not clear the door panel


----------



## strakele

JW.. what 8's were you trying?


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> JW.. what 8's were you trying?


I have some Poly cone 8s I won finals with last year that are awesome. Standard basket, so nothing drastic by any means or any large mounting flange. But width wise, it wouldnt clear the front of the door panel where it slopes inward to form to the kick panel area.
At least it would not fit without me making major modifications to the door panel which I dont have time to do


----------



## strakele

Hmm. Well, we'll see. 

I had also considered trimming out about 1/4 inch extra from the stock mounting hole for the speaker to move it up and back away from the front corner. Don't especially want to do that though. I think I'll be able to pick up a couple extra door panels to play around with..


----------



## decibelle

I think it would be in your best interest not to mess with 8s. At least for a while. And that's pretty much permanent. If you don't like the 8s... wasted time and wasted money.


----------



## strakele

Shouldn't be too big a deal. But we'll see.

Anyway, so I had this long R/C car antenna...










...that was cracked...










...so it has been replaced with a 3 inch aluminum/carbon fiber shorty antenna:










Simple, cheap, looks better.

Suspension upgrades coming this weekend I think


----------



## decibelle

Looks like ass.


----------



## strakele

millerlyte said:


> Looks like ass.



You look like ass 





In other news, I should be getting the 9887 soon...


----------



## aV8ter

strakele said:


> You look like ass
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In other news, I should be getting the 9887 soon...



Good choice sir. I would set it up sans the MS-8 to begin with and see if you can't surprise yourself with it's on-board processing.


----------



## bertholomey

millerlyte said:


> Looks like ass.





strakele said:


> You look like ass


Too Funny!!!


----------



## decibelle

I do believe he's going to be getting rid of the MS-8 soon anyways, but I could be wrong.


----------



## strakele

I will be trying the system with just 9887 processing and seeing what's possible compared to the MS-8.


----------



## bertholomey

Sweet! looking forward to hearing how it goes. My buddy Kendal has an excellent car using only the 9887 for processing. Mike (Velocity) suggested that he switches over to the PEQ vs the GEQ to see if he can get even that much better.


----------



## strakele

Yeah me too. If there's one thing the MS-8 isn't the greatest at, it's upper subbass/midbass, which happens to be my favorite part of music. I don't want to just hear the drums, I want to FEEL them. Interested to see how much difference there is.


----------



## aV8ter

strakele said:


> Yeah me too. If there's one thing the MS-8 isn't the greatest at, it's upper subbass/midbass, which happens to be my favorite part of music. I don't want to just hear the drums, I want to FEEL them. Interested to see how much difference there is.


I think you'll like the change. It can do individual gain adjustment and crossover slopes from left to right so that should be perfect for your wide-banders. 

I switched from the 9887 back to my older 9855 and not being able to bump the gain down on just the left tweet bugged the hell out of me. Really took that feature for granted when I had the 9887 in my car. Makes a huge difference alone.


----------



## slade1274

Too bad the crossovers aren't ideal for the widebanders..... But I believe Mark was able to get good results in the past with a similar HU.


----------



## aV8ter

slade1274 said:


> Too bad the crossovers aren't ideal for the widebanders..... But I believe Mark was able to get good results in the past with a similar HU.



True. Alpine geared it to a typical tweet, midbass, and sub crossover selection. I think the high pass for the "tweet" channels do run down to 200hz if I remember correctly, at 6db, 12db, 18db, and 24db slopes.


----------



## wdemetrius1

slade1274 said:


> Too bad the crossovers aren't ideal for the widebanders..... But I believe Mark was able to get good results in the past with a similar HU.




It was the same HU.


----------



## slade1274

and it was like 1.2Khz, right?


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Yep only down to 1.2khz. 

I did a highpass @ 1.2khz @ 6dbs on the XR3M-le and bandpass from [email protected] and [email protected] on the XR6.5m. Worked quite well. And yes the 5 band parametric is much better then the graphic eq. Not ideal but better then the internal graphic.


----------



## strakele

Oh the high pass only goes down to 1200? Hmm, I guess just doing a shallow slope would be ok until I get another processor.


edit.. Everywhere I've seen says the crossovers go down to 200Hz.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Oh the high pass only goes down to 1200? Hmm, I guess just doing a shallow slope would be ok until I get another processor.
> 
> 
> edit.. Everywhere I've seen says the crossovers go down to 200Hz.


One of the biggest reason I went with the CD8455 instead of the P880PRS. 
Highs HP goes down to 200Hz on the Eclipse which is better suited for 3 way quasi-active+sub or leaves you more options with horns setups... 

The CD8455 is now in my dad's car (still going strong even after 6 years of intensive use) and now own 1 x CD7000 and 2 x CD7200mkII 

Kelvin 

PS: checked again in the manual and the PRS's Xover goes down to 1.2kHz


----------



## decibelle

subwoofery said:


> The CD8455 is now in my dad's car (still going strong even after 6 years of intensive use) and now own 1 x CD7000 and 2 x CD7200mkII


And how do you like the latter?


----------



## strakele

Doing further research, the 9887 has a pro or advanced mode where you can take the high pass on the high output down to 200Hz.


----------



## bertholomey

Good find - I used that deck for quite a while and never saw that. It is in the wife's car.....might poke around a bit.....might do wide banders in there some day....


----------



## subwoofery

millerlyte said:


> And how do you like the latter?


Exact same tuning capabilities than the other 2. I love the PEQ (11 bands). 
Main difference? It runs cooler being a dead head (no power amplification) but sound wise it makes no difference (at least to me ) 

Anything you want to know in particular? We can take it to PMs if the OP wants his thread clean 

Kelvin


----------



## strakele

subwoofery said:


> Exact same tuning capabilities than the other 2. I love the PEQ (11 bands).
> Main difference? It runs cooler being a dead head (no power amplification) but sound wise it makes no difference (at least to me )
> 
> Anything you want to know in particular? We can take it to PMs if the OP wants his thread clean
> 
> Kelvin


Haha thanks. Feel free to post all over her build thread


----------



## slade1274

strakele said:


> Doing further research, the 9887 has a pro or advanced mode where you can take the high pass on the high output down to 200Hz.


Not what I see... the midbass can do that in a band pass configuration. If you use it 3 way, the "high" side can only go down to 1khz as I read it....

CDA-9887 manual

Page 15-16

I hope I'm wrong.


----------



## strakele

See the very bottom of the left column and very top of right column on page 16.


----------



## slade1274

I do.... that is what I was referring to.

It ties to the chart on page 15.

Low/Mid-L is he Sub... low pass from 200-20
Mid-High is the midbass... band pass with a HP from 20-200 and LP from 20-20khz (this would work for a full range driver with a max HP of 200, but then what would you use for the midbass?)
High is tweeter, or in your case the FR driver, and it only does HP from 1khz and up.

Again, could be wrong but that is how I read it and how it has worked for me in the past.....


All the 'Pro' does is allow for a flat slope; which is full 20-20khz (no crossovers), hence the footnote....


----------



## strakele

I'm pretty sure the 9887 has the exact same options and capabilities as my current head unit when combined with the H100. Using the H100, I was able to set the high pass much lower than 1K when I was testing the AR3K's. 

I'll have to test it out.


----------



## slade1274

Again... I hope I'm wrong; but I believe that was Mark's findings as well when his HU took a dirt nap prior to the GA show a couple months ago where he used D's loaner 9887.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Unless I'm misunderstanding the manual, I think that you are correct Grayson. I thought it was possible, but I never used that function. Nice find.


----------



## aV8ter

strakele said:


> Doing further research, the 9887 has a pro or advanced mode where you can take the high pass on the high output down to 200Hz.


Dude you're golden. I know I have done it in my car before. Accidentally stumbled upon it when I was learning how to use the unit.


----------



## wdemetrius1

slade1274 said:


> I do.... that is what I was referring to.
> 
> It ties to the chart on page 15.
> 
> Low/Mid-L is he Sub... low pass from 200-20
> Mid-High is the midbass... band pass with a HP from 20-200 and LP from 20-20khz (this would work for a full range driver with a max HP of 200, but then what would you use for the midbass?)
> High is tweeter, or in your case the FR driver, and it only does HP from 1khz and up.
> 
> Again, could be wrong but that is how I read it and how it has worked for me in the past.....
> 
> 
> All the 'Pro' does is allow for a flat slope; which is full 20-20khz (no crossovers), hence the footnote....


Upon going back and reading it again, I didn't realize that their were not any crossovers.


----------



## decibelle

subwoofery said:


> Exact same tuning capabilities than the other 2. I love the PEQ (11 bands).
> Main difference? It runs cooler being a dead head (no power amplification) but sound wise it makes no difference (at least to me )
> 
> Anything you want to know in particular? We can take it to PMs if the OP wants his thread clean
> 
> Kelvin


Would you recommend competing with just a tune from the HU itself, or still get a whole processor to override it and tune from there?



> Haha thanks. Feel free to post all over her build thread


Yes... I'll take as many views as I can get. I'm lonely over there


----------



## aV8ter

Confirmed! Just checked it out in my other car. Go into audio settings in the 9887 and simply change the "TW" setting from "Maker's" to "User's". It can highpass the Tweeter/High channels from 20hz-20,000hz going in third steps. Still have 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th order slopes available.

Headunit should be perfect. Only other thing I would note is setting the SUB channels to MONO right off the bat.


----------



## strakele

aV8ter said:


> Confirmed! Just checked it out in my other car. Go into audio settings in the 9887 and simply change the "TW" setting from "Maker's" to "User's". It can highpass the Tweeter/High channels from 20hz-20,000hz going in third steps. Still have 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th order slopes available.
> 
> Headunit should be perfect. Only other thing I would note is setting the SUB channels to MONO right off the bat.


Hah! I knew it. Thanks.


----------



## subwoofery

millerlyte said:


> Would you recommend competing with just a tune from the HU itself, or still get a whole processor to override it and tune from there?


To be honest, if you want to go the extra mile (and win competitions), I'd still think you would need a L/R EQ adjustment... 

In my girlfriend's car, I have a PG EQ232 hooked up to the High RCA of a CD7200mkII for my horns L/R adjustment. I then fine tune with the Parametric from the CD7200mkII. 

I don't see a problem for a daily driver (like my car) - I use a quasi active setup and my Focal passive has all the necessary adjustments to lock my soundstage up 

Kelvin


----------



## ErinH

On the flip side, sometimes too much DSP can wreck you. Just because it's there people want to use it even when they don't need it.


----------



## wdemetrius1

aV8ter said:


> Confirmed! Just checked it out in my other car. Go into audio settings in the 9887 and simply change the "TW" setting from "Maker's" to "User's". It can highpass the Tweeter/High channels from 20hz-20,000hz going in third steps. Still have 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th order slopes available.
> 
> Headunit should be perfect. Only other thing I would note is setting the SUB channels to MONO right off the bat.




Nice find.


----------



## strakele

Alright, so this weekend all the suspension work got done!

Here's some pre-install pics:

New Progress sway bar and perches:










New Progress lowering springs:










New KYB gas shocks:



















Random install pic... didn't take many:











And here's how the car sits without any audio stuff in the trunk:










Nice 2 finger gap in the front (used to be a loose 3 finger gap)











Super tight 1 finger gap in the back now a loose 2 finger gap... will go down a bit when subs/amps are reinstalled, but not as bad as it was.










Gonna Techflex the wires in the back before I put everything back in.

So far, the ride is nice and smooth. The original front shocks were in pretty bad shape, so it was the springs doing almost all the work. Now it's nice and responsive and there's less understeer.


----------



## strakele

Ordered some red and carbon Techflex and heat shrink yesterday.

And it's official. The last remaining part of my first, original system is gone. My trusty CDA-9884 has been sold...


----------



## moefi

nice work


----------



## strakele

Alright, I picked up a 9887 off the classifieds and I'm part way through Techflexing all the wires in the trunk.

I'm also going to rewire the amps so that the left amp runs the left side of the car and the right amps runs the right side instead of a midrange amp and a midbass amp.


----------



## wdemetrius1

I'm glad that you finally got the 9887. Looking forward to your finished product.


----------



## strakele

Still waiting on the 9887. So for now I have this to look at while I drive:











Anyway, like I said before, I took this opportunity to clean up the wiring in the trunk. This is far and away the most time and effort (and money) I've ever spent on making wire look good, and I'm darn proud of it. Hope you guys like.

With all of the equipment removed, I was left with this:





























So... 100ft of red and carbon Techflex, 12 feet of red and black heat shrink, and many hours later, I have this:

Red power cables cut to proper length:










Carbon ground wires. Still waiting on another bit of Techflex for the MS-8 ground..










Ends that required terminals were soldered:




















Remote wires for all 3 amps put together into one:










With branches coming off for each amp:


----------



## strakele

Moving on into the trunk...

Everything removed except for main power, speaker wires, and a bundle of wires for the MS-8.










Main 1/0 power got the Techflex / heat shrink treatment:










And some small wires for the LEDs.










RCAs, remote, and display for the MS-8.










MS-8 wires and speaker wire bundles in carbon Techflex. No zip ties yet.










All speaker wires were covered in carbon Techflex with red and black heat shrink for positive and negative:



















Subwoofer speaker wire too:










Ground wires run:










Laid in the general area of where the equipment will be that they'll connect to:


----------



## decibelle

Picture quality looks like ass.





























Wires look good though.




> many hours


*days.
**and zip ties.


----------



## strakele

And now for the amp rack. This took forever and brought out some OCD as I'm sure Ally will attest.

All wire Techflexed / heat shrunk as usual. All RCA's cut to exactly the right length and zip tied vertically with ties between each one as well to keep them exactly in the right place, and I think it looks cool. Amp mounting brackets smoothed, trimmed and painted black.










Relay for the fans all wired up and heat shrunk:










RCAs


----------



## strakele

Outside ready to finally put back in the car.















































Hours of zip tying and Techflexing and heat shrinking... but I really like how it turned out. And here's just part of the mess:











All for now. Next set will have it all back in the car. I'm still waiting to finish the MS-8 ground, and then some more zip tying.


----------



## strakele

millerlyte said:


> Picture quality looks like ass.


Cause there's not a single ceiling light in your apartment


----------



## bertholomey

That looks fantastic! A lot of patience displayed as well - certainly one of those, "I'm sure this is all going to pay off in the end kind of things." Can't wait to see it in person!


----------



## strakele

That's what I had to keep thinking. That, and every once in a while, I want to compete in install as well, so this will definitely improve my score there. Wiring is about my least favorite part of this kinda stuff, but I had to do it right.

I must have redone those RCA zip ties half a dozen times until I was happy with how it looked.


----------



## slade1274

Psst..... auto parts store.

Spark plug wire spacer/separators.


----------



## strakele

...After all the time I spent on this, I'm just going to pretend I didn't see that. Ally even works at an auto parts store!


----------



## decibelle

I'll use spark plug separators on my wiring then


----------



## strakele

Go for it.

And along with all this wiring, the speakers will now be wired so that the left amp powers the left side and right amp powers right for infinite stereo separation.


----------



## slade1274

strakele said:


> Go for it.
> 
> And along with all this wiring, the speakers will now be wired so that the left amp powers the left side and right amp powers right for infinite stereo separation.


Meh- over rated. Run a mono signal and see what the MS8 does with it. :laugh:


----------



## sinister-kustoms

Nice. Really liking the cableing work!


----------



## strakele

slade1274 said:


> Meh- over rated. Run a mono signal and see what the MS8 does with it. :laugh:


Haha that's probably the trick that will put me into the 80's in competition.


----------



## strakele

Got the amp rack back in the trunk and wired up. Not finished with zip ties, but here's for today.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Everything looks good Jason!


----------



## bertholomey

wdemetrius1 said:


> Everything looks good Jason!


D - those early morning hours must be getting to you (or are they late morning hours?). I'll take the compliment though


----------



## strakele

bertholomey said:


> D - those early morning hours must be getting to you (or are they late morning hours?). I'll take the compliment though


Jason: 1
Demetrius: 0


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

looking darn good sir, darn good.


----------



## strakele

Thanks Mark. Can't wait to try all the other stuff we were talking about!


----------



## DaveRulz

subwoofery said:


> To be honest, if you want to go the extra mile (and win competitions), I'd still think you would need a L/R EQ adjustment...


FYI, The 9887 has separate left and right EQ. I believe it's in the same menu where the tweeter settings are. You set the EQ to L/R instead of L=R

That HU pretty much does everything you could possibly need an active processor to do with the exception of mute a channel.


----------



## cgm246

NICE SYSTEM AND INSTALL....GOOD WORK!


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys.

New head unit came yesterday! Unfortunately, the seller did not include the trim ring, and it's been very tough to get in contact with him.

Anyone have one they feel like donating?  You'll get it back if/when I get the one that was supposed to come with it.

But for now, at least I have sound again!


----------



## bertholomey

What was the outcome on the crossover points?


----------



## strakele

I didn't plan on changing them. Crossover points are 63Hz and 320Hz.

Still using the MS-8 processing for now. After all the work I did on those RCAs... may as well use them. That, and not all of the RCAs run from the front to the back of my car will actually reach the amps they're supposed to, so until that gets fixed, running just the 9887 isn't an option anyway.

Got the sub put back in today and everything still works! Pics coming soon.


----------



## wdemetrius1

bertholomey said:


> D - those early morning hours must be getting to you (or are they late morning hours?). I'll take the compliment though




Wow, I just saw this post. :blush: Yeah, it was done after a long night of work. :laugh:


----------



## strakele

And it's done.

MS-8 wires zip tied:










Sub box back in:










And everything works!


----------



## bkjay

congrats! great job!


----------



## strakele

Scored an average of 71.4 at the Georgia State Finals over the weekend - my highest scores so far!


----------



## bertholomey

Congrats! I'd like to hear about it this weekend.


----------



## GavGT

Love this install. Its funny too how in the beginning, stuff is just thrown in to get a decent sound, then the bug hits and everything ends up getting changed.

Gav


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> Scored an average of 71.4 at the Georgia State Finals over the weekend - my highest scores so far!




Congratulations!!!


----------



## slade1274

With the MSgreat or 9887?


----------



## strakele

Both. 9887 as source and using a band or two of PEQ, but MS-8 still doing the majority of processing.

It sounds really good... for SQ music. I want it to sound different for my music though. The high end to bring out the sparkle and details and lightness up top for stuff on the Chesky disc makes my stuff too harsh. It's dynamic and has plenty of bass, but there's not enough punch for me.

Unfortunately it's not really quite as simple as just saving a different EQ preset on the MS-8, since the crossover points are lower for competition than I'd use for daily driving. The SLS's can play 50Hz just fine, to a point. But when it's cranked up, it doesn't sound like 50Hz, it sounds like a speaker playing 50Hz, if that makes sense. 



Anyway, certain components are nearing the end of their stay in my car, and there are plans to add some other fun stuff by the end of the year.


----------



## strakele

GavGT said:


> Love this install. Its funny too how in the beginning, stuff is just thrown in to get a decent sound, then the bug hits and everything ends up getting changed.
> 
> Gav


Haha thanks. At first, this was just something I did with birthday money prior to leaving for college. Now it has become my main hobby. Things started going from just sounding good to looking good as well once I started to meet members of this forum and really look at all the awesome build logs posted here.

I always hope that people don't just look at the first 2 pages and move on to something else... as you see it gets much better as you go!

I keep track of all changes on a spreadsheet. I think I posted this a while ago, but there have been a lot more additions since then. This is the simplified version:










Version 4.0 plans are fairly solidified, and will be mostly done within a month or two.


----------



## strakele

Lastly, here's a couple before/after shots of the trunk wiring before I go to the NC meet.


----------



## Yepvegas

Your attention to detail in your documentation is excelent. The spreadsheet is a nice touch.


----------



## strakele

Thanks! Next year I plan to compete in install every once in a while, so I'll almost be able to copy and paste my posts from this thread into the picture book, lol!

I like to keep track of everything I change just to see how often it happens, as well as a memory jogger to be able to look back at it and remember certain things about whatever gear I had running at the time.


----------



## Yepvegas

Cool if you do not mind how much tec flex did you you and about how much did it cost. Keep up the good work. I am getting closer to my build.


----------



## gtrplyr

love the setup


----------



## j-man

Very nice build log sir! Like has already been stated, it is very cool to watch how systems evolve and grow once someone finds this site and gets the bug  We have all been there and know the joys and frustrations. Great job!! I hate I didn't get a listen this morning, was planning on getting back there and checking it out. Next meet for sure. Keep up the great work young man!


----------



## strakele

Yepvegas said:


> Cool if you do not mind how much tec flex did you you and about how much did it cost. Keep up the good work. I am getting closer to my build.


I used 250ft I believe. Got it on ebay from username furryletters. Pricing depends on diameter.




J-man, I'm sorry you didn't get to listen to the car. Didn't know you had to leave early. Anyway, I look forward to seeing the build log on the new Vette, and I appreciate the compliments.


----------



## bertholomey

As well......I only got a few tracks listened to when I had to 'arrange' something as the host....I would love to get another chance when I'm in Atlanta. Love the trunk display though!


----------



## strakele

Let us know whenever you're here.



The car already sounds quite different than you heard yesterday...


----------



## chithead

I'm sorry I didn't get a chance either. I heard nothing but excellent comments on your install and tuning. If it sounds half as good as it looks, then it must be the bomb diggadie!!!


----------



## decibelle

> Both. 9887 as source and using a band or two of PEQ, but MS-8 still doing the majority of processing.


Are you still running everything off the HU or did you end up reverting back to the MS-8 because of yesterday's issues?


----------



## strakele

Alright, glad everyone liked the car this weekend. As I explained, it was set up for competition with everything cross real low which is great for low to mid volume, but at high volume, even the beastly SLS's aren't happy playing 50Hz.

There are a few changes in the works... and here's the first one. I wanted to switch to a snappier, higher efficiency midbass driver. I've read about the H-Audio Ebony, and having Mark down the road with a brand new shipment made it an easy choice to try.

I admit I was still skeptical when comparing to the much beefier SLS:










But look at the difference in actual cone area:










Mounted to a 1/2" MDF ring:










And installed in the doors:




















Also, I now am running the whole system from the 9887, bypassing the MS-8. Only a quick tune on it so far, but it's sounding really good, and I have a lot more punch. They're supposed to improve after a break in time, so we'll see how much better they get before going super critical. 

More fun stuff to come.


----------



## jooonnn

Sweet build man, looks great in person. Browsing through your thread it seems like you are eternally searching for that nice punchy midbass. In my experiences, you need to make sure you can get a good 100hz reproduction (of course the other surrounding frequencies). 100hz seems to be kind of hard to get right in a lot of the cars I've worked on, especially because it rattles the hell out of most plastic doors. 

Another thing is you should try branching out to the more mainstream lines. It seems you are kind of biased towards the DIY driver route. Hertz Milles/Audison Thesis drivers are cool I promise


----------



## strakele

Haha yeah, that's one thing I have always been after. Midbass choice is important for sure, but I'm convinced a lot of it comes from the subs as well, as I'm sure you can tell if you play a song without that big W7 playing.

And yeah, I have been going with mostly DIY/smaller brand drivers. Nothing against the bigger brand stuff, and your (and the other John's) Thesis setup sounded great. I just can't see myself spending that much on a set of speakers.


----------



## jooonnn

strakele said:


> Haha yeah, that's one thing I have always been after. Midbass choice is important for sure, but I'm convinced a lot of it comes from the subs as well, as I'm sure you can tell if you play a song without that big W7 playing.
> 
> And yeah, I have been going with mostly DIY/smaller brand drivers. Nothing against the bigger brand stuff, and your (and the other John's) Thesis setup sounded great. I just can't see myself spending that much on a set of speakers.


You'd be surprised to see what kind of sweet pricing you can land on some stuff. Also another thing to try (if you haven't already) is overlapping the midbass/sub crossovers. My sub LPF is only about 63hz with a very sharp 24db slope, whereas my midbass HPF is at 50hz with a 24db slope also. 

You'd be surprised how at how much midbass _should_ come out of a midbass even without a sub playing. Take for instance home speakers, demo board car speakers, or nice computer speakers (with 5" drivers).


----------



## strakele

Overlapping crossover points is something that wasn't possible with the MS-8 unfortunately. I liked being able to do that with the H100, and now that I can do it again by running off the 9887, I have a lot more punch again. For my personal music tastes, I like it better now than with the competition tune.

You'll have to hear it again sometime.


----------



## strakele

Unpleasant update: got a flat. 

No driving anywhere till my new tire gets here.


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> Haha yeah, that's one thing I have always been after. Midbass choice is important for sure, but I'm convinced a lot of it comes from the subs as well, as I'm sure you can tell if you play a song without that big W7 playing.
> 
> And yeah, I have been going with mostly DIY/smaller brand drivers. Nothing against the bigger brand stuff, and your (and the other John's) Thesis setup sounded great. I just can't see myself spending that much on a set of speakers.


I for one am really looking forward to your impressions of the Ebony once they are broken in. I liked their output when they were in Ryan's STi, and I think they will provide that hard hitting kick drum sound, but also be able to handle bass guitar and deeper accoustic strings as well.


----------



## strakele

That's what I'm hoping. Currently, they are accentuating some rattles I still have in my doors, lol.


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> That's what I'm hoping. Currently, they are accentuating some rattles I still have in my doors, lol.


So turn it dooooooown. Of course it's going to sound like they're housing a wild animal when you have the gains turned way up and volume at max with 7" mids xmaxing the hell out of themselves.


----------



## strakele

millerlyte said:


> So turn it dooooooown. Of course it's going to sound like they're housing a wild animal when you have the gains turned way up and volume at max with 7" mids xmaxing the hell out of themselves.


..Gains not too high, volume not at max (except when you turned it there), and the speakers not maxed.

Stiffer, tighter, snappier mids just make things rattle easier.


----------



## decibelle

You definitely have it up at around 30+ quite often 

Regardless, I need to deaden my doors further too, so looks like that will be another project of ours soon enough.


----------



## strakele

This is true. Gotta tackle your dash too.

I'm sure mine will probably need a similar treatment as well after the next round of updates..


----------



## decibelle

My dash... ugh. Just... ugh. Worst thing I have ever had to do in that car. By far.


----------



## strakele

Yeah.

Anyway, I'm really happy with how the car is sounding right now running off the 9887. Some more door deadening is necessary though. The snappy Ebony's bring out some buzzes that the smoother SLS's did not.

After my fall break, there will be another addition for next season


----------



## stereo_luver

Nice work. Good job on cleaning up the wiring. I need to have a listen.

Chuck


----------



## wdemetrius1

^^

I would like to get a listen to.


----------



## strakele

Hit me up whenever you guys are downtown.


----------



## bertholomey

stereo_luver said:


> Nice work. Good job on cleaning up the wiring. I need to have a listen.
> 
> Chuck





wdemetrius1 said:


> ^^
> 
> I would like to get a listen to.





strakele said:


> Hit me up whenever you guys are downtown.


I got a listen.....and it was Awesome! I really like the Ebony mid bass drivers - great performers with everything I played. Very snappy / responsive, very thick lower midbass, but very detailed as well - great articulation when it came to percussion and fast bass guitar (think Primus). 

Of course the AR3's were brilliant - handled the vocals flawlessly - great electric guitar sound, and perfect playback (for my taste) of cymbals. 

I like the sound you achieved from the 9887 better than when you had the MS-8 - just my preference. Had about an hour and a half listening session with some pretty aggressive (non fru-fru) music, played at respectable levels, without a hint of fatigue or headache - well done! 

You all need to hear the car! Now if I could just get a demo in Ally's car......sorry G......that was wrong to mention that here - she is the competition in this build thread.


----------



## strakele

Glad you enjoyed Jason, it was good to see you again and go through some heavier music.

Also, thanks for the dummy tip on the 9887! I was about to rip apart the dash to try a different iPod cable...


----------



## aV8ter

strakele said:


> Glad you enjoyed Jason, it was good to see you again and go through some heavier music.
> 
> Also, thanks for the dummy tip on the 9887! I was about to rip apart the dash to try a different iPod cable...



So you're running everything off just the 9887 now? How is it without the MS8? 

I have had countless high dollar Alpine headunits and even though I don't particularly like the fit and finish if the 9887, I would have to say it is the best all it one. Does everything I could ever ask it to do(except play DVDs and USB, Oh well...).


----------



## strakele

Yep, everything off the Alpine right now. I like it better, to be honest. I can easily change crossover points and time alignment whenever I want, etc etc.

As far as fit and finish, it's no P99, but the looks work with my car and I can live with the plastic-y feel because I didn't spend a grand on it.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Thanks Jason! Are you still in town? 




bertholomey said:


> I got a listen.....and it was Awesome! I really like the Ebony mid bass drivers - great performers with everything I played. Very snappy / responsive, very thick lower midbass, but very detailed as well - great articulation when it came to percussion and fast bass guitar (think Primus).
> 
> Of course the AR3's were brilliant - handled the vocals flawlessly - great electric guitar sound, and perfect playback (for my taste) of cymbals.
> 
> I like the sound you achieved from the 9887 better than when you had the MS-8 - just my preference. Had about an hour and a half listening session with some pretty aggressive (non fru-fru) music, played at respectable levels, without a hint of fatigue or headache - well done!
> 
> You all need to hear the car! Now if I could just get a demo in Ally's car......sorry G......that was wrong to mention that here - she is the competition in this build thread.


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> Hit me up whenever you guys are downtown.




Will do.


----------



## bertholomey

wdemetrius1 said:


> Thanks Jason! Are you still in town?


Nope, but will be again soon - I'll let you know.


----------



## strakele

And I'll have something new for you guys next time...


----------



## GavGT

strakele said:


> Haha thanks. At first, this was just something I did with birthday money prior to leaving for college. Now it has become my main hobby. Things started going from just sounding good to looking good as well once I started to meet members of this forum and really look at all the awesome build logs posted here.
> 
> I always hope that people don't just look at the first 2 pages and move on to something else... as you see it gets much better as you go!
> 
> I keep track of all changes on a spreadsheet. I think I posted this a while ago, but there have been a lot more additions since then. This is the simplified version:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Version 4.0 plans are fairly solidified, and will be mostly done within a month or two.



It happened in a similar way with me. I collected some cheap stuff off ebay and thrown it in, then joined a forum and decided to do a local competition so ended up rushing the rebuild. After looking around at the comp i realised how much work i had left to do lol.

Everything's coming together now though, and i'm starting to piece together better stuff including swapping out my basic pioneer for a 9855r. 


Gav


----------



## wdemetrius1

bertholomey said:


> I got a listen.....and it was Awesome! I really like the Ebony mid bass drivers - great performers with everything I played. Very snappy / responsive, very thick lower midbass, but very detailed as well - great articulation when it came to percussion and fast bass guitar (think Primus).
> 
> Of course the AR3's were brilliant - handled the vocals flawlessly - great electric guitar sound, and perfect playback (for my taste) of cymbals.
> 
> I like the sound you achieved from the 9887 better than when you had the MS-8 - just my preference. Had about an hour and a half listening session with some pretty aggressive (non fru-fru) music, played at respectable levels, without a hint of fatigue or headache - well done!
> 
> You all need to hear the car! Now if I could just get a demo in Ally's car......sorry G......that was wrong to mention that here - she is the competition in this build thread.



^^

Thanks for the feedback Jason.


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> And I'll have something new for you guys next time...



I'm looking forward to it.


----------



## strakele

Pics coming soon. Need a fully customizable 4 way processor...


----------



## strakele

Alright guys, here's what I've been planning and wanting to do off and on for months now.

And it is...

A front subwoofer. Specifically, one mounted in the passenger footwell. I've always been after great midbass punch and bass up front type feel, but had about reached the limits of what was possible with the door speakers. For a while I planned on trying to cram 8's in the doors, but that would have been a ton of custom work and resulted in more door rattles, so I finally decided to do what I should have done a long time ago and do a real front sub.

So I started researching shallow subs that work well in small airspace. Every company seems to have a shallow offering, but there isn't a whole lot of info out there about them. Several model very poorly in small airspace. After much deliberating, I wound up with an SB Acoustics SW26DAC76-8 shallow mount 10". I chose this model because it modeled the best in the smallest enclosure and was one of the shallowest offerings. The 8 ohm model of this particular sub has twice the BL of the 4 ohm version and models with a .7 Q in only .29 cubic feet. The mounting flange is 11.5" in diameter which did pose a slight challenge though.

For those of you not familiar, here it is:










It was one of the very last subs that I looked at, and rather quickly decided to go with it for reasons stated above.

Anyway, on to the build pics. Headed down to Mark's to learn how to fiberglass. First, the footwell as it was:










Here's what's under the carpet:










Removing the layer of barrier and fluff gained some additional depth:










Area all taped up:










First layer down... we were working outside, so there is some organic matter permanently embedded in the enclosure...










After several more layers, mold removed and roughly trimmed:










Baffle attached:



















Musical fleece stretched over to form the top of the enclosure. I'm told this type of fleece adds significantly to the SQ.


----------



## strakele

Speaker wire installed, milkshake inside to further seal and harden, and carpeted:










Bit of sound deadening on the outside:










Installed in the car:










And simple carpeted grill made to protect the sub:










A few better daylight pics to come. For now, I turned off the rear subs and have just the front sub playing. It does just what I want! Adds a lot of punch up to the midbass and keeps all the bass up front. No tuning to trick the ears into thinking it's up front... IT IS up front. Got a couple rattles in the dash to work out now, but overall I'm very happy with it. I had planned for it to be a bit more slanted in the front, but the oversize design of the sub made it difficult to accomplish. A side effect of this however is more enclosure volume resulting in better low end response. My only usual passenger is 5'2", so it'll be fine 

The sub can play down low with quite a bit of authority for a small shallow mount in a small enclosure, but once I get a fully customizable 4 way processor, I'll still be using the subs in the rear for the real low stuff at high volume, and powering the front sub off my Arc KS300.2.

But for now, SUCCESS. Thanks again to Mark for teaching me how to fiberglass.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Very nice Grayson!!!!


----------



## Salami

Awesome! I have been messing around with a sub in the front for a little while now but nothing in a permanent enclsoure. Now that I see this I need to get off my ass and build a nice enclosure like you did. Your's is almost exactly how I planned mine to look. Now I have a better idea on how it looks out side of my mind.


----------



## bertholomey

Great job Grayson....now I have to schedule another trip to Atlanta

I bet that live Megadeth track sounds even more rowdy 

You guys did a great job with the enclosure, and I'm very curious to hear what this set up sounds when you are able to do the 4 way processing. 

I also find it interesting that a lot of guys on DIYMA are putting in front subs lately (I know some have been rockin' it for several years - Mic for one), but it was interesting to go through some of these pics from EMMA finals and see how many guys across the pond have front subs. Some are in floor boards and some seem to be installed under the glove box or in place of the glove box.

emma finals 2011 :: IMG_2557.jpg picture by lbaudio_team - Photobucket


----------



## jooonnn

Looks sweet! Is the front cover removable? I've always liked seeing the cones from time to time, especially when they move ^_^.

When enough time has passed and you are inevitably anxious again to do car audio stuff (it's only a matter of time) you need to try this: How to Install a Subwoofer in the Dash - Guides - Car Audio and Electronics 

Imagine what you could tell friends. friend: "damn where is all this bass coming from, you said you don't have a sub in the trunk right?" you: "nope ..... i dunno where it's coming from.....what's in the glovebox lolz?"


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the feedback guys!

Glad I could be some inspiration.

Jason, you know how to find me. Also, yeah, EMMA cars are some of the most extreme builds I've ever seen.

Jon, yes, the grill is removable  As for in dash sub... Maybe a long time from now lol. There are some empty spaces back there but I feel like it'd create a bunch more rattles and stuff. Also, at least for now, this allows me to stay in the same class for competition, whereas with a rebuilt dash, I couldn't. But once I get a new car and this becomes a project car, it's certainly something I'd try.


----------



## Notloudenuf

Good work.


----------



## Mic10is

Id have sold u my old SB sub if I knew you were looking. I have a custom SB neo (same as you) except this is a 4ohm version with the 4layer VC and some other stuff that only the 8ohm model has to handle more power.
I have zero use for this thing bc of the outside mounting diameter of a 10....


----------



## strakele

I read somewhere that you had one custom made.. Thought you said you "used to" have it so I assumed you sold it.

But yeah, the mounting flange on this thing is huge. I intended for it to be a bit more angled like yours, but with the big frame, it wouldn't have worked right. Upside is if I ever want to switch drivers, a larger number of subs will fit.


----------



## AccordUno

bertholomey said:


> I also find it interesting that a lot of guys on DIYMA are putting in front subs lately (I know some have been rockin' it for several years - Mic for one), but it was interesting to go through some of these pics from EMMA finals and see how many guys across the pond have front subs. Some are in floor boards and some seem to be installed under the glove box or in place of the glove box.


I'm actually surprised it's not being done more. I used to run a 8" sub in the glove box in my Accord back in 05, worked out really well. It worked really well for SQ, but sucked if played too loud (localization)..


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> I read somewhere that you had one custom made.. Thought you said you "used to" have it so I assumed you sold it.


nah sittin on a shelf collecting dust with my XT10.

Make sure you anchor the enclosure to the vehicle . simply screw it down. That will help get the tactile feel from the bottom octaves


----------



## strakele

Interesting idea.. I wondered if you did that with yours. I'll probably do it when I mount the amp for it under the seat. It's pretty darn hard to yank out of the footwell.

I still plan on using the rear subs for the very bottom octave too.

How did you use this sub? Was it also a footwell install? Any pics?


----------



## decibelle

Car smells like ass.





But it does sound pretty good. Even with the sub on the far right, it's all right in front of you. Probably the best thing done to that car yet. I can't say I've heard a car that puts you in the pit of a concert more than this one.



jooonnn said:


> Looks sweet! Is the front cover removable? I've always liked seeing the cones from time to time, especially when they move ^_^.
> 
> When enough time has passed and you are inevitably anxious again to do car audio stuff (it's only a matter of time) you need to try this: How to Install a Subwoofer in the Dash - Guides - Car Audio and Electronics
> 
> Imagine what you could tell friends. friend: "damn where is all this bass coming from, you said you don't have a sub in the trunk right?" you: "nope ..... i dunno where it's coming from.....what's in the glovebox lolz?"


Implying he has friends.

This article is interesting, seeing as I've been mildly toying with the idea of mounting a driver somewhere in the dash/glove box for a while, just not knowing how to go about it. Nor having the tools. That's the primary part of things like this, is lack of time and adequate tools/space. Interesting read nonetheless, thanks for posting it.


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Interesting idea.. I wondered if you did that with yours. I'll probably do it when I mount the amp for it under the seat. It's pretty darn hard to yank out of the footwell.
> 
> I still plan on using the rear subs for the very bottom octave too.
> 
> How did you use this sub? Was it also a footwell install? Any pics?


Apparently I didnt take any finished pics with the grill off.



















I did a show with just the enclosure very pressure fitted into place. It took some force to remove it--and one of the comments I got back from Judged was I was missing the lower part of subbass, the actual SUB part of sub bass.
I played with eq, and TA and Xo points and it made very little improvement...
then before the next show, I decided to go ahead and screw it down in place since I was fairly happy with its tonality.
and BAM--that solved the issue.

also, note that ,mine is infinite baffle. It vents out through the fender well.


----------



## bertholomey

millerlyte said:


> Car smells like ass.
> 
> Probably the best thing done to that car yet.
> 
> Implying he has friends.


Wow! :laugh:


----------



## quickaudi07

WoW great build man...


----------



## strakele

Mic10is said:


> I did a show with just the enclosure very pressure fitted into place. It took some force to remove it--and one of the comments I got back from Judged was I was missing the lower part of subbass, the actual SUB part of sub bass.
> I played with eq, and TA and Xo points and it made very little improvement...
> then before the next show, I decided to go ahead and screw it down in place since I was fairly happy with its tonality.
> and BAM--that solved the issue.
> 
> also, note that ,mine is infinite baffle. It vents out through the fender well.



Interesting.. I'll definitely do that then. Just straight through the bottom to the floor?

Even more surprising that it made a difference in yours since it was IB.

Thanks for the info.



Jason... she sure is pleasant, isn't she?




millerlyte said:


> Implying he has friends.



Look who's talking


----------



## strakele

Anyway, now I've gotta kill a couple rattles up front, and for now I think I'm going to give the MS-8 another shot with the new gear and see how it sounds.


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> Look who's talking



Never said nothing about me. I'll be the first to point out I don't have any either 

Regardless, I meant what I said about your car. I'll give you endless crap for menial things but when it comes down to it, everybody here knows your car really is something to hear. Although I think you'd do well to troubleshoot the rattles from the grille asap... but that's pretty much it.


----------



## strakele

Yeah, that's just going to be a matter of attaching the carpet to the metal grill mesh itself, not just the wood around it.

Then a nice layer of CCF in the dash, around all the wires coming off the radio, and deadening the B pillars and that stupid spot in the passenger door.


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Anyway, now I've gotta kill a couple rattles up front, and for now I think *I'm going to give the MS-8 another shot* with the new gear and see how it sounds.


so you're giving up?:laugh::laugh:


There is a floor vent attachment under the dash that tends to rattle. Wires and holder in Kick panel tends to rattle
also, check the airbag connector above the glove box. sometimes it gets loose and can rattle around.

Most rattles seem to be door related tho. upper right hand side


----------



## strakele

Mic10is said:


> so you're giving up?:laugh::laugh:


lol nah, just want to be able to use both front and rear subs for a while until the new wave of 8ch processors comes out. Right now, only options are MS-8, BitOne, and H700/701 as far as I know. And I already have one of them, still installed and ready to go. It should be able to correct the phasing issues caused by the odd order crossover slopes I plan to use (...admittedly because it won't let me fully customize the crossover points.. ) and whatever other issues that may arise from having front and rear subs.

I plan on lifting up the whole top dash panel and putting a layer or 2 of CCF in there, as well as tightly wrapping the wires coming off the stereo. I definitely know the upper right corner door rattle you speak of... not looking forward to trying to get to that one. I think some of the other dash vents rattle too. This'll probably be a Thanksgiving break project.


----------



## decibelle

Mic10is said:


> Most rattles seem to be door related tho. upper right hand side


This is exactly what I'm hearing when I'm in his car. That and b-pillars.


----------



## Mic10is

H700 would allow you to use both. Use front sub on either center/sub out and rear subs on the other channels. U could run both at the same time or one or the other.
would allow you to shut down one sub for judging if you wanted to and turn them back on later for driving

its how I ran my set up in my BMW.


----------



## strakele

That's exactly how I plan on doing it. 

I just already have the MS-8, which is why I was gonna temporarily use that to see how it does until the new line of processors comes out. Mosconi 6to8, H800, 360.3, etc.


----------



## quickaudi07

H800 is already out  you could pick one up for about 800$ to 1200$ 

I though I'll share that with you.


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the post. I have been following the H800 thread and I'm not interested in purchasing this unit until it is available in the US and has been proven to be free of all the initial problems that it had.


----------



## strakele

Alright, here's some more updates. These are all cell phone pics but the camera in my new phone is pretty good so hopefully they look like all the others.

First off is a quick shot of the back of the removable grill (this is for you Jon) after attaching the carpet to the grill mesh itself.










Sub grill reinstalled and new floor mat for the front:



















Last evening/night, I installed my Arc KS300.2 to power the new front sub, so I can use the Clarion DPX for the rear subs again, and wired it all back to the MS-8 so I can get everything playing. It was night by the time it was all done, so excuse the low light pics.

First, new distribution block added in line with my main power cable to get power to the new amp, since the other one under my trunk floor was already full.










Right seat removed and amp mounted and wired:










Still had some leftover Techflex and heat shrink from doing the trunk, so I was able to keep my theme going.



















Seat bolted back down (and pushed all the way forward):










After getting everything connected, I reset the MS-8, and ran the calibration. After a couple tries, I got a setting that I liked. I have it set as a sub plus 3 way front stage, so the MS-8 thinks the Daytons are subs, the front sub is a midbass, the Ebonys are midranges, and the AR3K's are tweeters. Crossover points at 50, 80, and 350, all at 18dB. It sounds very good! I can't blame the MS-8 for pulling the stage to the right.. I told it I have stereo midbasses when I only have a single, so it's not hearing what it expects to hear. So the stage is a little far right (a little left balance, and it's better), but other than that... WOW. Kick drum impact is by far the best I've ever had. And it's all right up front! When I get a processor with more options, I will have the crossover between rear and front subs lower so there's absolutely no localization of the rear subs. But until then, I am very content. My only other complaint about the MS-8 is I have no snare drum. It sounds right.. nice and crisp. But zero body/impact. Snares and toms should ring through your chest at higher volume. And I've never been able to get the MS-8 to do it. Running just off the HU, it was easy.

And speaking of the HU.. I finally got the trim ring for it 










Anyway, that's the system as it stands now. New processor, and version 4.0 is complete!


----------



## strakele

The other night as I was updating my signature.. I realized that every single component in my car is a different brand... right down to distribution blocks and wire.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> The other night as I was updating my signature.. I realized that every single component in my car is a different brand... right down to distribution blocks and wire.


As long as your L & R drivers are of the same brand, you're good to go  

Kelvin


----------



## slade1274

I thought the right side drivers needed to be more efficient as they are farther from the primary listener?


----------



## strakele

Haha of course. Everyone's been doing it wrong!

Was wondering when I'd see you post in here again. How's Florida?


----------



## slade1274

Been lurking for the most part... adding my .02 whenever I think its value is required. 

Love the new sub box- good job. Next time I do glass, I'm going to try the epoxy resin as it "don't stink". Sure it's a bit more expensive, but in the overall scheme of things the incremental cost isn't too bad. Of course, the milkshake still requires matching resin if you are going with the mass available bondo-glass; so that will still stink.


----------



## ErinH

Take a lesson from me: get the 4:1 epoxy. 3:1 takes days even in the hot Alabama summer.


----------



## strakele

Hmm maybe we'll try that for Ally's pillars.. I can't think of anything else I'll need to glass in this car... At least for the foreseeable future.


----------



## decibelle

Even on a much colder day (such as late November) you'd still recommend the 4:1 poxy? Maybe I'm not understanding this right...


----------



## ecbmxer

So is your setup currently the Ebony midbass and the XR (or are they AR?) widebands? And you decided that you liked the Ebonies better than the XR 6.5" drivers? I only ask because I have the Ebony midbass drivers now and they sound great to me, but I admit I was curious about what the XR midbass was like in comparison. I plan to upgrade to the XR widebands from my Trinity widebands eventually to get a bit better off axis/top end response, but was undecided if I wanted to keep the Ebonies. Killer setup, I like it!


----------



## strakele

I'm using Ebony midbass and AR3K widebanders. I had previously used the AR6Ks in the doors. The Ebonys have more midbass than the AR6Ks in my experience. I haven't personally used the XRs, but I have heard a few cars with them and they had solid midbass.


----------



## bertholomey

Thank you for the [extended] demo last night. I really like the sound of the floorboard mounted sub! It gives that visceral impact that you were striving for. As we discussed last night, the 6.5's are being asked to do what they are really good at. The 10 is a great bridge between the subs and the midbass. I really liked the balance between the bass in the front of the car and the rear. I also liked the fact that the 10 provided impact on bass guitar / stand up bass.... not just percussion. Great addition to your system, and good application of equipment to help reproduce the music you enjoy at the volumes you enjoy playing it.


----------



## ecbmxer

strakele said:


> I'm using Ebony midbass and AR3K widebanders. I had previously used the AR6Ks in the doors. The Ebonys have more midbass than the AR6Ks in my experience. I haven't personally used the XRs, but I have heard a few cars with them and they had solid midbass.


Cool thanks! I never really understood the difference between the AR and XR, but I think either will be an upgrade from my Trinities for wideband duty in the sort of off axis arrangement I now have.


----------



## strakele

They are the same driver (basket, motor, etc) except for the cone and phase plug. The AR's have a woven Kevlar cone and aluminum phase plug whereas the XR's have a magnesium alloy cone and wood phase plug.

Glad you like the car Jason... should be even better next time!


----------



## strakele

Quick update:

After driving around for the last week, I can definitely say that my system is by far the most enjoyable to just drive and listen to as it has ever been. I finally have the impact that I've been searching for since I got into car audio. The best thing is, I get it at reasonable listening levels, not just when it's cranked to the max. I do still want more tuning options so I will be switching to a different processor, but for now, just for pure enjoyment, this current system is by far the best I've had, and to be honest, the best impact I've experienced in any car, period.


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> and to be honest, the best impact I've experienced in any car, period.


... and that is saying a lot considering the cars you have heard. 

As previously stated, I can attest to the impact


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> They are the same driver (basket, motor, etc) except for the cone and phase plug. The AR's have a woven Kevlar cone and aluminum phase plug whereas the XR's have a magnesium alloy cone and wood phase plug.
> 
> Glad you like the car Jason... should be even better next time!




^^

Also to add to your explanation, the XR's have a more extended high range frequency response compared to the AR's. Anyone looking to go tweeterless, then the XR's would be the better choice. Either driver could be used if a tweeter is involved.


----------



## strakele

Been a bit since any updates. All I've really done recently is add some more deadening in the doors and dash to kill some rattles...

...Until the Thanksgiving weekend. Millerlyte and I got some power tools and had some fun with some 15's.

Check out the thread here: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...iving-break-ib-install-driver-comparison.html

A couple teaser pics:


----------



## strakele

Testing the second one now:



















http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...-install-driver-comparison-3.html#post1495319


----------



## myhikingboots

Hey Strakele Looks like you been having some fun. Anyway if your looking for a cheap router, I happen to have a relatively old craftsman router that I never use anymore if you want it and enough scrap plexi glass to make a circle jig if you are interested. No charge! Shoot me a PM if your want it.

Chuck


----------



## strakele

PM sent!!


----------



## PottersField

So how much power are you feeding it? And just curious but how does it compare to the ported setup? You know, volume, clarity, etc. I'm running ported subs right now and IB is really starting to intrigue me.


----------



## strakele

The DB Drive K3 was wired to 8 ohms, so around 450-500W. The AE SBP-15 is a single 4 ohm, so a theoretical 850W. Even 450 is more than enough for IB, so I doubt they're seeing much more than 200W at any given time.

Most of my thoughts and more pictures are posted in the IB thread I linked to, since, for now, this is not a permanent install in my car. Just used to test some subs my girlfriend had.

Volume has been just as good as sealed 10's, ported 10's, and sealed 12's I've had in the past. No complaints regarding output. And they do it while using less power.

Clarity is quite outstanding. We have tested both subs at multiple crossover points with and without my front mounted sub, using MS-8 processing. We're now going back and testing the subs using the built in processing of the 9887, just so we know exactly how much (little) EQ is being applied to them, to ensure it's a fair test.

Further comments will still be posted in that thread. But to answer your question, I think this temporary test has prompted me to swap the ported Daytons for a single 15 or pair of 12" subs infinite baffle, which will be fully detailed in this thread when I do it


----------



## strakele

To anyone who is following this thread, mind taking a look at my post here and help me choose the IB sub for my new trunk install? Thanks

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...-baffle-subwoofers-ae-vs-fi-vs-dayton-vs.html


----------



## subwoofery

So you got your toms-snares issue resolved? 

Kelvin


----------



## decibelle

If the tune is from the 9887, yes, it sounds (and feels) significantly more punchy. It's just with the MS-8 that he can't remedy that particular aspect, and it doesn't appear to have a way to fix that. Hopefully the new Helix, if one of us can get a hold of one in time, will provide a better solution.


----------



## strakele

That was an issue I was trying to find a solution for while at the same time doing the IB test. Now that I have it switched over to the 9887, it sounds like I want it to again.

I will be looking for a new processor for this season, mostly because the MS-8 doesn't know what to do with the front sub. (I treat it as a mono midbass...)


----------



## strakele

Not much to report as far as changes, but since I haven't been able to find a pair of IB15's yet for my trunk build, I figured I'd sit down and at least plan out how I wanted to look.

So, starting from the base sketch posted in Kirk's TL build, I got to work. The plan is to have the subs mounted similar to how they were for the IB test, right against the back seat. Then there will be a wall behind them to protect from stuff in the trunk. This wall will have a removable panel to get viewing access to the back of the subs.

So the trunk in normal mode will be like this:










Pop off the panel and carpet, and it'll be like this:










Dotted lines showing how the actual floor of the trunk goes. X-ray view.










Was also considering the subs at a slight inward angle, but I don't think this is gonna happen...










The Mitsu logo could be carbon fiber or a grill to vent the subs, in addition to the slots for the trunk bars as well as the fact that they'll vent into the spare tire well. Not decided on that yet.




Does anyone have some AE IB15's they want to sell me?


----------



## strakele

Touch of color thrown in to help visualize:










Covers off:










Red border around opening for the subs I'm thinking will be edge lit plexi. Was originally planning on a plexi wall all the way across behind the cover similar to my amps, but having it open will allow me to leave the cover off to give the subs as much breathing room as possible for judging, as well as allowing much easier maintenance.

Comments? Suggestions?


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> Comments? Suggestions?



Looks like ass.












Also, I prefer the look of them firing straight forward. And also, in regards to the Mitsu grill-logo: that would be a bad ass location to do some red LED backlighting through the black grill.


----------



## Cruzer

should be sweet.

what program u using to make these pictures?

why the move to IB?

the dayton box was virtually IB as far as space taken up and looks, i liked it, granted IB is probably better for SQ and less EQ


----------



## strakele

More output. Cleaner output. Less EQ needed and less excursion required. Shallow roll off slope. Looks cool. Something to do with all the tools we just got. Learn wood working. Build something completely myself.

Used Paint.NET for the pics. Like a very basic photoshop.


----------



## Salami

You forgot "give girl reason to poke fun".


----------



## strakele

Haha yeah. Guess that should be a given


----------



## bertholomey

I really like the look of this lay out. Can I assume that the relative spacing in the diagram reflects closely to the actual measurements in the trunk? Your trunk is probably much deeper than mine, but mine is always twice as big in my mind then it is in reality (speaking car audio installation here). If everything will fit as it is shown in the diagram, I think it will look and sound incredible. I like the glowing Mitzu logo idea as well


----------



## strakele

Good thinking J. I used the basic shape of the layout from Kirk's build thread to get a general idea, but last night after looking at my car, I started a version that's actually based on my specific trunk. Will post when finished.

I'd say your trunk is deeper than mine. I know EXACTLY how you feel regarding it seeming much bigger than it is. I've been thinking about this design and how cool it will look a lot, and every time I open my trunk I think wow, this is smaller than I remember it. I blame it on Ally's car and looking at all of Bing's builds in Infitinty G cars and stuff like that with big trunks.


----------



## strakele

Here's the redone version that should be much more to scale in my trunk. I traced the outline of a photo I took.


----------



## Mic10is

to view both subs completely, the opening would have to go to almost each trunk lid arm.


----------



## rex450se

Love the way this is going. Subscribed

Victor


----------



## strakele

Mic, the center piece of my floor is the same width as the opening between the trunk and cabin, so it should be pretty close. You probably won't be able to see every inch of both of them all at the same time, but if you move your head an inch or 2, it should be alright. It's hard to draw this out before having subs in hand...


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> I blame it on Ally's car and looking at all of Bing's builds in Infitinty G cars and stuff like that with big trunks.


It's always my fault, isn't it


----------



## strakele

In short, yes


----------



## bertholomey

Got a chance to listen to a few tracks in the Lancer last night. Again phenomenal impact from the midbass, front sub, and rear subs. The AR's continue to be amazing at wideband duties. I think I certainly like the sound of the system sans MS-8. Of course I am very excited to hear the car again once you get the processor you mentioned. I hope to get an extended audition during a future trip to ATL. Difficult to get in 3 excellent cars in two hours


----------



## strakele

Thanks Jason. Should be quite a difference next time you hear it!


----------



## pionkej

strakele said:


> Thanks Jason. Should be quite a difference next time you hear it!


Are you going with the Helix...or are you keeping it a secret until you have it installed?


----------



## decibelle

bertholomey said:


> Got a chance to listen to a few tracks in the Lancer last night. Again phenomenal impact from the midbass, front sub, and rear subs. The AR's continue to be amazing at wideband duties. I think I certainly like the sound of the system sans MS-8. Of course I am very excited to hear the car again once you get the processor you mentioned. I hope to get an extended audition during a future trip to ATL. Difficult to get in 3 excellent cars in two hours


Since the two of us are likely going to be running the same processor, it looks like you're gonna have to choose a favorite pretty soon 

Also, to stay on topic, I do agree it sounds a lot better without the MS-8 gimping it up. Much more impact that way.


----------



## wdemetrius1

^^
I definitely agree with what is said above. From the first note that I heard, "I was like WOW"!!! The impact is incredible in your car. Having heard your car with and without the MS8, I have to say from the amount of impact that you are getting alone, is enough for me to say that I think I like it better without. Definitely looking forward to your future processing.


----------



## strakele

Well, I managed to take first place out of 8 at FreezeFest yesterday! I was extremely pleased with the result. And now with the judge's comments, I'm even more pumped to get my new trunk install done and ready to rock for spring break. Thanks to everyone who listened and gave their impressions.


----------



## pionkej

strakele said:


> Well, I managed to take first place out of 8 at FreezeFest yesterday! I was extremely pleased with the result. And now with the judge's comments, I'm even more pumped to get my new trunk install done and ready to rock for spring break. Thanks to everyone who listened and gave their impressions.


Congrats again man. That sub up front was something really cool. Lots of impact and no tactile cues from behind...very nice it was.


----------



## strakele

Thanks John. It was cool getting to hear your system taking full advantage of what an MS-8 can do compared to mine when I was just using it for a 2-way plus sub. I'll be interested to see what happens if you try lower crossover points on your midbasses.


----------



## myhikingboots

Awesome dude! There is a slight chance I may make it to the GTG on Saturday. I don't fly out until Monday now. So what comments did the judges give you, and is your processor still a big secret?

I'm still piecing my system together. Got to stay on budget. But I did finally finish purchasing my front stage. I went with HAT L3SE mids and L1V2 tweets to go along with the ID 6x9s. I'll be installing in earnest when I get back from Vegas in a ccouple of weeks. Now if I can just decide on a head unit and processor. And now you've got me considering an upfront sub!


----------



## hybridamp

Nice install, wish I could hear it actually.


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. 

Chuck, hope you make it out to the GTG. Main comments were needs more subbass and more volume. There were several other small tweaks that need to be done, and none of them should be difficult to implement. Processor isn't really a secret, but I'm going to post more info about that once I rebuild the trunk and have new pictures to add.


----------



## bertholomey

I got to hear this car again this Saturday, and I was very impressed. The new tune really opened things up, and it has a liveliness to it that is so exciting to listen to. 

Great balance between highs and lows with great staging. Once again, while I was listening, those debates about widebanders used from 300 and up were going through my head.... I thought it sounded brilliant - I don't discern all of the nastiness I'm supposed to hear with this type of set up - I just heard a fantastic system.


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the comments Jason. I always appreciate your feedback. Glad you were able to make it to the meet.


----------



## strakele

Haven't updated this in a while.

Since FreezeFest, I fixed the low bass issues and did one or two tweaks to the tune. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to finish the trunk build for SBN. I'm still trying to find a pair of IB15's. (BuickGN, if you're reading this, PM me buddy!) If anyone has a recommendation for a pair of 15's that would be great for IB and are less than $300, please let me know.

In other news, I came in 7th out of 10 at SBN. Had another 14 point spread on the score sheets..  It was a fun trip though, and I got to see and hear a lot of cool stuff.

While I continue to wait on the trunk install, I decided on another project. Contrary to my usual, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude, I wanted to toy around with one of my Dayton HO 10's that I still have sitting here. So thus began a 12-hour, 3-person, food and sleep-deprived job. The project? Replacing a 10 inch subwoofer with another 10 inch subwoofer.

Yep, you read that right. Why so long and so much work for something that should have taken about 2 minutes? It all starts with the fact that it's really easy to cut material out, but it's a ***** to try to put it back.

After glassing the front sub enclosure, I never actually measured how big it was. I was bored this weekend and was itching to work on something, so I yanked it out to check. I measured it to be about .48 cubic feet. It's also 7 inches deep at the shallowest spot, and gets deeper from there. When I first started the front sub project, I was looking only at shallow mount subs. But heck, with 7+ inches of depth, I could fit darn near any full size 10 that would work in that airspace. Conveniently, I happened to have a nice, full size, low distortion sub sitting here. But extremely inconveniently, the cutout for the existing SB Acoustics sub was too big for the Dayton to mount to. I figured I'd add some supports from the back, and rout out a cool design. This is what I envisioned:










Didn't think it would be too hard. But oh how wrong I was.


Mark and I sat around for a while thinking about how to do it, and he finally came up with the solution. I don't have a lot of pictures of this, but here's what happened: The carpet was removed, and a rough square was cut out of the front of the box. Then a larger shape was routed out 1/2, leaving it looking like this:










Ally said it looked like an old TV.

Then a shape matching the inside hole was cut from 3/4" MDF for the sub to mount to. It was hammered into the hole and bondo/glassed on both sides. Then another shape was cut from 1/2" MDF to go into the routed out portion, leaving space for the sub to be countersunk. This was bondo/glassed/screwed to the replacement baffle to give it full support. Then the whole thing was sanded, filled, and smoothed, then carpet was reapplied.

A bit of non-hardening clay for a nice gasket around the sub flange, and it's back together.



















So there you have it. A 10" speaker replaced with another 10" speaker. 

Luckily, this isn't the time where I say I liked it better how it was before. (I think Ally and Mark would have killed me, and I think I would have just blown this box to smithereens.) Since I have the space to fit a full size sub, I like being able to take advantage of it. The Dayton is a little more efficient, has a little more xmax, has a low distortion motor, and works very well in the airspace that I have. In reality, this means it can play lower with more output. I like it. Here's how they model in the given enclosure with the power I have available:










Now if I could just find some nice 15's...


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Haven't updated this in a while.
> 
> Since FreezeFest, I fixed the low bass issues and did one or two tweaks to the tune. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to finish the trunk build for SBN. I'm still trying to find a pair of IB15's. (BuickGN, if you're reading this, PM me buddy!) If anyone has a recommendation for a pair of 15's that would be great for IB and are less than $300, please let me know...
> 
> ...Now if I could just find some nice 15's...


Since you like Dayton, why not go with the Dayton RSS390HF-4 - closest specs I've found to the SPB15 and IB15A from AE... wait... didn't you start a thread on this and didn't I already gave you this suggestion?  

Kelvin


----------



## strakele

Haha yeah, I'm still looking. Those Daytons are about $50 out of price range and really heavy. I was trying to get something that would save some weight too. A pair of IB15's is just a bit heavier than one of the Dayton HF's. I suppose I could do a single, but I really want a pair..


----------



## Notloudenuf

Duh, you just needed a lumber stretcher. Everybody knows that!!!

www.lumberstretcher.com


----------



## JayinMI

Are those the same guys who make the 6x9 holesaw?

Jay


----------



## strakele

Is a lumber stretcher powered by pneumatic fluid? Probably need a left handed screw driver to operate it.


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> I figured I'd add some supports from the back, and rout out a cool design. This is what I envisioned:


Fix'd



strakele said:


> (I think Ally and Mark would have killed me, and I think I would have just blown this box to smithereens.)


You also forgot to mention you kept Mark and I up until 2am to enlist us in your forced-search-and-rescue unit for your running board trim panel... *which you had left sitting outside my apartment sixty miles away.* :mean:



That said, I think it looks nice


----------



## DAT

strakele said:


> Well, I managed to take first place out of 8 at FreezeFest yesterday! I was extremely pleased with the result. And now with the judge's comments, I'm even more pumped to get my new trunk install done and ready to rock for spring break. Thanks to everyone who listened and gave their impressions.


Awesome !

Now i have to figure out a time to meet some of you guys, and Ally at a show !!


----------



## strakele

Yeah we're looking forward to meeting you too, Dave. Sounds like your car will be a force to be reckoned with as well!


----------



## chinaman

nice SEAS tweeters!


----------



## decibelle

chinaman said:


> nice SEAS tweeters!





Where? Who?


----------



## strakele

chinaman said:


> nice SEAS tweeters!


Yeah I definitely did like them back when I was still using them over a year ago


----------



## strakele

Alright guys, BIG update in the works. Changes just about everywhere.

On the agenda:

- Some new subwoofers
- New sub install
- Some new amplifiers
- Completely new amp rack
- New trunk wall
- Some new wiring
- Some more flash in the install
- Some speaker changes

Deadline to have it done and tuned is May 12 for the NC meet. Right now I'm about 1/3 of the way there. After next week, I'll have a solid uninterrupted week to finish it. 

Some changes to make things better for competition, some just because I want to. I'm doing all of the work myself this time using techniques and ideas learned mostly from this forum.


----------



## decibelle

Boring.


----------



## strakele

At least mine won't involve dinosaurs and duct tape..


----------



## decibelle

Umm, yeah. Boring!








I guess I'll be nice and admit that his plans are kind of cool.


----------



## Notloudenuf

Pics or this never happened.


And waiting until May 12th does NOT count.


----------



## bertholomey

This is fantastic - another great reason that I am glad we are having a Spring NC meet. I can't wait to see / hear the improvements you and all the other peeps have made.


----------



## The Drake

Lookin forward to hearing your new setup at the meet. Any teasers you can give for those of us that dont want to wait until the 12th?


----------



## strakele

It will look better and sound better than last time


----------



## DAT

What's you next MECA show you will be at ?

Excited to see upgraded pics


----------



## strakele

I'll be at the next one in Texas when I'm back home for the summer.


----------



## SouthSyde

strakele said:


> I'll be at the next one in Texas when I'm back home for the summer.


Denison?


----------



## strakele

Yep, that's the one.


----------



## WRX2010

strakele said:


> Haha yeah, I'm still looking. Those Daytons are about $50 out of price range and really heavy. I was trying to get something that would save some weight too. A pair of IB15's is just a bit heavier than one of the Dayton HF's. I suppose I could do a single, but I really want a pair..


Aaron has his IDQ 15s from his original install for sale right now $200 plus shipping for the pair. here is the thread: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/car-audio-classifieds/128267-id-idq8-idq15.html


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the link. But as of last Saturday I'm now set as far as subs go.


----------



## SouthSyde

strakele said:


> Yep, that's the one.


I may see you up there...


----------



## strakele

Hey everyone. Here is an update for the weekend.

Last night instead of studying for exams I was out working on my project. Then I locked my keys in my trunk and I forgot all about it until this morning. When I realized my terrible mistake, I panicked. What ever was I going to do?!

Then I remembered, hey, I know, I'll just make Ally do it while I stand around and watch! That was such a good idea, I gave myself a pat on the back when she wasn't looking. So I woke Ally up and pleaded with her to save my stupid butt. She was gracious enough to go get a slim jim for me but only after did I tell her that my lock needs to pull sideways and not up, lol! Oops :blush:

So then I made her drive all the way out to my apartment to pick up the spare key, lol. Thanks to my remarkable problem-solving skills, everything turned out okay. Now I just need to find my amplifier covers. 

Wait, never mind - I'll just have Ally do it for me! Sure is good to be king.


I am Grayson and I approve this message.




:::::::::::::I am actually Grayson and I do not approve the above message:::::::::::::


----------



## decibelle

Oh Grayson, stop it, you're giving me too much credit :blush: You're so good to me


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> Wait, never mind - I'll just have Ally do it for me! Sure is good to be king.
> 
> 
> I am Grayson and I approve this message.


PRICELESS!



millerlyte said:


> Oh Grayson, stop it, you're giving me too much credit :blush: You're so good to me


WOW....Grayson, did you log in as Ally?


----------



## decibelle

Nah, it's all yours truly.


----------



## strakele

Apparently I have been massively trolled on my own account.

Let this serve as a reminder to everybody not to leave your computer logged on when you aren't at it... even around people you trust


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> :::::::::::::I am actually Grayson and I do not approve the above message:::::::::::::





millerlyte said:


> Nah, it's all yours truly.


Ok...now the slow kid in the audience is catching on......well played


----------



## strakele

It's ok Jason. If you ignore the little troll, maybe she'll stop.

Anyway, just wanted to give a say thanks to Chuck for helping procure some material I needed and teaching me how to work with it.

More boxes coming in the mail this week to get this finished up. Then the pics will come


----------



## myhikingboots

Your welcome and I'm glad to part with what little knowledge I can to an enthusiastic learner even though you were 2 hours late! Can't wait to see the finished product and hopefully get a little seat time when you get that monster cranked!

And now I owe you a thanks for all of your expertise on my upcoming build!

Chuck


----------



## strakele

Yeah, my apologies for being late.. See above for Ally's version of how that went...

Anyway, no problem on the ideas, and you'll probably be one of the first ones to hear it


----------



## pionkej

I'm excited to see these updates. I have a few of my own on the way. I'm wondering how different our installs will be from the last time we met up.


----------



## strakele

It will look the same from the drivers seat. That's about it though. Everything else will be different.


----------



## strakele

Halfway done. Now on to the amp rack...




Debating whether or not to post progress pics or just everything all at once.


----------



## DAT

strakele said:


> Halfway done. Now on to the amp rack...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Debating whether or not to post progress pics or just everything all at once.


Hmm your choice.....


----------



## Salami

"Or are you a tease?"
"She's a tease."
"I'm sure. Why don't you just forget it."
"Oh, you're a tease and you know it."


----------



## strakele

Haha alright, I'm in the process of typing up everything I've done so far.


----------



## strakele

Alright, so here’s the build log of the biggest car audio project I’ve taken on by myself. This first post will be mostly text, old pictures, and explanations, so if you just want new pics, keep scrolling. As stated on the previous page, changes made are:

1.	New subwoofers
2.	New sub install
3.	New trunk wall
4.	New amplifiers
5.	Completely new amp rack
6.	New wiring
7.	Some more flash in the install

To start off, here is what the last completed install looked like:




























Amp rack built by Mark Brooks, ported enclosure for Dayton HO’s built by Ryan Slade. Looked good, sounded good.

When Ally decided on an infinite baffle subwoofer setup in her car, we decided to test her old sub, a DB Drive K3 15D4 against her new Acoustic Elegance SBP-15 in my car while she ironed out the details of her install, which led to this thread: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...iving-break-ib-install-driver-comparison.html

So after that, the DB Drive sub stayed in my car for a long time, and was used at FreezeFest and SBN, just like this:










I liked the ability of an IB setup to play so clean and low, so I wanted my next install to include a pair of IB15’s. The Acoustic Elegance ones are incredibly hard to find, so I looked into Fi, Dayton, IA, SSA, Gladen, JBL, Image Dynamics, and probably some others. I had response graphs out the wazoo, and probably any of them would have been a good choice, but in the back of my mind, I still wanted AE subs, so I held off on that purchase for months longer than I intended.

While waiting, I drew up how it should look. I planned on building a wall in front of the subs with a removable grill to protect them, just like this:



















So that takes care of changes 1, 2, and 3.


Fast forward like 3 months to the Spring Fling competition in Tennessee, and my right side amp gets fried. My fault, but that certainly throws a wrench in the gears. They don’t make the MB Quart DSC4125’s I was using anymore. I was planning on switching amps eventually, but certainly not this soon.

Couple fried FETs:










So quickly to the drawing board, I figured I’d just replace the 2 front stage amps with something that’d be a drop in replacement. But since my accident at the competition was due to the circuit boards being exposed, I decided the next install would have the covers remain on the amps. Then came deciding on which amps to get. I played around with a design involving more Clarion DPX amps to match the subwoofer amplifier that I thought would look pretty cool. I’ve always been more in the “a watt is a watt, amps basically sound the same” camp. But for this one, after some convincing, I decided to try some high end amps after I thought of a way to make them look good too.

After seeing some of the awesome builds on this site, especially those from Bing, I wanted to emulate some of the techniques and design ideas in my own build, doing the work myself, especially now that I have a router, courtesy of Chuck. So that takes care of my reasoning behind changes 4 – 7. There may or may not be some speaker updates coming as well.


----------



## strakele

After replacing the front sub with the Dayton, I still felt like working on stuff, so I started on the wall that would go behind the subs. The goal was for everything to go together like the previous install without screws so panels could be removed quickly by hand if need be. This piece would be braced between the amp rack on the bottom and the rear center seatbelt mechanism on top.

A few cardboard templates later, and I had this:










And here it is in the car:










It was during this that I learned my trunk is not symmetrical at all. The curves on the sides are completely different, and the spots that I used to measure where the cutout would go are obviously not the same difference from the center, evidenced by the unequal spacing of the cutout. Lame.

Take 2: Wall is taller, cutout is taller and narrower, and the side curves fit better. Win, win, win.










So then a floor piece was cut to cover the wires and brace against the wall and the baffle to support them.










And it was carpeted:










The original plan was to have a thin trim ring press fit into the cutout in the wall, and another similar piece covered in carpet and grill mesh that would press fit in the cutout to protect the subs. The stupid trim rings like this gave me fits. I could never cut them to exactly the right size.










It’d look perfect, but then it’d flex a tiny bit when fit into the cutout since it was so thin. I tried making the grill with a piece this thin as well and it was also too flimsy. I went through about 5 of these rings before I gave up and did it a better way.



Now, back in time again, Ally happened to see the AE IB15’s pop up in the classifieds a few weeks ago, 5 minutes after they were posted. I emailed the seller ASAP and was able to pick them up despite like 25 other people wanting them. Huge victory for my install thanks to her being bored.

So the day I got them, I built a baffle out of two ¾” sheets of MDF screwed and glued together just like my test baffle, except cut much cleaner this time and with nicely countersunk screws. Carpeted on both sides since it’ll be viewable from both sides, and attached to the car using twice as many brackets as the test baffle, as well as additional screws. Sealing was done in the same was before with thick compressible foam, just with carpet over it this time. The baffle is completely sealed, and there is no messy expanding foam in this install.

Here’s the baffle in the car with the subs mounted:










I love the machined spokes of the sub baskets.










And from the cabin side, before the beauty panel. These things are huge!










Big difference from the pair of 10’s that were there before…


----------



## strakele

Some more boring stuff before I get to the cool stuff:

The wall was carpeted and checked for fitment in the car:










Speaker wire for the subs techflexed and heat shrunk:










Color coded just like the rest of the wires:











Now, to go with the black amps that I'd be using, I decided on silver carbon fiber vinyl to provide a nice contrast with the dark equipment and dark carpet. Here it is applied to the trim ring, which I got right this time routing out a portion of the wall on the back for it to fit in:










Close up of the pattern:










You'll see more of that stuff later.

Next, it was time for the grill to cover the subs. I used some black diamond mesh grill with around 72% open area. This should breathe enough so that the subs are still IB even when the grill is in place.










It was cut and attached to another 1/4" MDF ring, then carpeted. Here's a close up from the back:










To add some visual excitement, I decided to do some raised lettering with the RALLI ///// ///// ART logo. This was painstakingly measured to scale, cut, carpeted, and applied to the grill. Here's the result:










And here it is pressed into the wall:










I have some tiny neodymium magnets to use if it won't stay press fit once the 1.79 square feet of cone area starts moving air.

The cool stuff will come next.


----------



## bertholomey

Awesome stuff G! Looking forward to the rest.


----------



## Mic10is

Impressive

Are you covering the front side so those brackets arent viewable?


----------



## strakele

Yes, there will be a trim panel that covers the brackets and flanges of the subs.


----------



## SouthSyde

Everything will be done by May 26th?


----------



## slade1274

Too many screws on the baffle. Press fit is so much cleaner.


----------



## Notloudenuf

strakele said:


> Couple fried FETs:


Outchie! Did you drop a screw or something in here while it was powered up?


----------



## myhikingboots

Sweet. Turned out REAL nice! I hope you did well on your finals!


----------



## strakele

SouthSyde said:


> Everything will be done by May 26th?


May 12 is my self imposed deadline for the NC meet.



slade1274 said:


> Too many screws on the baffle. Press fit is so much cleaner.


I know right? But give me some credit, everything else will be press fit.



Notloudenuf said:


> Outchie! Did you drop a screw or something in here while it was powered up?


A wire touched something in there.



myhikingboots said:


> Sweet. Turned out REAL nice! I hope you did well on your finals!


Thanks, and yes I did.


----------



## DAT

Very Impressive work...


----------



## pionkej

Looks good man. I'm sure it feels great when you can look at it and say, "I did that". There's nothing wrong with getting help, but it feels that much better when you know you did the work yourself...especially when it turns out well. 

Can't wait to hear it too.


----------



## strakele

Amp rack is halfway done. Why is NOTHING in this trunk symmetrical? 

Still saving the cool pics for when it's all done.

So for now, here's an in progress pic of the grill I forgot to post:










Here's a power cable for the processor with an in line fuse since it won't have its own on the distribution block:










Here's making a power cord for a control module:










I've always felt like at certain frequencies some of the wires in my dash would rattle against stuff, so I finally did what I had been meaning to do for a while, which is cover them in foam:












Much more to come.


----------



## req

sweet build man. i had a great time at the meet - it was great to meet you, i knew i stumbled over this thread before too!

the car was real cool, it was interesting to hear _another lancer_ with a similar install too.

it will be interesting to see where you take this. until next time sir!!!


----------



## strakele

Thanks man! It was great meeting you as well. Glad you enjoyed the car. Seems like we have similar preferences as far as tuning, so I definitely liked yours as well.


I finished the trunk last night, and I'm extremely happy with how it came out. Pics coming soon.


----------



## abdulwq

nice clean install


----------



## strakele

Alright, I finally got around to taking and uploading all the pictures.

I was holding off on some of the details until I got it all done, but now it is. So, to pick up where I left off...

I wanted to use edge-lit plexi in this build after seeing such cool installs with it. Some of you may have caught it in one of the above pics, but there is a 1/2" plexi ring that is flush with the silver carbon fiber trim around the opening in the wall.

The plexi was rough cut:










Smoothed and sanded:










RGB LED strip applied to the outside:










Screwed to the wall and black tape applied:










Close up:










Each wire individually techflexed:










And test fit in the car:










Tried the LEDs too and they worked... for a while. The strip ended up cracking right at the beginning, so I had to cut off then resolder all the wires just ahead of the cut. It works again.. but that sure scared me.

LEDs will be powered and controlled by this unit:










IR remote mounted under the switch for the normal trunk light:


----------



## strakele

Now on to the amp rack.

After some consideration, I decided to replace the MB Quart Discus series amps with Mosconi One series 120.4's. The Clarion DPX11551 would remain the subwoofer amplifier, but the logo would be rotated and the cover painted black to match the color and texture of the Mosconis.

To gain a bit of extra trunk room, this amp rack is sunken slightly into the spare tire well, still retaining the tire itself.

Here's a shot of the floor piece. It sits on the tire itself on standoffs so wires can pass underneath.










Here's the piece that the amps will mount to:










Carpeted and spacers added to the sides so that the Mosconis and Clarion sit at exactly the same height:










Some holes drilled for wires and test fit with the amps. Note the black cover for the Clarion amp.










Mounting panel for the distribution block and LED control unit carpeted and standoffs added:










Mounting panel for the Mosconi 6to8 processor carpeted, standoffs added, wires zip tied:










Final mounting spot for amp rack and wiring:









Now for the main false floor piece that will cover everything with a cutout in the middle to show the amps.

Piece was cut and given a roundover:










Middle became the cover piece with raised Mitsubishi logo: (sorry for the dirty lens on this one)


----------



## strakele

Next up is the trim piece for the amplifiers. One of the most precise parts of the project.

A piece of 1/4" MDF was cut to fit perfectly around the amps:










Then trimmed to fit behind the main floor piece:










Next, the plexi to go around the amps was cut and sanded:










Trimmed so that LEDs fit perfectly around the perimeter:










LEDs attached with black tape:










Trim piece covered with silver CF vinyl and attached to the floor piece along with the plexi to check fitment:











Everything fitting correctly... begin final assembly.

Cover pieces for the distribution block and processor were cut and carpeted, and then everything put together.

The narrow floor piece that goes between the back of the wall and the baffle which is shown in the second post on this page is the "keystone" of the trunk install. Once the main floor piece is pressed down, this piece is pushed down and locks everything in place. It braces between the baffle and wall so that nothing can move. It's all very solid.





So here it is, the final trunk.

In full stealth mode:










Remove the carpet and you see the new false floor with the cutout and raised Mitsu logo:










Closer view:


----------



## strakele

Pop off the Ralliart grill and you see the AE IB15's on the 1.5" baffle through the cutout in the wall, trimmed by the silver carbon fiber:



















Remove the cover piece for the amps, and you see the two Mosconi One 120.4's and the custom painted Clarion DPX11551 trimmed in silver carbon fiber vinyl.










Both together:





















And now for the lighting:

Red (because it looks awesome):



















White (because it really lights up the silver trim)



















Blue (because the Clarion logo lights up blue)












It can do other colors too, but those are my favorites.





So there you have it... the product of 2 solid weeks of work. I'm very happy with how it came out and proud to be able to say I did it all myself. This has definitely given me even more respect for the work that installers do. My fingers and back and legs and everything have been so sore at the end of each day. 

Thanks again to Chuck for the plexiglass and having all the right tools to work with it. And of course to Ally for being the invaluable extra set of hands whenever I needed and someone to bounce ideas off of (even though she'll tell you I never listened to her)

Anyway, I think it looks good and it also sounds fantastic. I'm very happy with the new amps and subs. I'm going to a competition this weekend so I'll see if the judge agrees.


----------



## DAT

Dang, TEAM AP always has the best Installs, did Ally do this for you?

j/k Nice work!


----------



## m0sdef

Install looks great. Those AE IB15's look so sexy!


----------



## strakele

DAT said:


> Dang, TEAM AP always has the best Installs, did Ally do this for you?
> 
> j/k Nice work!


Haha thanks. There were probably dozens of times when she wanted to drag me away from it. But she was a big help when I needed it.

Anyway, first thing I did after this was completed was drive 800 miles in one day with a big old suitcase in the trunk. It passed this test with no damage or overheating or anything, so I think it's good to go.

I do still have to do the trim panel for the subs on the cabin side, but I'm gonna take a bit of time to just enjoy it before anything else.





m0sdef said:


> Install looks great. Those AE IB15's look so sexy!


Thanks and I agree. I love how the light reflects off the backs of the spokes.


----------



## Notloudenuf

Excellent work Grayson.
Looking forward to checking out the sound of those new Mosconi amps.


----------



## myhikingboots

Looks great dude! If all of your other career plans fall through you may have a future in fabrication! Good luck at the competition.

Sorry we couldn't get together, I really wanted to hear it. Have a great summer and I'll see you in the Fall.

Chuck


----------



## pionkej

Looks great man. Looking forward to seeing/hearing the changes. Are you and Ally planning to make it down (or left and up a bit) for the Vinny?


----------



## Mic10is

Nice work:2thumbsup:


----------



## slade1274

Nice!


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys.

John, I think Ally will be there, but I'm back in Texas for the summer so I won't be able to make the Vinny.


----------



## DAT

strakele said:


> Thanks guys.
> 
> John, I think Ally will be there, but I'm back in Texas for the summer so I won't be able to make the Vinny.


Man, I thought for sure I'd get to see your Car at Vinny.


----------



## ErinH

strakele said:


> Thanks guys.
> 
> John, I think Ally will be there, but I'm back in Texas for the summer so I won't be able to make the Vinny.


Bummer! Was looking forward to chatting. I'm hoping the turnout at the Vinny will be better than it was last year. Sucks you can't make it. 


Sent from my iPhone. Pardon the grammar.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Looks great man. Great work. I like the color match Clarion amp, looks very nice, very nice indeed!! Way to go sir.


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## strakele

Dave and Erin I'll be back in Georgia at the end of July and going to events in the AL/TN/SC area.


----------



## slade1274

You taught the boy well Mark.


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## SouthSyde

Dang that looks nice! Hope to hear it at Denison this weekend


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## strakele

I still plan to be there!


----------



## bertholomey

This does look fantastic! I had a preview at the NC Meet, and I was impressed before it was even done. 

The best part to me was how the system sounds. You have done very well with the equipment choices, the install and the tune. I'm looking forward to my next demo!


----------



## wdemetrius1

I'm impressed. Very nice Grayson!


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. Looking forward to hearing your cars again as well.


----------



## decibelle

The past few days I've really been close to making a sarcastic remark on his install, as per usual. 

But as much as it pains me, I can't. I basically oversaw every single thing he did in this project, and I am thoroughly impressed with how ambitious and diligent he was during the two straight weeks he worked on this. He was up at midnight spending quality time with the router and didn't even realize the time. He actually became known throughout my apartment building and we had _multiple_ strangers approach him and go, "Hey man, I keep seeing you working on something up there every day, whatcha doing?" 
And Grayson, I've already had a guy ask what happened to you since coming back here. 

It's also worth noting that, especially for someone who's never done fabrication before, how literally perfect the whole install is. To the one-sixteenth of an inch perfect. More impressive yet is how seldom he screwed anything up. The project's complexity is not nearly justified in the pictures here.

Here's the aftermath of the install left on my porch for me to clean up (thanks dear):

The table used to be white, and there used to be a floor. Now...


















not so much. But hey... the install is nice.


----------



## Notloudenuf

millerlyte said:


> The past few days I've really been close to making a sarcastic remark on his install, as per usual.
> 
> But as much as it pains me, I can't. I basically oversaw every single thing he did in this project, and I am thoroughly impressed with how ambitious and diligent he was during the two straight weeks he worked on this. He was up at midnight spending quality time with the router and didn't even realize the time. He actually became known throughout my apartment building and we had _multiple_ strangers approach him and go, "Hey man, I keep seeing you working on something up there every day, whatcha doing?"
> And Grayson, I've already had a guy ask what happened to you since coming back here.
> 
> It's also worth noting that, especially for someone who's never done fabrication before, how literally perfect the whole install is. To the one-sixteenth of an inch perfect. More impressive yet is how seldom he screwed anything up. The project's complexity is not nearly justified in the pictures here.
> 
> Here's the aftermath of the install left on my porch for me to clean up (thanks dear):
> 
> But hey... the install is nice.


This is high praise. Ally normally doesn't like anything 

This install is something you can be proud of for years to come....or at least until you change it :laugh:


----------



## sydmonster

Looking back and to what you have now, this car has been a credit to you and your hard work!! Impressive. You should be proud!


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## strakele

Thank you sir. It sure has come a long way since a couple of Alpine Type R's in a prefab box in the trunk.


----------



## jgustin

Grayson,
Thanks so much for the demo last week. I can't express how blown away I was! I'm secretly trying to figure out how to fit a couple of 15's in my truck 
How did the competition go this weekend?


----------



## strakele

Glad you enjoyed it. Competition went well - I took first in modified and had the second highest score of the day behind Mark Eldridges' Nascar.


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> Competition went well - I took first in modified and had the second highest score of the day behind Mark Eldridges' Nascar.


SWEET!


----------



## strakele

Little update - took first, phat car, and SQ best of show at the last show in Oklahoma, so I'm now qualified for finals. Tune keeps getting better, but it's still got more to go if I'm gonna have a chance against some of the big names.

And for the Texas/Oklahoma guys who might see this, check out this thread and see if you can make it!

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum.../128557-north-texas-meet-mid-june-2012-a.html

Details finalized on page 2.


----------



## ErinH

Congrats. Todd said your car has a lot of potential.


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## strakele

Thanks. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on it sometime later in the year at one of the TN shows or something since you never got to hear it at Freezefest.


----------



## wdemetrius1

strakele said:


> Little update - took first, phat car, and SQ best of show at the last show in Oklahoma, so I'm now qualified for finals. Tune keeps getting better, but it's still got more to go if I'm gonna have a chance against some of the big names.
> 
> And for the Texas/Oklahoma guys who might see this, check out this thread and see if you can make it!
> 
> http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum.../128557-north-texas-meet-mid-june-2012-a.html
> 
> Details finalized on page 2.



Congratulations Grayson!!!


----------



## bertholomey

Way to go G! Fantastic results.


----------



## simplicityinsound

that looks absolutely great! i wish i can hear it! congrats on the results!!!!!!


----------



## DeanE10

This car is very impressive both in fabrication and sound... I got the full demo last weekend at the Plano meet. I am glad I made the trip. Greyson even helped me tune my truvk 

Thanks a TON Greyson, I enjoyed the demo, you have given this beginner some great insight.


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## strakele

Thanks Dean. Glad you could make it and glad you enjoyed the system. Yours definitely has potential, and you have some pretty cool plans for the future.


----------



## ledzpg

Hi,

Took me 3 days to read the whole thread, but it's worth it!
Congratulations! You did an amazing job in your car. Very impressive work, really.

I have an older Lancer (1994), but the main base are pretty much the same, so you gave me a LOT of ideas for my trunk.

I think I don't have the same patience as you to techflex all the wires, but I'd really like to do some better work on my trunk. Today I've disassembled all the interior to rewire the RCAs and clean the carpet . Upgraded my crossovers but I'm not satisfied with the visual result, even with most of wires well hidden under the trunk floor (my amps are attached to the back seat).


----------



## strakele

Thanks! Doing the techflex and stuff does take a lot of patience. Wiring is my least favorite part.

A good way to make it look better would be to use a wide, shallow box that goes all the way across the back of the trunk instead of the cube you're currently using. It'll take up less trunk space too.


----------



## ledzpg

Yes, I've noticed that...

This is a huge trapezoidal box with 43 liters (~1.52 ft³) that I've made after some simulations on bassbox, but I can't remember why I've made it *this* way instead of using all the 90cm of the trunk 

I'm planning to change this sub for a pair of 8" or even a pair of 10" with a box like yours, but with the amp rack built in the back of the box.
I'll measure everything and do some draws later, but I'll start to do something only after buying the new subs.

Can you post some pics of the zipties you've used? I couldn't notice the "head" of them on your pics of the MS-8 cables.


----------



## strakele

Most of the new ones in the trunk are standard 4" zip ties from home depot. No special head or anything. I rotated them all down under the wires specifically so you can't see the head. I think it looks cleaner that way.

I'd offer to sell you my old enclosure for the Dayton 10's that went all the way across the back, but I'm sure shipping to Brazil would make it totally not worth it. Building a box with a rack for the amps certainly wouldn't be a bad idea.


----------



## ledzpg

Shipping a box would cost something like $300! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

But how about you MS-8, do you still have it? Do you plan to sell it?


----------



## strakele

Sorry, the MS-8 was sold a while ago to make room for the 6to8.


----------



## strakele

Just a reminder - when you're working on a project, don't cheap out on the little stuff. I just had to replace a couple shoddy RCA plugs cause I didn't use the better ones the first time around (didn't feel like going to the store and spending more) for a connection that isn't ever visible.

Just do it right the first time.


----------



## wdemetrius1

I agree.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

strakele said:


> Just a reminder - when you're working on a project, don't cheap out on the little stuff. I just had to replace a couple shoddy RCA plugs cause I didn't use the better ones the first time around (didn't feel like going to the store and spending more) for a connection that isn't ever visible.
> 
> Just do it right the first time.


Preach on Brother Preach on. :bowdown:

Lords I say it all the time.


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> Thanks! Doing the techflex and stuff does take a lot of patience. Wiring is my least favorite part.
> 
> A good way to make it look better would be to use a wide, shallow box that goes all the way across the back of the trunk instead of the cube you're currently using. It'll take up less trunk space too.


 
That's interesting because it's one of my favorite things to do. Getting them techflexed, heat-shrinked and prettied up is relaxing for me. Now pulling wires in the car is a real PITA that I don't like.

I've gotta say Grayson, I'm really impressed with all that you've done here so far. Truly excellent work. I had considered going with a front sub in the same location in my Mazda 3 but havent pulled the trigger on that one. It does make it a little easier though when you have 8" midbasses vs the 6-7" to put it off. I've still got quite a bit of work to do on my own install as well, but I'm getting there. Congrats on a fine job !


----------



## strakele

I don't mind doing the heat shrink and stuff. Like you, I hate running wires in the car. I think good wiring looks really good, so I make myself do it, but it's a pain.

Thanks for the compliments though. Looking back, it sure has come a long way.

The front sub was one of my favorite additions - it made such a difference. If I could fit 8s though, it wouldn't have been as necessary. Though I remember you used to have a Lancer that you put SLS8s in...


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> Though I remember you used to have a Lancer that you put SLS8s in...


 
Yeah, that was MUCH more work then I had anticipated too :surprised:

I went from what you had, to this:


































Unfortunately, I dont think I ever got finished pics before I sold the car 
But you get the idea... Fitting 8's where they don't belong is no easy task.


----------



## strakele

Ah, too bad. I was gonna ask if you had finished pics.

A lot of the problem was how deep the SLSs were, right? If they had been a lot shallower (say less than 3" deep) would it have been easier?


----------



## hybridamp

Very nice job on the carbon fiber. Clean car!


----------



## strakele

Thanks. It's pretty good to work with if you have a heat gun. An extra set of hands definitely helps for trickier pieces.


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> Ah, too bad. I was gonna ask if you had finished pics.
> 
> A lot of the problem was how deep the SLSs were, right? If they had been a lot shallower (say less than 3" deep) would it have been easier?


Not just the extreme depth, but also the diameter of the driver. With that much magnet depth and its large diameter, there was just no way of getting it to work with the stock panel unfortunately.

BTW- I should note that my Lancer was surprisingly resonance and rattle resistant. I didn't have to do too much to keep it pretty quiet at good listening levels. Do you experience the same? Mine was the 2003 so I'm not sure what minor changes they had in the interiors.


----------



## strakele

I was considering trying to fit a pair of shallow 8s by trimming a bit of metal to move them up and back a little bit to fit under the door panel, but idk.

Mine isn't terrible with rattles, but with the amount if power and cone area I'm running now, I can definitely make stuff rattle, but you can only hear it if there's bass and not much else playing.


----------



## decibelle

Shallow 8s huh? Hey Grayson, there's these really cool things your car has, they're called kick panels--

oh wait.


----------



## strakele

Sure, but I like the class that I'm in, I like my clutch pedal right where it is, and I like the fuse boxes sitting right where they are, nice and comfy in the kick panels.


----------



## hybridamp

strakele said:


> Thanks. It's pretty good to work with if you have a heat gun. An extra set of hands definitely helps for trickier pieces.


I can't even apply vinyl decals very well so I wouldn't imagine tackling the carbon fiber interior, but yours sure turned out great.


----------



## strakele

Thank you sir!


----------



## strakele

About time for an update!

After my victory in modified class at NC/SC state finals, it's time to show off some new gear that I've had the privilege of playing with before most other people. Mark will be posting more detailed info in a week or so, but here it is: the new Audible Physics front stage!

First, the Arian midbass / wideband midrange driver. It uses the same basket as the Ebony so it was an easy drop in replacement, but check the size of the motor in comparison. Overall higher quality, higher resolution, more powerful driver.




























I'm using this just as a midbass, but it's a wideband speaker. Mark demoed them for me in his car running full range, zero crossovers of any kind, and it was pretty impressive. And that wasn't even on axis. But, there's no reason run it that way because of...


...the new Nz3-A/AMT combo. The 3" wideband midrange uses the same basket as the XR/AR3K speakers so again, it was a drop in fit. New cone material making it much more efficient than my old AR3K's, and a ferrite motor to keep it affordable. 

Camera was outta juice when I was playing with these, so I apologize, but this is the only halfway decent pic I got with my phone:










But now there's a twist. For everyone who felt like widebanders couldn't provide that very top end air/sparkle, there are the tiny AMTs - air motion transducers that play from around 16KHz and up to well above human hearing. Since they aren't a typical driver, they require no crossover of their own and can be run off the same amp channel as the Nz3. This coupled with their extremely tiny size makes it possible to install them virtually anywhere without any need for more channels of amplification/processing.

I chose to put them in my sail panels to keep path lengths the same.

Here's the AMT:










Sail panel has a convenient cover piece that pops off:










Drilled out a little oval hole for it, rounded the edges a bit, and attached it to the back:










Both done, with the whole sail panel fixture:










Sail panel back in the car, and Nz3 in the pillar. Here you can really see the scale of the AMT compared to the midrange.










Sail panels covered in grill cloth, and a closeup of the sexy black/grey cone:










Grills back on:






















So there you have it. The new front stage feels much more dynamic, especially higher up, than my previous system. There was an immediate, very noticeable difference. Even Ally likes them, and she doesn't like anything 

With a bit more tuning, I think I'll be competitive come finals in October.


----------



## DAT

Grayson, it looks great!!


----------



## jgustin

Wow, I didn't think your car could get any better! If these provided a noticeable difference then they must be impressive.


----------



## strakele

They truly are. My score last weekend was the highest it's been. And I was able to turn the gains down a good bit since they're much more efficient. High end dynamics are in another league. Once I track down a tiny bit of hiss, I'm going to be extremely satisfied.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Here's the AMT:


H-Audio selling those? Any specs? Would be fun to use it with horns if they are efficient enough  

Kelvin


----------



## strakele

No idea on efficiency numbers and no idea if they'll be available separately.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Looks great Grayson!


----------



## captainobvious

I like the look of the changes Grayson! The sail panels look great and those AMT's seem to be a great fit. 
So you say because they are a different type of tweeter, they need no crossover and can share the same amp channel. Can you elaborate more on that? Is this because they have a very high impedance so they pose no real strain on the amp? Im trying to wrap my brain around them not needing a HPF...enlighten me brotha!


----------



## strakele

I'm not extremely familiar with the air motion transducer technology and Mark will be able to answer more about it, but in short, you're basically right. I believe it is due to the impedance. You can run a full range signal through them without damage. They simply don't respond to lower frequencies. They're not like any other tweeter design where they have to be protected, making them a TON more flexible.


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> I'm not extremely familiar with the air motion transducer technology and Mark will be able to answer more about it, but in short, you're basically right. I believe it is due to the impedance. You can run a full range signal through them without damage. They simply don't respond to lower frequencies. They're not like any other tweeter design where they have to be protected, making them a TON more flexible.


Geez, what's the downside? 

Looking forward to hearing this on Saturday. By the way I can't even get my initial install done and you're allready upgrading like crazy!


----------



## myhikingboots

Oh by the way I won't be hearing those transducers. My old ears can only catch 12k down.


----------



## strakele

Not much lol. You just gotta have something that'll play up pretty darn high to meet up with them.


[And any decent wideband will play up to 12K so you got nothin to worry about ]


----------



## Notloudenuf

I cannot wait to hear this. Your car has always been stellar so I'm ready to be wowed


----------



## Mic10is

nice update. I have a feeling you'll have no problems getting on stage at Finals.


----------



## bassfromspace

Looks great! Aren't you in N. Texas now?


----------



## captainobvious

Mic10is said:


> nice update. I have a feeling you'll have no problems getting on stage at Finals.


 
Oh, are they having a bikini contest this year...?


----------



## Mic10is

captainobvious said:


> Oh, are they having a bikini contest this year...?


dude have you ever seen Grayson? Im not sure he's big enough to support a bikini. I'm short but at least im getting ever more curvier as I get older--but Grayson is a stick.


----------



## Thrill_House

strakele said:


> So there you have it. The new front stage feels much more dynamic, especially higher up, than my previous system. There was an immediate, very noticeable difference. Even Ally likes them, and she doesn't like anything
> 
> With a bit more tuning, I think I'll be competitive come finals in October.


What class will you be competing in?


----------



## Thrill_House

strakele said:


> They truly are. My score last weekend was the highest it's been. And I was able to turn the gains down a good bit since they're much more efficient. High end dynamics are in another league. Once I track down a tiny bit of hiss, I'm going to be extremely satisfied.


Out of curiosity, what was your score at the show?


----------



## wdemetrius1

These drivers are the BEST, that I have ever heard. They suffer from none of the complaints from Wideband drivers from ANY brand. I repeat, ANY BRAND. Simply put, they have raised the bar.


----------



## Mic10is

Thrill_House said:


> What class will you be competing in?


hes in Modified for MECA
He will do very well


----------



## decibelle

captainobvious said:


> Oh, are they having a bikini contest this year...?


I have one he can borrow


----------



## strakele

Notloudenuf said:


> I cannot wait to hear this. Your car has always been stellar so I'm ready to be wowed


I can pretty safely say this is the best it has ever been.



Mic10is said:


> nice update. I have a feeling you'll have no problems getting on stage at Finals.


Thanks Mic!



captainobvious said:


> Oh, are they having a bikini contest this year...?


Har har har. I told Ally she should have entered at SBN...



bassfromspace said:


> Looks great! Aren't you in N. Texas now?


Not anymore - back in Atlanta for my senior year.


----------



## strakele

Mic10is said:


> dude have you ever seen Grayson? Im not sure he's big enough to support a bikini. I'm short but at least im getting ever more curvier as I get older--but Grayson is a stick.


lololol. At that rate you'll be giving Ally a run for her money soon 



Thrill_House said:


> Out of curiosity, what was your score at the show?


77 from Joe, 77.5 from Brian, 81 from Matt Roberts.



wdemetrius1 said:


> These drivers are the BEST, that I have ever heard. They suffer from none of the complaints from Wideband drivers from ANY brand. I repeat, ANY BRAND. Simply put, they have raised the bar.


They are definitely revolutionary.







Apparently I can't leave DIYMA for a few hours to go to homework without talk about males in bikinis starting lol


----------



## narvarr

strakele said:


> lololol. At that rate you'll be giving Ally a run for her money soon
> 
> 
> 
> 77 from Joe, 77.5 from Brian, 81 from Matt Roberts.
> 
> 
> 
> They are definitely revolutionary.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Apparently I can't leave DIYMA for a few hours to go to homework without talk about males in bikinis starting lol


Congratulations On the win Grayson. Can't wait to hear your new install at MECA finals.

Sent from my SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE using Tapatalk 2


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## Rishi S

Congrats Grayson.


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## DeanE10

Looking awesome Grayson! I will not be at MECA Finals this year... But looking forward to hearing it soon


----------



## captainobvious

wdemetrius1 said:


> These drivers are the BEST, that I have ever heard. They suffer from none of the complaints from Wideband drivers from ANY brand. I repeat, ANY BRAND. Simply put, they have raised the bar.


Which complaints would those be? They may sound great but they can't break the laws of physics


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> lololol. At that rate you'll be giving Ally a run for her money soon
> 
> 
> 
> 77 from Joe, 77.5 from Brian, 81 from Matt Roberts.
> 
> 
> 
> They are definitely revolutionary.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Apparently I can't leave DIYMA for a few hours to go to homework without talk about males in bikinis starting lol


 
My fault 

BTW- that's pretty consistent scoring from 3 seperate judges. Nice work buddy!


----------



## wdemetrius1

captainobvious said:


> Which complaints would those be? They may sound great but they can't break the laws of physics



The main thing that I heard over and over again, was that Wideband Driver are good, but they lack the ability to provide the airy sound that a tweeter can provide. That can no longer be said about the NZ3's. They have to be heard to understand. 

Captain as much as you liked the TB W3's, I think that you might like the NZ's better.


----------



## papasin

Anxious to try these myself.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

captainobvious said:


> Which complaints would those be? They may sound great but they can't break the laws of physics


J
I agree sir we can not break the laws of physics, but we can put up one hell of a fight.


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the comments from everyone who heard the car at our Atlanta meet over the weekend. I was able to incorporate several of the suggestions coupled with the judges comments from the previous weekend, so it should be even better for this coming weekend in Alabama.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

As I always say/said and seem to one of my favorite phases. She is becoming the "Beast" I know it could be. Great job sir.


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## myhikingboots

Good luck! You're going to kill'em!


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## Guest

Wonderful choice of speakers and amplifiers !


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## JayinMI

strakele said:


> No idea on efficiency numbers and no idea if they'll be available separately.


So, they only come with the NZ3's?

Interesting...

Jay


----------



## Guest

I'm pretty sure you can get them with the Arian also...


----------



## JayinMI

The new 3's remind me of the H-Audio 3" from before...
Oh well, now I imagine everyone will upgrade and I'll be able to pick up some AR3's cheap. LOL

Jay


----------



## DAT

I hear the NZ3's are incredible, going to get a set also.


----------



## Guest

The Naz are going to be very nice....


----------



## Guest

Combined with the Arian... Very special...


----------



## strakele

Yep, it's definitely a great combo!


----------



## DeanE10

Go fix your 6to8 so I know what to do on mine 

I did turn off the input gains as much as possible and the noise is almost non existent but... Not allot of volume left after that


----------



## strakele

I know, I know. I got a plan for that.


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> I know, I know. I got a plan for that.


Otherwise known as "hey Ally, give me your processor."


----------



## ErinH

millerlyte said:


> Otherwise known as "hey Ally, give me your processor."


Or AKA: 1.21 jigawatts!


----------



## strakele

Change that to jigavolts, and you got the right idea


----------



## slade1274

bikinpunk said:


> Or AKA: 1.21 jigawatts!


Before his time.....

:laugh:


----------



## myhikingboots

I think he needs a new flux capacitor.
















God we're old.


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## myhikingboots

_"It's what makes Time Alignment possible!"_










Sorry I just had to throw that in there.:blush:


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## strakele

Haha nice.


----------



## Velozity

Very nice install Grayson. I hope to hear it at some point. Curious, did you try the AMT in different locations before settling on the sails? Just curious about directivity of the transducer.


----------



## Notloudenuf

Velozity said:


> Very nice install Grayson. I hope to hear it at some point.


NC Meet Nov. 3rd (hint hint)


----------



## strakele

Velozity said:


> Very nice install Grayson. I hope to hear it at some point. Curious, did you try the AMT in different locations before settling on the sails? Just curious about directivity of the transducer.


Thanks! The only places I was considering for the AMT was directly over the midrange cone or the sails. Sails were a lot simpler to install, and path lengths were the same, so I went with it. Mark said the dispersion pattern was pretty good and it didn't really matter if they were vertical or horizontal, and vertical made it easier to mount.




Anyway, got first in modified at AL state finals this past weekend. Probably the last show until finals. Got some more tweaks to do before the big show. Started on it today


----------



## Velozity

Kendal I got your hint . If I can get a red-eye back from Vegas (SEMA show) on Friday night then I'll be there. I may even be ready to debut my new truck after taking a year off 


Grayson thanks for the info. I've got a set sitting on my bench awaiting install and I'm just trying to decide how to best implement them given the stealthy theme of my install. I may do cloth covered sails too. I'm just tired of running wires!


----------



## pionkej

strakele said:


> Thanks! The only places I was considering for the AMT was directly over the midrange cone or the sails. Sails were a lot simpler to install, and path lengths were the same, so I went with it. Mark said the dispersion pattern was pretty good and it didn't really matter if they were vertical or horizontal, and vertical made it easier to mount.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Anyway, got first in modified at AL state finals this past weekend. Probably the last show until finals. Got some more tweaks to do before the big show. Started on it today


Not making the drive for TN State Finals next weekend. I was looking forward to hearing your's and Ally's changes sooner than later. If not, I'd certainly like to hear them both at Finals in October!


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## decibelle

I don't think we'll be at TN Finals. I have to work on my new install, which costs money, and make sure I can afford Finals. Dunno what's keeping Gray from going though. 

But we will definitely see you there next month.


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## strakele

John, do you know who will be judging TN finals? If one or more of them will be the same judging finals, I might drag myself up there.

In other news, Ally and I took first place in our respective classes at the Alabama state finals last weekend. Had a great time hanging out with everyone too.

Couple more updates in the works..


----------



## mrboost

I own a 03 Evo VIII. I put my focal tweeter in the stock location to start. Sounded great (from what i thought). Start this year in meca, i finnaly had someone to go against. So i desided to do some more, i recently moved the tweets up to around eye level. And it made a HUGE difference.


----------



## ecbmxer

Wow, those new audible physics drivers are sweet! Do you have much better midbass with that larger motor vs the ebony? I'm intrigued by the little tweeter things. I think Mark should put up a post somewhere telling us about them!


----------



## strakele

I do have slightly more detailed and defined midbass with the new drivers. Much of the midbass comes from the front sub too however.

There is a bit more info on the high frequency transducers in the review thread in the review section.


----------



## strakele

I know I've said it more than once in this thread, but I HATE running wires.

Everything has been working basically fine, but for a while I've been wanting to redo all the wiring to make everything match, no splices, all high quality, etc.

So, on the agenda for this weekend:

- Replace ALL old speaker wire (Monster 4-con) with nice new 14ga (custom TechFlexed)
- Replace ALL RCA's with IXOS 600 series (custom TechFlexed)
- Ground ALL audio related components at a new grounding block
- Carpet a piece of the amp rack that you never see.

Also, thanks to Casey I'm now rocking a used XS Power D3400 battery up front with new battery terminals, and 2 of the Big 3 done (so far) with 1/0ga wire.

Lastly, as part of my quest to eliminate all hiss from my system, I got an AudioControl Overdrive Plus line driver to boost the voltage of my head unit a bit to the max the processor can take, so that I could turn the output levels down and hopefully reduce the hiss. In temporary test configuration, results have been promising. Hiss isn't gone, but definitely diminished. This was with some crappy Walmart RCAs.


So basically, I'm doing a whole lot of work this weekend on stuff that isn't really going to change the sound, but it will look better, be more solid, and just make me feel good knowing it's there.


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## ledzpg

Good luck... hehehe :biggrinflip:


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## Notloudenuf

strakele said:


> I know I've said it more than once in this thread, but I HATE running wires.
> 
> So basically, I'm doing a whole lot of work this weekend on stuff that isn't really going to change the sound, but it will look better, be more solid, and just make me feel good knowing it's there.


Spoken like a true enthusiast.  The little stuff we do that makes no audible difference yet makes us feel finished.


----------



## strakele

Boring update of some stuff...

New 1/0 engine to chassis ground:










New (old) battery, with new terminals and stuff:










Front to rear RCA:










What the short RCA's look like:










Close up:










New ground "harness" for amps and all audio related components:










How all speaker wire will look:










Small pigtails from the speakers to bullet connectors:










All connections will be soldered like this:










And heat shrunk:












So far amp grounds are done and ready, some of the speaker wire is done, RCA's are installed, amp rack is fully carpeted, front to rear ground is done. Still need to reground front amp, run rest of speaker wire, then reinstall amp rack and put the whole thing back together.


----------



## myhikingboots

Looks good dude. Is that heat shrink or tape on the flextube going to the battery?


----------



## strakele

It's tape that was already on the split loom. I'll probably replace it with heat shrink.


----------



## strakele

More wiring stuff...

Some more speaker wire ready to go:










And run through the doors:



















Soldered wires to midbass:










Matching the midrange:










Whole family:










Speaker wire ready for midrange:










Overdrive mounted where I used to have the H100 behind the glove box:



















Never really showed install of the AMT's because it wasn't pretty or anything special. But now they match everything else:












1 more speaker wire to run, then the amp rack goes back in and everything gets reassembled. Hopefully to be done Thursday. Friday at the latest.


----------



## myhikingboots

Very sexy! I may have to break down and redo mine now. Goodluck at finals!


----------



## DeanE10

Did the overdrive make a huge difference Greyson? I have one of those and a PLD1 too... trying to decide if I should use it or just leave it alone...


----------



## strakele

Haven't gotten much listening time after installing it, and none with all the new wiring upgrades. It did help the hiss. With the gain up just a bit, I was able to lower the output levels by like 10dB which definitely made an improvement.


----------



## strakele

Well, sometimes it's better to just leave well enough alone, lol. After all the time and work I had more issues than I started with. After a bunch of troubleshooting, the main problem (other than a stupid mistake on my part) was a bad RCA cable that was introducing crackle and alternator whine.



After getting everything working as it should again, Ally and I had what will probably be the last pre-finals tuning session with Kirk Proffitt yesterday, and the cars (all 3) are sounding fantastic! Just 1 week to go...


----------



## DeanE10

strakele said:


> Well, sometimes it's better to just leave well enough alone, lol. After all the time and work I had more issues than I started with. After a bunch of troubleshooting, the main problem (other than a stupid mistake on my part) was a bad RCA cable that was introducing crackle and alternator whine.
> 
> 
> 
> After getting everything working as it should again, Ally and I had what will probably be the last pre-finals tuning session with Kirk Proffitt yesterday, and the cars (all 3) are sounding fantastic! Just 1 week to go...


HAHAHA! I know this all too well! It is EXACTLY the reason why I have not started the rebuild on the truck... kind of skeered to !


----------



## ledzpg

I have to confess that I'm always afraid to change what is already working fine for the same reason: after modding too much, something starts to NOT work.

I'm close to get the new subs and a new 2-way kit, then I'll redo all my trunk and start a thread too. Hope everything works fine hehehe 

Sent from Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2


----------



## KP

strakele said:


> Well, sometimes it's better to just leave well enough alone, lol. After all the time and work I had more issues than I started with. After a bunch of troubleshooting, the main problem (other than a stupid mistake on my part) was a bad RCA cable that was introducing crackle and alternator whine.
> 
> 
> 
> After getting everything working as it should again, Ally and I had what will probably be the last pre-finals tuning session with Kirk Proffitt yesterday, and the cars (all 3) are sounding fantastic! Just 1 week to go...


Good seeing ya'll as always! Yeap, cars are ready! Finals, here we come.......


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Can't wait to get my ears on the new tunes. Thanks for helping the guys out Kirk.


----------



## wdemetrius1

^^

X2!


----------



## decibelle

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear grayson, you're old and wrinkly at 22 

:rimshot:


----------



## SteveH!

happy birthday slappay!


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

millerlyte said:


> Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear grayson, you're old and wrinkly at 22
> 
> :rimshot:


Wait a moment here, now you are telling me that grayson Birthday is today also. Wow Jr. Birthday is today also. 

Happy Birthday Grayson.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Happy Birthday Grayson.


----------



## DeanE10

Happy Birthday Grayson !!!!


----------



## DAT

Happy Birthday Grayson !!!!

See you at Finals!


----------



## peg_legs

Happy Birthday!


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the birthday wishes everyone


----------



## ErinH

Happy belated birthday, Grayson. 

That makes you what?.... 43?


----------



## mrboost

grats on the win man! glad i could finnaly meet another person in meca with a dsm! lol


----------



## strakele

Thanks man. You too. Lancers FTW!


So yeah... post-finals update: It went well


----------



## mrboost

wwweeee! next time i will adjust my seat when the judge says "do i really have to sit like this?" other wise my scores would have been much higher


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> Thanks man. You too. Lancers FTW!
> 
> 
> So yeah... post-finals update: It went well


Great job dude! I remember back at Erin's gtg last year and asking you if you were going to compete and you said that you weren't sure. And now look at you! Congrats to Ally too! Super job guys.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Grayson, My man. Amazing job sir amazing job!!!!!!

Hats off to you sir and all team AP.


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## narvarr

Grayson congrats on the win my man! 

Sent from my SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE using Tapatalk 2


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## wdemetrius1

Congratulations G Man!!!


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## DeanE10

Congratulations Grayson!!!! We will be head-to-head this year though as I think I will get bumped up to Modified as well... Looks like I will have my work cut out for me


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys!

Remains to be seen if I'll have time to compete next season, but hopefully I will.


----------



## ledzpg

Congratulations! :thumbup:


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## claydo

Just wanted to say GREAT work on this car..........I've heard plenty of systems in my time, and in most of them I can find something I like. Great bass, sweet stage height, or tight midrange snap. Every instal,and then subsequent upgrade/ change to my own systems were always in pursuit of a sound, that when asked I couldn't successfully describe. While still unsure how to describe my "sound", after listening to your car Saturday at least I have finally experienced it somewhere other than in my head! So now that I know its possible, I have work to do! Thanks for the awesome demo...........


----------



## strakele

Thanks Clay! Glad you enjoyed it. Your car was a lot of fun too.


----------



## Notloudenuf

I hope what I'm about to say makes sense.
I have always had this idea in my head of the 'perfect' sound system. It was one of those things that lots of systems have come close but never really got there. I would "know it when I heard it".
Well I have to say I have "heard it" and it is this version of Grayson's Lancer.
Congratulations on your win. Like I told you during the demo, "If there are better sound systems out there, I want to hear them"


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## slade1274

Perfect is a word I can't use, but I have to say (FWIW) that I was thoroughly impressed. By far the best it has sounded over the countless times I've had the pleasure. Great job on the DIY trunk as well as the tune.

My choice of word would be OUTSTANDING and a worthy benchmark for you Kendal.


----------



## strakele

Thanks a lot to both of you. I know the DIYMA ears can be just as picky as any judge, so I'm really glad ya'll like it and that it has been steadily improving. Good seeing you guys again as always.


----------



## Golden Ear

Where can the NZ3-A be purchased and how much are they?


----------



## EditTim

Golden Ear said:


> Where can the NZ3-A be purchased and how much are they?


PM Mark Brooks


----------



## strakele

Sent you a PM but for anyone else wondering, calling will be best for the next couple days. PM me for the number if you want.


----------



## Golden Ear

Got the pm and responded. Thanx Grayson. Great job on the car btw. Do you know if those nz3s would sound good as a midrange with a tweeter? I have a passive 2-way setup right now that I like but I feel it would sound great as a 3-way active if I add a midrange.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Yes they would great as a wide band midrange. Conact me at anytime you like neve to early or late.


----------



## strakele

Hey guys, figured I'd post some pics with the newest additions from Christmas. Bunch of new Ralliart and other parts, but nothing really audio related.

Door sills:










Ralliart pedals:










Dash mat: 










Carbon fiber brake handle:










Ralliart oil cap:










New leather steering wheel cover with red stitching: (same as old, but stitching was faded and leather was worn in some places)



















Ralliart valve stem caps:










Ralliart leather shift boot with red stitching, custom trim ring, and aluminum shift knob: (trim ring was painted aluminum to match the knob, and 8 Allen head screws were added to hold everything together)





















I have some audio plans for the near future, but not really sure when they'll get done.


----------



## Notloudenuf

That's like at least 50 horsepower right? 

Looks good man. Just messing with you.


----------



## Coppertone

Very clean and classy.


----------



## DAT

Nice... Like it...


----------



## EditTim

What, nothing shiny for the poor dead pedal? FAIL!



J/K... Looks great Grayson, it's all in the details...


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Looking good sir, looking good indeed.


----------



## strakele

EditTim said:


> What, nothing shiny for the poor dead pedal? FAIL!
> 
> 
> 
> J/K... Looks great Grayson, it's all in the details...


I know man..the Ralliart pedals for the new Lancers come with the dead pedal too, but no love for the previous generation. 

Thanks though. Also I still have your Radiohead CD.


----------



## EditTim

strakele said:


> I know man..the Ralliart pedals for the new Lancers come with the dead pedal too, but no love for the previous generation.
> 
> Thanks though. Also I still have your Radiohead CD.


Ah, thought so... I was looking for it the other day 
I'll just pick it up at the GTG...

You could always mod a new gen dead pedal plate maybe, if you care.
Mine are from ultimate pedals, and they will do custom work, again, if you care.


----------



## strakele

Alright, time for an update.

I've had this done for a month or two now (work started right after the 3/16 Atlanta Meet) and I've held off on posting till I went to a few shows and see what the judges thought. Now that I've made the decision to change it further, I figured I'd show what was done, the goals, and the results.

To start with, I was completely happy with how the car sounded after finals. It was the best it has ever been and there was no pressing need to change, other than that I wanted to see if it could get even better. After studying some of the top cars, reading up on sound power response and some other stuff, I decided on what I wanted to do.

So the goals were:
1. Re-aim the NZ3's to be more on axis, and try to equalize power response from both speakers to eliminate the need for as much independent L/R EQ, and to get better high frequency response from these wideband drivers
2. Increase width and depth
3. Install the speakers behind the pillars, so that there was no indication of a speaker there

Results:
1. Fail. I'll elaborate on this later. But basically theory was better than reality, given other constraints.
2. Success in the width, depth..maybe a little. 
3. Success. Not sure how I feel about how it looks though.

Now on to the build. Luckily, the Lancer has fairly wide pillars with a good bit of space behind them, so I was able to accomplish goal number 3. But to do so, the dash had to come out...

Starting:










Done:










The area we're working with:










Why not make a true enclosure while we're at it?










Aiming angle we're going for - much more on axis, following the slope of the windshield:










Glass 'em in:










Bit of carpet and reconnect the speaker:










Installed:










Dash back on:




















Angle looks great from this perspective doesn't it? But Grayson, it looks like quite a bit of the cone is below the plane of the dash. Won't that have an adverse effect on the response? Yes 

From certain angles, it looks good, but in the listening position, too much of the speaker is blocked by the dash. Highs are muffled, volume is lost. Blah. Width is pretty good though. Oh well. You win some, you lose some. Thanks to Mark for the help in doing all this.


----------



## claydo

Sometimes ya have to jump in with both feet, huh...... looks like a lot of work, sorry you didn't get what you were after. I have a sneaking suspicion this isn't over yet though.......is it?


----------



## Mic10is

hmmm now thats an interesting way of mounting mids in a Lancer


----------



## strakele

Anyway, to finish up, got some high open area hex mesh:










Spent waaayyyy too long trying to form it to the right shape:










Covered in grill cloth:










And back in the car:




























Then ghetto rig some Dayton 5/8" tweets running off a simple capacitor high pass to add some temporary top end until a more permanent fix is devised:










With these, it really does sound pretty darn good. 14KHz high pass on the tweets, -6dB. But I want something better and more permanent than this.

So back to the drawing board. But I have some good ideas 



Also, photobucket really sucks now.


----------



## claydo

Wow, can't even tell anythings there! Can't wait to see what's next!


----------



## Golden Ear

Just got my NZ3s semi dialed-in today and I love them! Good luck with yours


----------



## claydo

So......uh.......does this move you outta modified?


----------



## strakele

Nope. No dash cutting involved.


----------



## claydo

<-------- meca's newest modified competitor.

Dammit!


----------



## ErinH

curious what you're going to do next to achieve the sound you were after here while keeping you in modified.


----------



## bertholomey

Not saying this to be 'nice', but I thought the car sounded phenomenal this weekend - it certainly was stealthy as well.


----------



## strakele

Thanks Jason. It really doesn't sound bad. The tweets make a big difference. I'm sure I could have it back to real competition level with a more permanent tweeter install and some more tuning. It just wasn't the huge improvement I was hoping for yet. At it is now it's scoring around 76, which isn't bad by any means.

I just want to take it to the next level.


----------



## ledzpg

Very, very, very good. :thumbup:


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> I just want to take it to the next level.


----------



## papasin

Mic10is said:


>


As Marcel says, "uh hoho, yes, nice, very nice" .


----------



## subwoofery

Mic10is said:


>


Love it  

Kelvin


----------



## narvarr

Nice work! Looks like I picked the wrong time to move up to modified class.

Sent from my SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE using Tapatalk 2


----------



## ecbmxer

Wow, that's one of my favorite midrange mounting locations I've seen! If only you could cut out a little half circle from the dash and glass in some kind of a smooth transition/waveguide. But I guess that would bump you into another class because of ANY dash cutting? What about just slightly reworking them so they are more behind the bottom of the pillar than the dash itself? Then you could cut a big ol hole out of the bottom of the pillar and wrap it in grill cloth like you did. IDK, just throwing ideas out.


----------



## strakele

Yeah, basically any dash cutting is not permitted in modified. That and, if I screw it up or want to change something next year, a new dash is like $450, whereas new pillars are like $40.

Your second suggestion is more in line with where I'll be going with it. Might have to built out the pillar a little. We'll see.


----------



## crxsir121

Did you have to modify your doors to mount those 6inch drivers? Any cutting of the metal in the doors? Great work


----------



## strakele

Nope. Just mounted on a 1/2 inch baffle.


----------



## captainobvious

Im surprised more issues wouldnt arise from having half of the cone firing under the dash and half above. 
Looks cool though!


----------



## strakele

It kinda depends on how you look at it. The speakers fire up and out the pillar grills. It's just that, especially on the passenger side, you don't really get any direct sound.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Looks great Grayson!!!


----------



## jgustin

Hi Grayson. It's been a while. I hope you and your family are doing well.
First of all, I thought your car sounded amazing when I heard it - and that was before the latest speaker upgrade! Now that I have the latest wide-bands in my truck I can only imagine how good your car sounds with the new wide-bands AND the new mid-bass. I have been blown away by the sound since I upgraded, and I thought my truck sounded pretty good before.
Unfortunately, your desire to continue tinkering when your car sounds amazing only supports the belief that car audio is a never ending work in progress. I wonder when/if we will ever reach the point that we realize the diminishing returns, or that we are chasing ghosts, and leave well enough alone! Well, there could be worse hobbies! Good luck getting your current dilemma fixed.

On a side note...can you please tell me where you get your grill cloth? Thanks!


----------



## strakele

Thanks, and glad to hear you've made progress!

Grill cloth on the pillars is from Parts-Express.


----------



## rockytophigh

I just read this whole thread from the FS thread...wow, what a journey. My hat's off to you Grayson. This was like reading the car audio version of Forrest Gump. From pre-fab to World Champ....


----------



## captainobvious

It truly is great to see nice people succeeding and doing some great work here. I've been a member on DIYMA for quite a number of years and it's always cool to see "one of your own" kicking butt.
I always thought there was something special about that Lancer. My 2003 had better potential than any other car I've owned. I don't know what it is...maybe the geometry of the vehicle, shape and length of the dash...meal doors, the combination of all of them...
It's just a vehicle that can be made to sound REALLY good. I think Mic would agree too.


----------



## claydo

Any updates grayson? Seems I read somewhere you were awaiting new equipment? Was I trippin?


----------



## strakele

Thanks for the kind words guys. It really has been quite a journey.

Clay, you remember correctly. Ally and I have been working all day every day for the past week and a half on our cars. Mostly cosmetic on hers, mostly hardware on mine.

Details and updates soon


----------



## narvarr

Can't wait to hear it this weekend!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk 4 Beta


----------



## Notloudenuf

strakele said:


> Thanks for the kind words guys. It really has been quite a journey.
> 
> Clay, you remember correctly. Ally and I have been working all day every day for the past week and a half on our cars. Mostly cosmetic on hers, mostly hardware on mine.
> 
> Details and updates soon


But I want it now


----------



## strakele

narvarr said:


> Can't wait to hear it this weekend!


Dude Narvarr I can't wait to hear yours as well... looking at your signature, you've made some HUGE changes.


----------



## decibelle

narvarr said:


> Can't wait to hear it this weekend!
> 
> Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk 4 Beta


Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it still sounds like ass. Hasn't even got the darn things broken in yet!


----------



## strakele

Shut up hater. 

It sounds good, and will get better.


----------



## claydo

<---------jealous of all you guys......wish Texas was within range.


----------



## claydo

That show looks epic.......


----------



## narvarr

strakele said:


> Dude Narvarr I can't wait to hear yours as well... looking at your signature, you've made some HUGE changes.


Yep. Drastic changes...my install still looks horrible though compaired to yours. Lol.

Sent from my SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE using Tapatalk 2


----------



## strakele

So there have been a lot of changes in the past couple months, and many of you have seen/heard the car in various stages of this progression, or noticed that I've been selling a good amount of the gear that was in the car.

Here's some of what's been going on.

First, as I said, I wasn't really happy with the sound from putting the mids behind the pillars, since too much of with was blocked/absorbed since they were too low. The plan was to install new mids higher up to fix this problem, and go a little bigger in the process. So I picked up some Scan 10F's with the intention of fixing that issue. I also began the search for a tweeter (first tweeter to be used in this car for over 2 years, for those who haven't been following since the beginning). While I researched and tried to find exactly what I wanted, I used the Dayton ND16's I had laying around since their small size made install a breeze. 

I installed them inside the sail panels with some velcro to hold them in place at the proper angle:



















Cut a tweeter sized hole in the cover piece, then wrapped in grill cloth:










Once installed it looked exactly like it did with the ambient transducers from the AP NZ set. I ran these tweets with the NZ3 mids and while briefly testing the 10F's.

As mentioned, I couldn't fit the Scans where I wanted, so they never got passed the wrapped in towels playing with angles phase:










This angle happened to work quite well, and will likely be revisited in the future.



Next, I knew that to add tweeters, my midranges could no longer be bridged on the One amps if I didn't want to add a 5th amp (which I don't) so that meant I needed new mids and tweets with good efficiency if I didn't want to lose volume and dynamics. The gains on my amps were already pretty high due to the relatively low output voltage of the 6to8, and hiss was an issue, which would be further emphasized by adding tweeters. So I wanted to swap to a processor with nice strong outputs. After playing with the software of all the big processors including Mosconi, Alpine, Rockford, Helix, and Arc, and reading up on their respective threads for bugs and other issues, I decided on the Rockford Fosgate 3sixty.3. It has 8V outputs, 31 parametric bands per channel, on/off delay, Bluetooth, and a remote control - all features that I wanted. I don't like the software as much, and have submitted some feature requests to RF. We'll see if they're as receptive as Mosconi was.

Anyway, enough talk. Power connector was Techflexed and heat shrunk:










Processor installed:










USB cable ran to the glove box:










Remote control installed in the factory ash tray:



















Cover still closes to hide it:










So far it seems to be working well. I have a couple minor complaints, but nothing major. Solved everything I wanted it to solve. Great volume with much lower amp gains, turn on/off delay killed a pop that had developed, and the remote negates the need for a phone or laptop to change presets.


----------



## quietfly

looking good, amazing when i go from start to finish looking at the difference in what you have. and to have a partner that loves it too? sir you are truly blessed!!!


----------



## strakele

Haha yeah it is pretty funny to look back 2.5 years ago and see how far it has come. I should post the spreadsheet of all the different versions lol.

And it's definitely awesome having Ally into all this as well.

Still to come: speakers, wiring, cosmetic stuff


----------



## claydo

Updates? Glad the 360 solved some problems for ya, definately eliminated some complexity with the line driver. Has Rockford got all the bugs out of the software now? I know initially the threads were full of negative posts about glitches and such, if all that is straight, it looks like a fairly flexible unit. Hopefully you will have some comments after more time spent with it........ that much parametric equal would be a disaster for me! I regularly have to start over with my piddly 16 band graphic....I know I could destroy tonality with that much adjustment available!


----------



## slade1274

My first one was a brick- but love the feature and interface when it was replaced without hassle for one that has been problem free.


----------



## strakele

I haven't ran into any bugs. Just some features that should be there but aren't. I sent them several suggestions. Though apparently they don't have their programmer anymore so idk how long if ever it'll take to implement.


----------



## strakele

Next update is mainly cosmetic.

First, I painted the wheels anthracite grey metallic and did a touch up on the calipers.

Before:



















After:



















Ally and I got some chips and scratches in our bumpers fixed so we went out to take some pictures:




























And finally, new tail lights.

Old chrome housing:










New carbon fiber housing:




















Making progress on the tune...


----------



## claydo

Its amazing how Lil touches add up to look really good! The darker wheels definately make those calipers pop. Also love the dual trunk display!


----------



## bertholomey

That really does look great - nice shots with trophies and the trunks. I'd be interested in hearing more about the tuning efforts with the new gear. 

Clay - we need to get together!


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys.

As far as tuning, I've mostly been working on my daily tune recently. And procrastinating on some final install touches. Finally got that stuff done yesterday, and we're getting a new calibrated RTA mic soon so real tuning work will start soon. Trying to focus on getting phase right. Fun stuff.


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> Thanks guys.
> 
> As far as tuning, I've mostly been working on my daily tune recently. And procrastinating on some final install touches. Finally got that stuff done yesterday, and we're getting a new calibrated RTA mic soon so real tuning work will start soon. Trying to focus on getting phase right. Fun stuff.


Looks great! I hope that you will post a detailed report on your tuning when you get it dialed in.


----------



## claydo

bertholomey said:


> That really does look great - nice shots with trophies and the trunks. I'd be interested in hearing more about the tuning efforts with the new gear.
> 
> Clay - we need to get together!


Word, most definately.......I got Changes coming!


----------



## Serieus

your car looks great with the new tail lights and painted wheels! did you paint the wheels yourself? the paint on mine are peeling and i'm buying furniture for my apartment so i don't have enough for a professional paint job, just curious how the wheel paints that auto parts stores sell are. it looks good, for sure.

your trunks look awesome, that's a cool photo. someday i might just finish working on my trunk, if i can ever figure out which way i want to go when i ditch the big ported box. i want to hear your car 



claydo said:


> Word, most definately.......I got Changes coming!


i'd love to join you guys, have a small problem with my passenger side mid so i'm probably going to be shipping it in for warranty this week or next but i've had some changes since the last meet


----------



## claydo

Serieus said:


> your car looks great with the new tail lights and painted wheels! did you paint the wheels yourself? the paint on mine are peeling and i'm buying furniture for my apartment so i don't have enough for a professional paint job, just curious how the wheel paints that auto parts stores sell are. it looks good, for sure.
> 
> your trunks look awesome, that's a cool photo. someday i might just finish working on my trunk, if i can ever figure out which way i want to go when i ditch the big ported box. i want to hear your car
> 
> 
> 
> i'd love to join you guys, have a small problem with my passenger side mid so i'm probably going to be shipping it in for warranty this week or next but i've had some changes since the last meet


I've been waiting on your pm!


----------



## Serieus

claydo said:


> I've been waiting on your pm!


i haven't forgotten, i've been busy with work and getting things together for moving in august  it doesn't help that i need a cloudy day to work with since my car doesn't have air conditioning, either :laugh:


----------



## strakele

Yes I painted the wheels myself. What color do you want to do yours?


----------



## Serieus

they look good! how many coats?

i'm not sure, i was thinking gunmetal but i think that would be pretty close to what you did yours and it looks like it would be a bit dark for my car imo. definitely want to stick with a silver though


----------



## strakele

Happy Independence Day everyone!

Next up, door speakers.

I'm a big fan of midbass, and am always searching for perfection in that region (among others, of course ). I think that's the most often switched component in my car (7 aftermarket sets). I've always wanted to run 8's but couldn't ever find one that would fit my car. I don't have a lot of depth to work with and the door panel sits very close to the door itself so there just isn't a lot of room to go bigger. It doesn't help that most 8's have a flange around 8.75" in diameter.

But then I discovered the Dynaudio MW172. It's only 3" deep and is actually a hair less than 8" at the flange, but still has almost 40% more cone area than the AP Arians I was running (which already have fairly high cone area for their size). So I picked a pair of these up, and they juuuust fit.

Comparison to the Arians:










Shallow depth:










Removed the Arians and cleaned all the deadener and stuff from around the speaker hole, then traced out a line that would have to be cut to get the wide basket of the MW172s to fit in the hole.










Didn't take much since the factory speaker holes are pretty big (stock speakers are bigger than your average 6.5)










No more stock mounting holes, so I used machine screws and nuts to attach the 5/8" MDF baffle to the doors. Screws are spaced somewhat uneven to avoid the mounting screws for the speaker and to get into the areas with the thickest strongest metal on the door panel.










Painted with spray on bedliner to protect from moisture:










After figuring out which terminal was which (speaker terminals are on opposite sides of the basket and not labeled in any way that I could find) leads were soldered on and tied to the basket so as not to touch the window as it rolls down:










And finally attached to the door:










The door panel even fits back on  Just barely.


The MW172's can take a lower crossover point more effortlessly than the 6.5's I have used in the past. I don't need to play them super low with the front sub, but it's nice to not have to worry about them at high volume. They're nice and snappy and do what I need them to do without issue.





Now go buy a gun, grill some burgers, shoot off some fireworks, and remember what this day really stands for.


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Happy Independence Day everyone!
> 
> 
> Now go buy a gun, grill some burgers, shoot off some fireworks, and remember what this day really stands for.



uh Ku doi....Its my Birthday obviously!


----------



## ErinH

cool stuff. surface area is king.


----------



## papasin

Very nice. Going with 8s was the biggest and most noticeable upgrade for my car. It just made a few things more feasible .


----------



## JayinMI

Papasin's car has me seriously thinking about seeing if we still have any old stock 8" ZR's laying around. I liked my Dayton 7's when I had them in the Genesis, but I'd like more cone area. Probably need to make a plan before I build kicks. lol

Strakele -- Wheels/tails are a big improvement. What paint did you use on the wheels? 

Hope the Dyn's work well for you. What's the ballpark on a pair of those?

Jay


----------



## papasin

JayinMI said:


> Papasin's car has me seriously thinking about seeing if we still have any old stock 8" ZR's laying around. I liked my Dayton 7's when I had them in the Genesis, but I'd like more cone area. Probably need to make a plan before I build kicks. lol


Erin should get some credit too.


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. And happy birthday Mic arty3:

The paint is anthracite metallic from dipyourcar.com

The Dyns run $600/pair retail, but there's a few guys on the forums who are dealers and might be willing to give you a discount.


----------



## JayinMI

Not as bad as I thought for the Dyns.

So you used plastidip to do your wheels? Did you do glossifier over it? I don't remember selling actual wheel paint over there.

Thanks.

Jay


----------



## decibelle

I remember a conversation long ago that went something like this.

"Gray, you should get 8s."

"But I don't wanna cut metal... these beefy 6.5s will do"

_few months later..._

"Gray, you ever thought about 8s?"

"But I don't _wanna_ cut metal!"

"It'll be worth it"

"No I don't wanna cut metal"

"You will someday"

"It's too much of a hassle"

_few months later..._

"Gray, get you some 8s."

"I don't know, maybe."

"You know you'll do it eventually."

"No I won't"

_few months later...._



strakele said:


> But then I discovered the Dynaudio MW172.... So I picked a pair of these up, and they juuuust fit. ....


Go on babycakes, tell me I was right.


----------



## strakele

The biggest contributor to that wasn't refusing to trim a little around the speaker hole, it was not wanting to rebuild the door panel, which I would have had to do with any other speakers except for these due to depth and flange diameter.

And yes one coat of gloss on the wheels as well.


----------



## bertholomey

millerlyte said:


> Go on babycakes, tell me I was right.


BABYCAKES?


----------



## strakele

Ally's super creative way to come up with funny nicknames is to reuse, verbatim, the ones I come up with for her


----------



## decibelle

You didn't come up with it dingbat, but you did remind me of how awesome of a petname it was. 

Come at me bro.


----------



## strakele

Whatever.

Also, half the time, whenever I talked about wanting 8's, you said I shouldn't.

Proof:



millerlyte said:


> I think it would be in your best interest not to mess with 8s. At least for a while. And that's pretty much permanent. If you don't like the 8s... wasted time and wasted money.


----------



## captainobvious

Yeah, rebuilding the door panels on the Lancer is a pain in the ass. It took a hell of alot of hours for me to do mine. And then you also run into issues with clearance from the door where it meets the dash. Nice work on yours, and the cosmetic updates to the car look terrific.


----------



## strakele

Thanks Steve. I remember seeing in progress pics of yours and thinking it sure looked like a pain lol.


----------



## Mic10is

Dyn 170/172 are technically 7s...not 8s...thats why they fit....
Outside diameter may be closer to 8" but its classified for the most part as a 7" driver. Cone area is just over 6.5"
the 180s, were an 8, but OD was closer to 9"--but same thing cone area was just shy of 8"

so babycakes still aint got 8s ;-)


----------



## strakele

Lol reminds me of when I was giving BuickGN crap about his 182's not being 10's.

Still 20% more cone area than a 7" though so I'll take it.


----------



## Golden Ear

Nice updates, Gray! Are you still working on the midranges? I'm not sure if I missed it


----------



## decibelle

strakele said:


> Whatever.
> 
> Also, half the time, whenever I talked about wanting 8's, you said I shouldn't.
> 
> Proof:


I was supporting your then-decision of not wanting them. 

But seriously we had many conversations about you not wanting them for so long.

That said I'm very glad you finally went with 8s and I'm glad you love them.



Mic10is said:


> Dyn 170/172 are technically 7s...not 8s...thats why they fit....
> Outside diameter may be closer to 8" but its classified for the most part as a 7" driver. Cone area is just over 6.5"
> the 180s, were an 8, but OD was closer to 9"--but same thing cone area was just shy of 8"
> 
> so babycakes still aint got 8s ;-)



:laugh::laugh: You're getting me in trouble


----------



## strakele

Last update until we talk about new speakers.

In order to actually use tweeters, I had to run a third set of speaker wire to each side.

So here's some wires, wrapped in carbon Techflex and secured with zip ties, cause that's how the cool kids do it.










3rd set of speaker wire running to amps now - mids and tweets on front outputs, midbass still bridged on rear of each amp.










New red Ixos RCA300 cables for the trunk. Also the entire amp rack is carpeted now... not sure if I ever showed pics of that before. But here's what it looks like under the false floor now:



















Also got a new LED control module (that's black this time) that can also make the LEDs pulse to music, because why not.










And the last piece for what will hopefully be a while... a nice carbon fiber trim piece for the gauge cluster:










Current view from the driver's seat:


----------



## bassfromspace

Have you actually played music through the 360 using the BT feature? I didn't think I'd like it, but it's actually a cool feature.


----------



## strakele

Tried it for the first time today and it worked nicely. Volume seemed to only be able to be controlled with the phone and not the processor remote controller though. Is that how yours works?


----------



## bassfromspace

strakele said:


> Tried it for the first time today and it worked nicely. Volume seemed to only be able to be controlled with the phone and not the processor remote controller though. Is that how yours works?


Yeah, but I found it convenient because I could use my phone as a remote and also acts similar to a valet switch. Basically, no one can use your system without the phone, which comes in handy when you leave the vehicle with someone else.


----------



## Mixerdriver

Love the progression of your car. Subscribed to follow this one.


----------



## strakele

Ok, that works. Didn't know if I should be expecting the controller to adjust volume as well. Thanks.


----------



## strakele

Forgot to post this one...

Typical day for us so far this summer:


----------



## BigAl205

^^^ROFL...Nice!

I soooo want to hear what they both sound like now. I saw that you guys might be coming to town for Erin's GTG. Are you bringing both cars?


----------



## WRX2010

Grayson why are you wearing Ally's capri pants?


----------



## bassfromspace

WRX2010 said:


> Grayson why are you wearing Ally's capri pants?


Sharing is caring.


----------



## decibelle

WRX2010 said:


> Grayson why are you wearing Ally's capri pants?



BWAHAAHAHA 

Al I dunno about Gray but I'll be there with Monte.


----------



## strakele

Anyway...


A few of you had asked me to discuss tuning.

The majority of my work recently has been focused on phase - getting an accurate phase coherent wave front from all the speakers. Not only important with the front sub/rear sub setup, but all speakers. In talking with Todd L. and Mark E. it became apparent that I needed to forget about what time alignment numbers "should" be based on distance measurements and stuff, and simply concentrate on setting the t/a wherever it sounded best. For example, the midbass, midrange, and tweeter on the passenger side of the car all have equal path lengths to the drivers headrest (within 1.5 inches or less). But by playing with delay on these channels I was able to achieve much more of a point source at the corner of the dash effect, rather than a more or less vertical line source from the pillar down through the door. Very cool. Phase aligning the midbass, front sub, and rear sub has involved tweaking crossover points, slopes, phase inversion, and time alignment. Set crossovers to a 'reasonable' point. Listen, invert phase, listen. Change slope, listen, invert phase, listen. Vary crossover points up and down a bit, while continuing to mess with slope/phase inversion. I think I have it pretty good right now, but we'll see what everyone has to say tomorrow at the meet. For my competition tune I tried to set it for a smooth and linear response with detail and without being muddy. For my daily tune I have it set for maximum impact.

As far as EQ, I wasted a lot of time getting everything to look perfect on the RTA. Todd suggested level matching frequency bands by ear. I'm finding that quite difficult and have been swapping between that and just EQing by ear on music. It's pretty good right now, but I know it can get better.

I'm still trying to work up the motivation to build a new set of pillars with the midranges aimed differently.


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Anyway...
> 
> 
> A few of you had asked me to discuss tuning.
> 
> *The majority of my work recently has been focused on phase - getting an accurate phase coherent wave front from all the speakers. * Not only important with the front sub/rear sub setup, but all speakers. *In talking with Todd L. and Mark E. it became apparent that I needed to forget about what time alignment numbers "should" be based on distance measurements and stuff, and simply concentrate on setting the t/a wherever it sounded best. *For example, the midbass, midrange, and tweeter on the passenger side of the car all have equal path lengths to the drivers headrest (within 1.5 inches or less). But by playing with delay on these channels I was able to achieve much more of a point source at the corner of the dash effect, rather than a more or less vertical line source from the pillar down through the door. Very cool. Phase aligning the midbass, front sub, and rear sub has involved tweaking crossover points, slopes, phase inversion, and time alignment. Set crossovers to a 'reasonable' point. Listen, invert phase, listen. Change slope, listen, invert phase, listen. Vary crossover points up and down a bit, while continuing to mess with slope/phase inversion. I think I have it pretty good right now, but we'll see what everyone has to say tomorrow at the meet. For my competition tune I tried to set it for a smooth and linear response with detail and without being muddy. For my daily tune I have it set for maximum impact.
> 
> As far as EQ, I wasted a lot of time getting everything to look perfect on the RTA. Todd suggested level matching frequency bands by ear. I'm finding that quite difficult and have been swapping between that and just EQing by ear on music. It's pretty good right now, but I know it can get better.
> 
> I'm still trying to work up the motivation to build a new set of pillars with the midranges aimed differently.


This is Key. and So many people over look it and its always funny to hear people who many consider to be "experts" saying to just use a tape measure and do the math. tape measure and math may get you close, and close may be good enough for most. But close seldom ever wins


----------



## strakele

Yep. My previous tunes were always done by ear for t/a, with the measurement as a starting point. It was never exactly what the measurement said it should be, but fairly close, which seemed logical. I'd start to feel weird and question myself if it got too far away from what it should 'theoretically' be, and I certainly wouldn't have thought to try the kind of numbers I'm running now.


----------



## bertholomey

Thanks for your post Gray - I'll be looking at this as well in my car


----------



## myhikingboots

strakele said:


> Yep. My previous tunes were always done by ear for t/a, with the measurement as a starting point. It was never exactly what the measurement said it should be, but fairly close, which seemed logical. I'd start to feel weird and question myself if it got too far away from what it should 'theoretically' be, and I certainly wouldn't have thought to try the kind of numbers I'm running now.


Just curious, but are the numbers you ended up with further away or closer than they should be by the tape measure or a mix?


----------



## strakele

Quite a bit further in pretty much every case.

But part of that was to account for the additional delay added to align each driver on it's respective side. Instead of just saying, ok, all 3 drivers on the right side are the same distance away so leave them all at 0, I have delay added to the midrange or midbass to phase align them. So then I'd do the same thing on the left side, and then when putting it together to get a center image, the delays on the left side would have to be higher than 'normal' to account for all this.


----------



## ErinH

As long as you understand that TA is just altering the combing pattern, it really makes understanding what time alignment does and how a specific number via tape measure isn't the number you should end on. Though I will say that I have come up with a pretty good excel sheet with some funky math that really seems to work well for getting it extremely close via tape measure and crossover points used. And Todd can vouch for that.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Quite a bit further in pretty much every case.
> 
> But part of that was to account for the additional delay added to align each driver on it's respective side. Instead of just saying, ok, all 3 drivers on the right side are the same distance away so leave them all at 0, I have delay added to the midrange or midbass to phase align them. So then I'd do the same thing on the left side, and then when putting it together to get a center image, the delays on the left side would have to be higher than 'normal' to account for all this.


Now that you have a phase coherent system... Did you end up with some drivers in reverse polarity? 

Kelvin


----------



## strakele

Currently just the front sub polarity is inverted. I did try it with other speakers as well but it seems to work well with them set normally with the delay I'm running.


----------



## james2266

bikinpunk said:


> As long as you understand that TA is just altering the combing pattern, it really makes understanding what time alignment does and how a specific number via tape measure isn't the number you should end on. Though I will say that I have come up with a pretty good excel sheet with some funky math that really seems to work well for getting it extremely close via tape measure and crossover points used. And Todd can vouch for that.


I would be VERY interested in this `math`equation that works for setting ta based off of tape measure and crossover points. Its probably too much or too hard to get into words here tho. Wish you were closer.


----------



## sqnut

james2266 said:


> I would be VERY interested in this `math`equation that works for setting ta based off of tape measure and crossover points. Its probably too much or too hard to get into words here tho. Wish you were closer.


That equation is going to give you a certain response and therefore a sound. You can use your ears to get you there too. Once you have heard and internalized a given sound, you can hear your way there.


----------



## quality_sound

bikinpunk said:


> As long as you understand that TA is just altering the combing pattern, it really makes understanding what time alignment does and how a specific number via tape measure isn't the number you should end on. Though I will say that I have come up with a pretty good excel sheet with some funky math that really seems to work well for getting it extremely close via tape measure and crossover points used. And Todd can vouch for that.


I'd like to see that excel sheet.


----------



## spyders03

quality_sound said:


> I'd like to see that excel sheet.


I second that, sounds awesome

Swyped while swerving


----------



## strakele

I never posted info about the mids and tweets since they are as of yet unreleased, but now that they'll be on the market soon, here's some info and pics.

I'm now using the Melodic Acoustic Euphoria Duet midrange and tweeter combo. (Look for more details from Mark in the coming weeks about the rest of the new lineup.) It's a more efficient, paper cone dedicated midrange with the same frame as the Nz3s, and a gigantic motor. It's meant to be a midrange, not necessarily a wideband driver, but I played it all the way up in testing and it was flat on the RTA to 10KHz+. The tweeter is a pretty basic looking 3/4" alloy dome. 

So here it is:




























Euphoria 2.0 compared to Dayton ND16 I was running:










Euphoria 8.9 compared to ScanSpeak 10F I had planned on using:










Speakers got the usual quick disconnect pigtails soldered:










Tweeter in the sail panel on axis, midrange in my trusty old a-pillars:










With grills:












Since adding tweeters I no longer have the One amps bridged on the mids, so I dropped from ~350W on a wideband to 120W per mid and tweet. Luckily, the added efficiency of the new midranges helps make up for the power loss, along with the higher output voltage of the 3sixty.3. Overall I'm quite happy with the new speakers. The Euphoria 8.9 has more weight in the lower end than the Nz3's did, and a nice smooth midrange. The tweeter is surprisingly laid back considering a it's a metal dome. I've never used a metal dome tweeter before, but I've read all about people thinking they're too harsh, tinny, bright, etc. These have no such issue. I currently have them as close to on axis as possible, and they're not unpleasant in any way. I've had these for a couple months and have been tweaking here and there, but I generally have the crossover point between the midrange and tweeter at around 6300Hz. At some point I'm planning on playing with aiming of the speakers some more, but for now, I'm liking it. I scored almost 78 at the last MECA comp with a tune I did the night before the show after dropping these speakers in.


----------



## quality_sound

My last two tweeters were metal (Titanium Quart QSD and Beryllium illusion) and they're both fantastic. People give them a bad rap for no reason. 

I can't wait to hear the new drivers.


----------



## claydo

Alright, looking good........I noticed you got all quiet about your front stage. Knowing your ties with mark, I thought you might be running some type of new product. Maybe one day ill get to hear your car again.......ill be looking forward to it!


----------



## strakele

Paul, I believe this new tweeter is actually a close relative of the Illusion tweeter.

Clay, I hope to get to hear yours again too! I'll be in East Mississippi next year so if Erin or someone in Alabama has a meet, you should come.


----------



## claydo

I will try, for sure.........you guys and Jason have me totally hooked on the gtg scene. I'm trying to make Erin's this year........but I think you had to back out, iirc.


----------



## strakele

Yeah, I was supposed to be going to MS at the end of September... now it got moved to January.


----------



## claydo

Boooo, like I said, maybe one day.....the NC meet looks like a good one this year, hate you are so far away.......is ally still gonna try and make it?


----------



## pyropoptrt

strakele said:


> Paul, I believe this new tweeter is actually a close relative of the Illusion tweeter.
> 
> Clay, I hope to get to hear yours again too! I'll be in East Mississippi next year so if Erin or someone in Alabama has a meet, you should come.


Where in East Mississippi will you be Grayson?


----------



## james2266

Interesting looking drivers. I count myself in the not liking metal domes crowd but those midranges look interesting. I don't really care for that big rear end again as it would likely make installing a bit of a pain in tight quarters like most of us would install them (apillars for me). I am nonetheless interested in reading some specs and what the tag will be for them.

Edit: Oh, you said these take the place of a set of 10f. Comparisons against the 10f which I am very familiar with?


----------



## quality_sound

strakele said:


> Paul, I believe this new tweeter is actually a close relative of the Illusion tweeter.
> 
> Clay, I hope to get to hear yours again too! I'll be in East Mississippi next year so if Erin or someone in Alabama has a meet, you should come.


It could be. It looks fairly similar but overall, I think I prefer metal tweeters as long as they're well-made.


----------



## oilman

Your car always sounded good so this should be a treat.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Nice pics Greyson.

First I would like to say. The Euphoria 2.0 is an amazing little tweeter. Call it a metal dome if you must, but it is an Alloy more then just metal it has a mixture. So believe me when I say, it has no hit harshness, none at all. Very smooth, with a nice amount of detail and resolution. Quit silk dome sounding. It does like power.

The Euphoria 8.9 is a little beast. Smooth as Greyson said and the add efficient is great. the motor is large but not so much that is an issue with mounting. The lower midrange in this little is......well big.

Great job Greyson.


----------



## james2266

Melodic Acoustic said:


> Nice pics Greyson.
> 
> First I would like to say. The Euphoria 2.0 is an amazing little tweeter. Call it a metal dome if you must, but it is an Alloy more then just metal it has a mixture. So believe me when I say, it has no hit harshness, none at all. Very smooth, with a nice amount of detail and resolution. Quit silk dome sounding. It does like power.
> 
> The Euphoria 8.9 is a little beast. Smooth as Greyson said and the add efficient is great. the motor is large but not so much that is an issue with mounting. The lower midrange in this little is......well big.
> 
> Great job Greyson.


Nice description Mark. I just sent ya a PM too


----------



## narvarr

strakele said:


> Paul, I believe this new tweeter is actually a close relative of the Illusion tweeter.
> 
> Clay, I hope to get to hear yours again too! I'll be in East Mississippi next year so if Erin or someone in Alabama has a meet, you should come.


Lol I'm from MS. Where you gonna be stationed? 

Sent from my SAMSUNG GALAXY NOTE using Tapatalk 2


----------



## JayinMI

I'm confused. I was under the impression that Melodic Acoustic was this months name for Hustler/H-Audio/etc. and that Mark was no longer affiliated with them. But this is just from some comments I had seen in various posts, I haven't like researched it or anything.

Grayson, Why the change? 

Jay


----------



## strakele

I'm gonna be stationed at Columbus AFB.

H-Audio still exists, Audible Physics still exists, and Melodic Acoustic is Mark's new company separate from the others. He can explain all the details. 

The change was to correct the issues I had with the previous install. Couldn't get the 10Fs to fit how I wanted and I already had these pillars that these speakers could drop right into (just barely) so it seemed like the logical choice.

I never got past the "wrapped in towels sitting on the dash" stage with the 10Fs so it's hard to make a real comparison. The 10Fs were lively and dynamic but didn't seem to have as much in the low end.


----------



## james2266

strakele said:


> I'm gonna be stationed at Columbus AFB.
> 
> H-Audio still exists, Audible Physics still exists, and Melodic Acoustic is Mark's new company separate from the others. He can explain all the details.
> 
> The change was to correct the issues I had with the previous install. Couldn't get the 10Fs to fit how I wanted and I already had these pillars that these speakers could drop right into (just barely) so it seemed like the logical choice.
> 
> I never got past the "wrapped in towels sitting on the dash" stage with the 10Fs so it's hard to make a real comparison. The 10Fs were lively and dynamic but didn't seem to have as much in the low end.


And how did you want to mount the 10f that you couldn't if you don't mind me asking? Did you get to hear the 10f and how does it compare to the new midrange if you can compare. Thanks, it is an interesting looking driver for sure and I am talking to Mark about it passively. I kind of already have a dome midrange solution on its way but might still need a cone driver and this one looks very promising by the numbers and dimensions. Just wish I could hear one - care to make a trip just a little north and west?:laugh:


----------



## JayinMI

strakele said:


> H-Audio still exists, Audible Physics still exists, and Melodic Acoustic is Mark's new company separate from the others. He can explain all the details.
> 
> The change was to correct the issues I had with the previous install. Couldn't get the 10Fs to fit how I wanted and I already had these pillars that these speakers could drop right into (just barely) so it seemed like the logical choice.


Ahh, OK. Thanks for clearing that up. I remember now that you were trying to mount the 10f's more in the corners of the dash, and that you said you couldn't really mount them how you wanted.

Jay


----------



## strakele

Yeah, I wanted to mount the 10Fs in the dash corner how I did with the Nz3 except a bit higher up, then just add a tweeter. Unfortunately the geometry just wouldn't work while allowing me to mount it on axis and be stealthy. I only heard them in my car in towels, as pictured a page or two back. I have heard them correctly installed in two vehicles and liked them. It's pretty hard to compare the sound of speakers in two very different cars, running different amounts of power and different amounts of processing. Sorry I can't be of more help here. The magnet on the Euphoria 8.9 is rather wide in diameter, but it isn't super deep, so it should still fit in most places.

Recently I am less concerned with getting everything on axis than I was a few months ago. I've heard/seen too many good cars breaking all the 'rules' and preconceived notions to really care at this point.


----------



## highly

That looks great, Grayson! Those little mids have a lot of motor hanging out 'round back. I've no doubt they'd command more authority lower in their passband.

Silk dome tweeters are nice. They can be made to do a lot of things well, and tend to be forgiving to a less accurate tune and still sound good. They can sparkle and they can provide very nice ambiance. I was a silk dome-or-ring man for a very long time. Once you start becoming attentive to transient response and accurately reproducing the sounds made by cymbals and horns the merits of a silk dome begin to fall away. It's at that point that you realize only a metal dome has the leading edge impact that these instruments possess. The trouble is that there are a LOT of crappy metal domes around and they are much less forgiving than silk. Finding a metal dome that can lay down for daily use with Primus and Dream Theater without causing blood loss but be tightened up for competition is no small feat. It sounds like you are onto something you like here, so I can't wait to hear them! Will we be expecting you up to Bixby for Patriot Autofest or are you going to make me wait for Finals? 

Rules? Where we're going, we don't need _rules_...

-T


----------



## quality_sound

strakele said:


> I'm gonna be stationed at Columbus AFB.


Staff or student?


----------



## strakele

Student.

Todd, I'll be able to make it to the Oklahoma show. Finals is iffy now that I'm not going to be nearly as close as I was supposed to be by then.


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

highly said:


> That looks great, Grayson! Those little mids have a lot of motor hanging out 'round back. I've no doubt they'd command more authority lower in their passband.
> 
> Silk dome tweeters are nice. They can be made to do a lot of things well, and tend to be forgiving to a less accurate tune and still sound good. They can sparkle and they can provide very nice ambiance. I was a silk dome-or-ring man for a very long time. Once you start becoming attentive to transient response and accurately reproducing the sounds made by cymbals and horns the merits of a silk dome begin to fall away. It's at that point that you realize only a metal dome has the leading edge impact that these instruments possess. The trouble is that there are a LOT of crappy metal domes around and they are much less forgiving than silk. Finding a metal dome that can lay down for daily use with Primus and Dream Theater without causing blood loss but be tightened up for competition is no small feat. It sounds like you are onto something you like here, so I can't wait to hear them! Will we be expecting you up to Bixby for Patriot Autofest or are you going to make me wait for Finals?
> 
> Rules? Where we're going, we don't need _rules_...
> 
> -T


Very well said Todd. 

With the Euphoria 2.0, that is what I was after. So a mix of soft and hard metals was used (ALLOY). It was a fine line there to get that balance you speak of. 

I think we got as close to it as any mobile audio metal dome tweeter has come. I wouldn't say it was a grand slam knocked it out the ballpark Home Run, as with the small size it does has some limits, but I would have to say it is an in the ballpark Home Run with 2 players already on base. 

I am more then excited with the results of the introductory products for Melodic Acoustic. 

Once more Great job as always Mr. Strakele


----------



## JayinMI

james2266 said:


> Interesting looking drivers. I count myself in the not liking metal domes crowd but those midranges look interesting. I don't really care for that big rear end again as it would likely make installing a bit of a pain in tight quarters like most of us would install them (apillars for me). I am nonetheless interested in reading some specs and what the tag will be for them.
> 
> Edit: Oh, you said these take the place of a set of 10f. Comparisons against the 10f which I am very familiar with?


I haven't really cared for too many metal dome tweeters either. Going back to old MB Quart and Boston Acoustics. Just about every set I heard made my ears bleed. I got to hear Grayson's car the other day and these tweeters sound amazing. Not a hint of harshness. None. The do their job seamlessly.

Jay


----------



## spyders03

I really don't get the silk vs metal dome debate, it should be tweeter dependant. I have a set of not very expensive aluminum inverted dome tweeters, and it had been the one area I always get great remarks from judges. Some of the best tweeters in the world are metal. 

The problem is they get a bad rep, most cheap aluminum tweeters that people pick up for $10 a set are very harsh, and vice versa most middle to high end tweeters are silk so people associate them with a nicer sound. I can't stand when people make these blanket statements. I've heard nice sounding metal dome, and harsh sounding silkies, all comes down to the individual tweeter and tuning.

Swyped while swerving


----------



## strakele

Thanks Jay. It was good getting to hang out for a bit last weekend!


----------



## Chaos

I have to say that I really like the way that you have presented this build. It reads more like a story about a build than the typical technical presentation that we usually see. To see the evolution from a basic sub box in the trunk all the way to winning your class last year is what this hobby used to be all about. The way that you cooperated with your team on simultaneous projects is especially cool.


----------



## strakele

Thanks man, glad you enjoyed it (and Ally's as well). It's been quite a journey.

I'm now in the process of a partial rebuild. I'll post more once I decide what exactly is going to happen.


----------



## Chaos

Actually, after I posted here, I read through the build in the Monte as well. There is quite a lot to like about each car and I am truly impressed with how much effort went into these vehicles over the last few years. I really do think that both projects are great examples of the principles that DIYMA was founded on.


----------



## strakele

Time for some updates.

Couple minor things:

I was running with no front sub for a while, just using the Dyns in the doors and IB15s. In asking more from the midbass, I noticed some panel buzzes and what sounded like the right side speaker coming in contact with the door panel. So I took them off to investigate and found that my non-hardening modeling clay I had around the speaker baffles had..hardened. So I got rid of all that, cleaned everything up, tightened everything down, added some foam in a couple places, replaced the non(sic) hardening clay with duct seal, and replaced a couple of the door panel clips that were getting worn. No more door issues. Yay.










Next, my XS D3400 up and died on me one day, so it had to get replaced:










Along with that, I got this cool little voltmeter so I can keep track of battery voltage whenever I demo with the car off and no charger. Just plugs into the cigarette lighter. I think it reads a tenth or two low so there's a bit of built in safety margin.












So I mentioned running with no front sub for a while. Ever since I've been running a front sub, I've always had it band passed, not just low passed. But I wanted something I could run with no high pass and be able to take whatever I throw at it and not care. So after doing some research and modeling, I decided to try out the 5th generation Alpine Type R. The whole Alpine sub lineup has gotten a major overhaul recently with lots of new high tech features implemented, and they've been getting great reviews.

But this introduces a problem. If any of you remember when I replaced my original SB Acoustics shallow sub with the Dayton, you'll remember that there was an issue with all 10" subs not actually being the same size and required hacking up and modifying the baffle quite a bit. Same story, different day here. But this time, I wanted to do it right and not cut corners. (Well actually, I decided to really do it right after cutting corners didn't work..) Basically, the screw holes were pretty worn out, and the cutout circle wasn't exactly circular so one of the screws didn't really have anything to bite into so I couldn't get a good seal. Anyone who has heard a sealed sub box that isn't quite sealed knows it sounds utterly horrible. So with that, I decided to completely remove the baffle and start over.

However, I first decided to test each sub free air. At this point I became concerned because the Alpine had significantly more mechanical noise than the Dayton. With how close the sub will be to me in the cabin, that could easily be a deal-breaker. I'd be furious if I spent the time and money to completely rebuild the front of the enclosure only to find that the sub is too noisy, so I needed a way to test it. 

So off to the store to pick up a prefab enclosure to test it in, just to make sure it actually does sound good.










It passed the test (though the test enclosure didn't lol), so the project moved on.

Carpet pulled off. You can see the mounting surface looks kinda smooth and shiny where I tried to just add some resin to bring in back to life a bit. No go.










After a bit of time with the circular saw and a couple pry bars, baffle and fiberglass enclosure are no longer one.










Sanded and chipped out most of the excess globs of filler, resin, fiberglass, and other stuff in the enclosure to maximize airspace as much as possible.










The Alpine sub sits fairly high over the baffle which probably would have interfered with my cover panel, so I had to countersink the sub in the box. Both top layers are built out so as not to take up any enclosure volume, and the third layer is basically just a ring to double the thickness of where the screws bite into to further solidify mounting without taking up any more volume than necessary. This .5 cubic foot enclosure is a bit small for the Alpine, so I wanted to get every bit I could out of it.










Baffles screwed together and covered in resin. Used machine screws and hurricane nuts to mount the sub instead of wood screws this time. I will never mount another sub with wood screws after using these!










Had a couple arguments with the router starting out..


----------



## strakele

After the baffle was glued to the enclosure with resin, the entire perimeter on both the inside and outside was sealed with at least 2-3 layers of fiberglass mat.










Test fit - works perfect!










Wrapped in black and stuffed with some SQ fluff:










Sub installed:










And in the car:










Cover panel back on:











Weather has been nasty here so no good lighting for better pics. But you get the idea. The Type R is a pretty cool looking sub with the black cone, red logo, multi roll surround, and gasket that covers the screws.

Most importantly, it does what I wanted it to do. The enclosure is completely sealed, and the sub takes anything I throw at it with no need for a high pass. Victory. Also definitely more output than before.



Next up, I will be evaluating these guys:










From what I know, they are the same speaker with a different cone as what I'm running now, supposedly with better top end. We shall see


----------



## quality_sound

I think you had more than "a couple" arguments with that router. lol


----------



## SkizeR

strakele said:


> Had a couple arguments with the router starting out..


you and me both :laugh:


----------



## strakele

To be fair, a lot of that was just scrap lol.

But as I was figuring out how I wanted to design the baffle to get me more than 1/2" of thickness for mounting but not take up much airspace, I had an issue where my circle jig started to move which ruined one or two pieces. Then I cut a bunch of circles trying to get the cutout diameter for the sub "just right" to where it fits perfectly and can't move at all. The dimensions listed in the manual were not exact, so I had to do it via trial and error. Had plenty of scrap, so it didn't matter. Sure did make a ton of sawdust.


----------



## narvarr

If I had known what you were up to, I'd have loaned you a 10" Ultimo SC to try up front. It does well in the midbass/sub region.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk


----------



## strakele

The Ultimo SC is one I was interested in when I started looking but it's relatively low xmax and power handling is what took it out of the running. The Arc amp I have running the front sub can do 6-700W at best, and the Alpine can take every bit of it with no highpass and no bottoming out. I can beat on it and not worry.


----------



## decibelle

Damn, all that scrap! Now I see why you were raging about it the other day. Glad you finally got er done though. You'll probably end up changing it again before I can get a chance to hear it.

Now hurry up and send me the router so I don't have to buy another. I'll probably need it before you will


----------



## ErinH

^ shipping a router back and forth can get costly. might as well just buy one. 


I can't knock scraps. The worst is when you're cutting a trim ring. You cut the inside just fine. Set your outer diameter on the jig then cut. THEN realize you forgot to account for the 1/4" blade diameter *2 to make the outer ring actually match the OD rather than an ID. DOH!!!!!

How many times will it take me to remember that?...


----------



## decibelle

bikinpunk said:


> ^ shipping a router back and forth can get costly. might as well just buy one.


Who said anything about sending it back?


----------



## SkizeR

millerlyte said:


> Who said anything about sending it back?


thats mean


----------



## ErinH

millerlyte said:


> Who said anything about sending it back?


Heck, you guys already are married via common law in GA. Either of you could make a case for that router.


----------



## strakele

Luckily we're both Texas residents


----------



## spyders03

Looking good man, can't wait till I can hear it.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk


----------



## strakele

Minor update - added some red trim to the doors and dash.


----------



## ErinH

Looks good!


----------



## Melodic Acoustic

Looks amazing sir.


----------



## decibelle

That's it?


----------



## bertholomey

Naysayers gotta Naysay.......


----------



## strakele

millerlyte said:


> That's it?


Nope. Got a new voltmeter that's actually accurate too


----------



## JayinMI

What holds that on? That looks awesome.

Jay


----------



## ErinH

JayinMI said:


> What holds that on? That looks awesome.
> 
> Jay


Looks like it's just plugged in to the cigarette lighter.


----------



## Salami

strakele said:


> Nope. Got a new voltmeter that's actually accurate too


Who makes it and how much? I have been looking for one like that that is fairly accurate.


----------



## strakele

JayinMI said:


> What holds that on? That looks awesome.


Has a thin strip behind the piping that you just wedge in between panels.



Salami said:


> Who makes it and how much? I have been looking for one like that that is fairly accurate.


'Pipedream'

$12.50. Might not come out of the box exceptionally accurate, but unlike the one I had before, it's got an adjustment pot so you can fine tune it. I made it match my DMM as close as possible. Right now it's just a tad high I think, so I'll probably end up tweaking it more so if anything, it reads a tad low.


----------



## captainobvious

What is the trim/piping product and how is it applied/secured? Where would I find something like that ?


----------



## strakele

It's made by Mechunik for BMW's. A few sites carry it, and they all charge the same price and the same shipping, so there's no point in shopping around. The thin strip on the back side of the piping wedges in between panels. It also comes with double sided tape to help it stay in bends and panel gaps that aren't as tight.


----------



## strakele

To continue the interior updates, I got a OEM carbon fiber e-brake handle with aluminum accents instead of black chrome to match the other metal in the interior, and a new red stitched leather armrest cover and e-brake boot to match the shift boot and steering wheel, along with all the other black/red in the car. The current shift boot will also be replaced with one that looks very similar but is made of a nicer material and has the Ralliart logo stitched _into_ it instead of _onto_ it. That won't happen till I figure out if I'm switching processors and adding some more vinyl.

Anyway, here's some pics.

Before:
















After:







































Much nicer IMO


----------



## Kevin K

Very nice.


----------



## bertholomey

I like it - nice little touches like that are fun!


----------



## strakele

I agree. All the little touches you've done in your car look great as well Jason.


----------



## spyders03

Very nice, I like it

Swyped while Swerving


----------



## wdemetrius1

I agree with everyone, it looks great.


----------



## strakele

I mentioned a while back while working on the cars with Ally last summer that we got LED controllers that can also respond to music. Never posted a video of it and don't really use it that much, but I thought of it yesterday, so here's an example. Also shows some of the other colors it does besides the red/white/blue that I normally use.

Click for video


Works pretty well actually. At the right volume.


----------



## deltasaurus

Just finished a beginning to end read and I have to say Bravo, Sir! A truly great work of art full of love and care. If you are still in Georgia, I would love ro hear this sweet ride at the upcoming gtg in August! Keep it coming and best wishes to you!


----------



## strakele

Thank you very much! I appreciate the comments and I'd love for you to hear it, but I'm no longer in Atlanta. About to start learning how to fly jets at Vance AFB in Oklahoma.


----------



## deltasaurus

Well, ratts. As usual a day late and a dollar short! Well, maybe somewhere down the road. Until then, best to you and thank you for your choice to serve our Country! May fortune shine upon you for that!


----------



## strakele

I still have a lot of audio buddies around there so if I ever happen to be out there with the car again maybe we can have another meet.

Thanks for the kind words!


----------



## strakele

I still have a lot of audio buddies around there so if I ever happen to be out there with the car again maybe we can have another meet.

Thanks for the kind words!


----------



## deltasaurus

I would welcome the opportunity. Who knows what the future holds.


----------



## strakele

Got some real updates coming, but here's something to go along with the new front sub build.

Last time I was down in OKC I was able to get the Type R measured in the enclosure using Todd's woofer tester. I had measured the internal volume of the box to be .48 cubic feet - a hair smaller than optimal for this sub. There's a decent amount of polyfill in it, and this gave me the opportunity to see how the specs compared to the model.

Here's the result:










It's very similar to the WinISD model. Adjusting the volume in the model to make Fb match the measured result yields .58 cubic feet, doing the same for Qts yields .44 cubic feet, so in between is .51 which makes perfect sense, so I was pretty happy to see that.


Also, the shift boot I had was made of some pretty stiff leather vinyl and ended up cracking, so it got replaced with a nicer one made with softer material and an embroidered logo instead of stitched on.

Old:



















New:


----------



## james2266

Very nice indeed. So, you are rocking a front sub now. I hope there will be detailed build pics. Curious as to how many glass layers you used on the base mold. I am seriously considering attempting a front sub under my glove box. I still need to start the basic measuring and actually buy a suitable sub for that (probably the greatest obstacle). Is there anything I should be wary of with this. ie. deadening the area possibly? The sub most intriguing to me is probably the SI BM mk4 12 for this. I would like the Illusion C12 xl but that is just way out of my budget at this time. Any thoughts on my choice or even better any experience with this SI sub as an up front guy. I am currently running a Morel Ultimo 12 and want to make sure not to be disappointed in this attempt. Sure would be nice not having a giant box in the back both taking up valuable cargo space and staring at anyone that happens by when I am loading things at a store.


----------



## strakele

I've actually been rocking a front sub for quite a while now. The original build up using the SB Acoustics shallow sub is detailed here: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...bishi-lancer-ralliart-first-build-log-14.html

The update with the Dayton HO is posted here: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/1595419-post409.html

And the rebuild with the Alpine Type R starts at post 770 a few pages back: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...bishi-lancer-ralliart-first-build-log-31.html

The glass part started with a really thick layer of fiberglass cloth (don't remember weight, but it was some serious stuff. Then 3 or 4 layers of mat. Fleece for the top, reinforced with mat and then coated with milkshake on the inside.

Not sure if it's just my car or the box or what, but I needed very little extra deadening up front due to the sub. There's a layer of CLD on the top of the box, and it sits on carpet that kinda decouples in from the car, but that's about it.

Sub choice will depend mostly on the amount of airspace you can give it. No sense buying a $1200 sub if you can't give it the volume it needs to sound right. Once you figure that out, you can narrow down your choices.

As far as the SI BM Mk4, my friend Jason has one in .5 cubic feet up front in his BRZ and it sounds great: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/2028441-post864.html

And for the C12XL, my friend Linda has one in 1 cubic foot (I think) up front in her Smart and it sounds great as well: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/1965814-post146.html

If you can get the airspace required, either would do well for you.


----------



## james2266

strakele said:


> I've actually been rocking a front sub for quite a while now. The original build up using the SB Acoustics shallow sub is detailed here: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...bishi-lancer-ralliart-first-build-log-14.html
> 
> The update with the Dayton HO is posted here: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/1595419-post409.html
> 
> And the rebuild with the Alpine Type R starts at post 770 a few pages back: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...bishi-lancer-ralliart-first-build-log-31.html
> 
> The glass part started with a really thick layer of fiberglass cloth (don't remember weight, but it was some serious stuff. Then 3 or 4 layers of mat. Fleece for the top, reinforced with mat and then coated with milkshake on the inside.
> 
> Not sure if it's just my car or the box or what, but I needed very little extra deadening up front due to the sub. There's a layer of CLD on the top of the box, and it sits on carpet that kinda decouples in from the car, but that's about it.
> 
> Sub choice will depend mostly on the amount of airspace you can give it. No sense buying a $1200 sub if you can't give it the volume it needs to sound right. Once you figure that out, you can narrow down your choices.
> 
> As far as the SI BM Mk4, my friend Jason has one in .5 cubic feet up front in his BRZ and it sounds great: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/2028441-post864.html
> 
> And for the C12XL, my friend Linda has one in 1 cubic foot (I think) up front in her Smart and it sounds great as well: http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/1965814-post146.html
> 
> If you can get the airspace required, either would do well for you.


Thanks a pile for all that. I guess I have some reading to do. I have heard Linda's Smart first hand and was impressed to say the least. Does the SI sub have that same kind of low end impact as the c12xl does? My largest concern sq wise is that the SI sub might not play low enough or my liking and/or not have enough impact. Sure would be nice to have absolutely no pull to the back too. I have the Ultimo about as good as it can get for staying up front but there are frequencies that still drift to the back on occasion. Up front sub eliminates that 100% and also gives me all my cargo space back and keeps things alot more stealth which is important too. If I lose sq tho all of this is not worth it to me. Once again, thanks for all the info. Going over to your buddy Jason's log now


----------



## strakele

The BM definitely has some impressive low end, especially for a shallow sub, and sounds extremely clean doing it. It's not an SPL monster, but if your concern is SQ, it should be great. Jason will be able to say more, I've only had the pleasure of hearing it once. 

Pulling to the back is a tricky thing. Most likely, there will be certain frequencies in your car that will still pull back a little bit, purely due to the wavelength and the car's interior dimensions. When the wavelength is such that a quarter (I think) wave forms at the back of your car... it'll sound like it's coming from the back, even if the source is up front. Luckily, it's still much less of a problem than when the sub is actually behind you, and it brings all the impact forward.


----------



## james2266

strakele said:


> The BM definitely has some impressive low end, especially for a shallow sub, and sounds extremely clean doing it. It's not an SPL monster, but if your concern is SQ, it should be great. Jason will be able to say more, I've only had the pleasure of hearing it once.
> 
> Pulling to the back is a tricky thing. Most likely, there will be certain frequencies in your car that will still pull back a little bit, purely due to the wavelength and the car's interior dimensions. When the wavelength is such that a quarter (I think) wave forms at the back of your car... it'll sound like it's coming from the back, even if the source is up front. Luckily, it's still much less of a problem than when the sub is actually behind you, and it brings all the impact forward.


My thoughts exactly. Nice that I think I have my brain around what's going on with this finally. 

I must say, it shocked me the configuration that Jason is using for his up front sub. I had never thought of trying up firing at the glove box. Did he have any issues with ratting coming from the glove box/dash area? Very nice that when all trim pieces are in place that one can see no evidence of a sub there. Very nice install indeed. I will have to search out his entire build log now and I will ask more questions there.


----------



## strakele

No extra issues that I'm aware of due to the upfiring configuration compared to any other option.



Also, today I got around to running a 3.5mm to RCA cable in the car so that anything with a headphone jack can be used as a source.


----------



## strakele

Last piece finally came in, and will be done soon


----------



## pocket5s

Done? There is such a thing?


----------



## strakele

Haha. I was referring to my modification of the last piece being done, but after that, yeah, the car will be "done" for at least the next year or so, excluding tweaks on the tune. With pilot training having finally started, I'm not going to have any time to do real work on it anymore.


----------



## strakele

Well it's about time for some more updates. Should be "done" by this weekend, but here's a little bit for now.


First, my floor mat had a big nasty hole worn in the carpet. So instead of getting all new ones again, I got this:










Maybe a little ricey to some people, but I wear combat boots to work and they will tear up carpet real quick. I don't care for the look of completely rubber mats, especially for the passenger seats, so this will protect the carpet and match the pedals.












Other than that, there are some new things in the works...


----------



## strakele

First up, replaced the Rockford 3sixty.3 with the Mosconi 6to8v8.

It has none of the noise floor issues my first one had, and all the software features that I like. Only real complaint is that I still have to turn the input sensitivity down pretty far so it doesn't mute at high volume. That, and coming from the 3sixty.3 with 31 bands/channel, there's definitely less EQ bands available. But it's enough to make it sound good


----------



## captainobvious

Were the eq bands on the 3sixty graphic only? At least you get peq on the 6to8. 
Nice to hear no issues with noise floor on it either.

As for the muting, are you sure you're not getting clipping at the inputs off of the deck? Are you noticing more output either way before the awesome "muting feature" ?


----------



## papasin

captainobvious said:


> Were the eq bands on the 3sixty graphic only? At least you get peq on the 6to8.



3Sixty.3 is 31 band PEQ for all 8 channels. But I'm sure Grayson has his reasons...I found pros and cons between the various ones I've used. Saving presets on the 3Sixty.3 and the fact that you can't have different slopes on the two sides of a bandpass were a couple of my pet peeves. It's what I use in one of our cars though and works pretty well.


----------



## strakele

Yep, 31 freely configurable parametric bands on each channel of the 3sixty.3. It's really very powerful. The 6to8 has a wider range of Q adjustment though..max on the Rockford was 6.

The Alpine CDA-9887 that I use does not clip at max volume, and certainly not at 80% volume where the 6to8 starts to mute. I recently upped my gains a little and am running the levels in the 6to8 as high as possible and the volume is pretty good now. My general desire for volume is to have the system able to play my quietest recording "too loud." Right now, it can play 'most' recordings too loud to listen. I guess the plus side of this is that it's always enough for normal loud listening, and extremely unlikely to damage anything at any volume level.

And yeah, there were a couple other annoying things about the Rockford, but like Richard said, they all have some issues.

The "perfect processor" in my opinion would be the 6to8v8 with the input muting removed, t/a, level, and phase screens combined into one, incremental phase adjustment like the Helix, at least 12 bands on the midbass/sub channels, and coded so that making an adjustment results in no audible pop/click.


----------



## JayinMI

I've used both a BitOne (in my car), a Mosconi 6to8 (not the V8), a couple of 360.2's and a couple of 360.3's. I gotta say, the Mosconi is a very nice unit, but I found the software to be a PITA comparatively. The BitOne and Rockford software seemed similar to me and both were pretty easy to use. I really feel like the 6to8V8 with the high res bluetooth adapter would be a GREAT piece especially if it had easier to use software/GUI. 

I hope to get my hands on a PS8 at some point. Maybe even an H800...I haven't gotten to play with either.

Jay


----------



## strakele

I totally understand why people like the 'all on one screen' UI design of other common processors. But what I really like about the 6to8 UI is the ability to make adjustments on multiple channels at once. Want to delay the entire left side? Sure. Invert phase on both mids? Done. Adjust levels on both tweets simultaneously? Easy. Adjust EQ on one midbass, then the other, then both from the same screen? Yup. Can't do that when each screen is only for 1 speaker. I can do with one click what would take 4 with a different interface. Although I suppose if you wanted to go back and forth between level, t/a, and EQ for one speaker at a time, it would be more tedious with the 6to8.

Also, unrelated, I was always under the impression that the 9887 iPod cable was digital, but that impression was recently smashed by reality, and has me kind of wanting a new head unit. Well that's one reason anyway. But I'm just not excited about anything currently available.


----------



## strakele

Anyway, here's the most recent project. Replacing my trusty Melodic Acoustic 3.5" midranges (right) with Morel Hybrid Ovation 4" midranges (left). Only 1/2" bigger diameter, but almost 2.5x as much cone are due to the Morel's flangeless design.



















Onto the build:

A large open area was cut out from the base of the pillars and reinforced with some thin steel rods to resist twisting and flexing while cloth was being stretched:










Mock up of how the speakers would be aimed. They are placed as wide as possible, inset into the pillar so the baffle is essentially touching the metal of the pillar to maximize stage width and minimize the amount they stick out.










Baffles were made out of a fiber reinforced plastic 4" atrium grate that was cut and turned on a lathe to precisely fit the speaker



















The rings were then placed in each side and glued in place:




























Then the area around the pillar was fully masked off:


----------



## strakele

And cloth stretched to form the shape of the base:










Then resin was applied and the pillar was placed in position to cure:










And removed from the car when cured..










Same was done to the other side, and as usual, the second one came out a bit better:










Kinda tough to tell in the pic, but then a large half oval area was cut out in front of the speaker baffle so it wouldn't block the speaker and to form a smooth transition, and cloth stretched to form and smooth concave curve:










After resin applied and cured:










Test fit in car:










After reinforcement with a few layers of fiberglass mat on the back side, it was time for body filler to smooth:


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> I totally understand why people like the 'all on one screen' UI design of other common processors. But what I really like about the 6to8 UI is the ability to make adjustments on multiple channels at once. Want to delay the entire left side? Sure. Invert phase on both mids? Done. Adjust levels on both tweets simultaneously? Easy. Adjust EQ on one midbass, then the other, then both from the same screen? Yup. Can't do that when each screen is only for 1 speaker. I can do with one click what would take 4 with a different interface. Although I suppose if you wanted to go back and forth between level, t/a, and EQ for one speaker at a time, it would be more tedious with the 6to8.
> 
> Also, unrelated, I was always under the impression that the 9887 iPod cable was digital, but that impression was recently smashed by reality, and has me kind of wanting a new head unit. Well that's one reason anyway. But I'm just not excited about anything currently available.



Time to go digital direct into the 6to8v8 it sounds like... 

I'm on that path myself as well. Have the 6to8v8 with multi-digital input board and AMAS along with the RCD controller. Pretty cool stuff.

Thanks for the clarification on the 360.3 EQ


----------



## strakele

Then the other was filled and smoothed to match:










Then I shot them with Plasti-Dip so it was all one color to make it easier to see any flaws while being easy to remove:



















And wrapped in polyester real quick for the big Texas show where some of you saw it. My phone decided it didn't feel like storing my pictures anymore, so this one was taken by someone at the show..










But then that was torn off for real upholstery!

They are wrapped with black vinyl on the majority just like the old pillars to match the interior, with a padded suede insert behind the speaker to control some reflections, and red French seam stitching to match the rest of the interior.

Right after picking them up:










And in the car!


----------



## strakele

captainobvious said:


> Time to go digital direct into the 6to8v8 it sounds like...
> 
> I'm on that path myself as well. Have the 6to8v8 with multi-digital input board and AMAS along with the RCD controller. Pretty cool stuff.
> 
> Thanks for the clarification on the 360.3 EQ


Yeah, but that's a couple hundred bucks, plus however much a digital iPod dock costs, and then it means I can't control it from the head unit, which I'm not sure I'd even be allowed to do on base with their ban on handheld electronics. So getting a new HU with digital iPod cable would definitely be the cheaper/easier option, though the signal would be be analog after the HU instead of digital straight to the DSP. 

Having the Bluetooth and other features of a more modern head unit would be nice too. The CDA-117 would be the ticket I think, except that for whatever reason they decided to make it light up blue only. The newer 149BT would also work, but I'm not as big of a fan of the looks, with that giant 'Source' button. Meh. We'll see. Not a huge priority right now.


----------



## JayinMI

So how do those Morels mount since they have no flange?
I loved the way your car sounded last year, so I hope this ends up being an improvement for you.

Jay


----------



## captainobvious

Yup I can understand that. The decked out 6to8 gets really pricey for sure. I wouldnt have splurged for the whole setup new because I wouldnt have been able to justify it. I just got lucky with a great deal from a fellow board member.

Bummer about the portable electronics ban on base. Do you typically do all cd's then or can you use a USB stick?


----------



## strakele

JayinMI said:


> So how do those Morels mount since they have no flange?
> I loved the way your car sounded last year, so I hope this ends up being an improvement for you.
> 
> Jay



If you look at the side view of it (second pic down on this page) you'll see one of the three 2-pronged clips on the basket that hold it into the baffle. The center of it is the small gold circle.



captainobvious said:


> Yup I can understand that. The decked out 6to8 gets really pricey for sure. I wouldnt have splurged for the whole setup new because I wouldnt have been able to justify it. I just got lucky with a great deal from a fellow board member.
> 
> Bummer about the portable electronics ban on base. Do you typically do all cd's then or can you use a USB stick?


My source is a 64G iPod Touch that lives in the car. I can control it from the head unit.


----------



## captainobvious

Oh and BTW- I know I said it in NC, but you did a fantastic job of filling and smoothing those pillars. Really nice work. I like the finishing touches with the stitching and the new shift boot as well.
I miss my Lancer. That was a really fun car.


----------



## strakele

Thanks Steve. The body filler wasn't as bad to work with as I was expecting. Not too shabby for my first try at making pillars 

I brought them up to NC cause I was considering just leaving them with Mark and having him finish them. After talking for a bit I decided to try it myself and am glad I did. Only thing I didn't do was the final wrap/stitching. So other than the resin and filler, that was my only cost for this whole project. In total, it cost 1/10 of what some shops had quoted me to do them.


----------



## Mic10is

that looks pretty slick dude. well done. Id be curious to hear it now w the new set up


----------



## strakele

Thanks Mic. Pretty happy with how it came out 

Learned a lot about tuning in the past few months doing it all myself. It's really coming along well. Last night Todd said it sounded f-ing awesome.

I'd love to have you and the rest of the NC crew hear it, but it'll probably be quite a while before I'm out there again now that UPT is underway.


----------



## Mic10is

strakele said:


> Thanks Mic. Pretty happy with how it came out
> 
> 
> 
> *I'd love to have you and the rest of the NC crew hear it,*



that part still sounds funny to me..LOL

We've only been in the state 6 weeks, not sure Id really be part of the crew


----------



## strakele

You live in NC and do car audio. Pretty sure those are the only requirements 

And showing up for the meets. Really, meeting 2 of those 3 is probably enough lol.


----------



## casey

those new mids engulf the 3" previous. they look bigger than my scan 12m!


----------



## strakele

They do look quite a bit bigger in the pics. But the funny thing is, the Morels are actually a full 1cm smaller in diameter than the Scan 12M, while having 30% more cone area.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Haha yeah, Clay likes to rock, that's for sure. And I believe that you have good success with the 172's and I'm glad and would love to hear it. I just rarely have the same experience in my car for whatever reason.
> 
> 
> Kelvin, I've tried and modeled a lot of midbass speakers in my car. I've ran:
> 
> - stock Infinity woofer
> - Alpine Type S
> - Boston Acoustics SPZ60
> - Usher 8945A
> - Audible Physics AR6K
> - Peerless SLS6
> - H-Audio Ebony
> - Audible Physics Arian
> - Dynaudio MW172
> 
> The only ones that could take a crossover below 80Hz were the Usher and Peerless. The Boston SPZ probably could as well but I didn't have much processing available back then. It was either 80Hz or no high pass.
> 
> Feel free to PM or discuss in my build thread so we don't get Casey's too far off topic


What made you change the Usher or the SLS? No midbass thumb due to the low Qts - aka F3 starting too soon up high? 
I've always been drawed towards high Qts drivers (>0.6) for midbass use. 

I'm still overseas and will be able to try and model a few drivers when I get back home. 

Kelvin


----------



## strakele

Only reason I changed the Usher was due to getting a package deal on the AR3K/AR6K.

Changing out the SLS was partly due to switching to team drivers, partly to see if there was anything to the 'high qts speakers are more snappy' talk, and party because every time I rolled down my windows with the SLS I was scared something might have shifted half a millimeter and the magnet was going to scratch my tint (which did happen). It also had fairly low cone area due to the huge surround.

Minus the size issue of the SLS, I'm pretty sure I'd be content switching back to either of those.

I'm currently keeping an eye on the new XBL mid that SI is about to come out with, as well as any potential shallow offering from Kravchenko.


----------



## Bluenote

Tweeters are in the sails right? I've followed the build but with all the advancements you've made I lost track


----------



## strakele

Yes, they're in the sails. I'll post some pics of the new tweet setup when I get a chance.


----------



## Bluenote

Cool! Nice work, and I've always wanted to know how well those Morel Mids played. You've got a great set up!


----------



## edouble101

Happy to see that you got those MW4's installed. The pillars look fantastic! What are your thoughts on them?


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. I'm definitely liking the Morels. Tuned right, they're smooth and dynamic. Definitely a contrast from the widebanders that I've ran previously - these have no top end extension. But as a dedicated midrange, I think they're great.


----------



## Notloudenuf

strakele said:


> You live in NC and do car audio. Pretty sure those are the only requirements
> 
> And showing up for the meets. Really, meeting 2 of those 3 is probably enough lol.


You are correct sir. :laugh: NCSQ is not real strict with membership requirements.
You can do 1 of those 3 and be one of the "crew" so long as you want to be in.


----------



## bigbubba

Wow Grayson, those pillars came out really nice! I'm guessing they play down into the dash. How did you come to test fit them to the atrium grate?


----------



## strakele

Thanks man. Yeah, they play down into the dash, which is sealed off about halfway down, so there's no sound coming out the bottom.

The atrium grate was kinda out of necessity. Some baffles I had made without the speakers present didn't quite fit. The grate was a random piece Todd had laying around his shop that happened to fit after a bit of trimming.


----------



## req

damn gray.

thats how pillars should look. they came out awesome! cant wait to hear it again dude!


----------



## ErinH

indeed. looks awesome! bring it to finals.


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys. I'd love to go to finals. But I won't have time. Or points. We'll be a month and a half into flying by then. 12 hour days and whatnot. Just had our first academic test today. 

aced it!


----------



## ErinH

congrats on the little accomplishment. 


hopefully we can tag up at a future meet sometime.


----------



## strakele

Just come out to the next meet at Todd's

That goes for everyone looking that wants to hear it


----------



## ledzpg

Awesome pillars!  :bowdown:

I wish I could make nice things with fiberglass like this...


----------



## strakele

I really just learned from looking at so many pictures of pillar builds on this site. It was pretty straightforward. I thought it was going to be worse/harder than it was.


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> I really just learned from looking at so many pictures of pillar builds on this site. It was pretty straightforward. I thought it was going to be worse/harder than it was.


As a non-professional (obviously), the key to getting good results with things like pillars is patience and elbow grease. 

Taking your time, thinking through the process, not sweating having to re-do, sanding and more sanding, etc. And then you have to understand that you're not a pro and that they may not be "perfect", but they're the best _you_ can do. In Grayson's case, these came out much better than most amateurs, and certainly better than my first attempt.:blush:


----------



## JayinMI

You can also fix a lot with more filler. lol

Jay


----------



## strakele

Haha true that ^^


----------



## ledzpg

My extra pair of OEM pillars are waiting for me to have time, patience, courage and some experience with fiberglass. I've never made anything with it before, and I don't want to ruin the pillars on my first try, because they was really hard to find with an affordable price. The 92-95 Lancer is kinda rare here, and spare OEM interior parts aren't cheap... =/


----------



## captainobvious

ledzpg said:


> My extra pair of OEM pillars are waiting for me to have time, patience, courage and some experience with fiberglass. I've never made anything with it before, and I don't want to ruin the pillars on my first try, because they was really hard to find with an affordable price. The 92-95 Lancer is kinda rare here, and spare OEM interior parts aren't cheap... =/


Pillars for these cars are usually in the $30 range. Don't sweat it, give it a go!


----------



## wdemetrius1

Wow, those pillars do look great!!!


----------



## strakele

Thanks D! Haven't seen you around much man, what's up? Any changes to your car in the past year or so?


----------



## splaudiohz

strakele said:


> And cloth stretched to form the shape of the base:
> 
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> 
> 
> Then resin was applied and the pillar was placed in position to cure:
> 
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> 
> 
> And removed from the car when cured..
> 
> 
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> 
> Same was done to the other side, and as usual, the second one came out a bit better:
> 
> 
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> 
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> 
> 
> Kinda tough to tell in the pic, but then a large half oval area was cut out in front of the speaker baffle so it wouldn't block the speaker and to form a smooth transition, and cloth stretched to form and smooth concave curve:
> 
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> 
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> 
> After resin applied and cured:
> 
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> Test fit in car:
> 
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> 
> After reinforcement with a few layers of fiberglass mat on the back side, it was time for body filler to smooth:




Nice I like this idea... after you cut out the section where the concave would be , you stretched cloth over it but did the resin sag in the concave to form it? It seems if you wrap cloth tight over the cut out it would not concave.


----------



## strakele

The the cloth at the front of the concave section (closest to where the speaker sits) was attached to the outside edge of the green baffle as shown in the 5th picture. That cause it to start curved right there, then gradually smooth out towards the top. It was pulled smooth but not real tight. After resin was applied, a section of 4" PVC pipe was placed into the concave area to maintain a more or less constant radius curve throughout that concave cutout while the resin cured.


----------



## claydo

strakele said:


> The the cloth at the front of the concave section (closest to where the speaker sits) was attached to the outside edge of the green baffle as shown in the 5th picture. That cause it to start curved right there, then gradually smooth out towards the top. It was pulled smooth but not real tight. After resin was applied, a section of 4" PVC pipe was placed into the concave area to maintain a more or less constant radius curve throughout that concave cutout while the resin cured.


Ya know, I wondered about that but hadn't asked.....brilliant!


----------



## strakele

Part 2: Replacing Melodic Acoustic 20mm tweeter with JL Audio ZR-100 1 inch tweeter:




















For the way I intended to install them, the JL's worked out better because they were the same diameter but shallower, and also had a bigger radiating surface.

Wire hole for the side mirror adjustment motor was moved forward to allow the tweeters to sit as far inside the sail panel as possible with how I wanted to aim them.










Sail panel was cut up quite a bit so tweeters could be aimed up and out so as to bounce off the side glass. You can kinda see the tweeter's reflection in the glass near the side mirrors. That becomes the apparent source of the sound.




























A sheet of foam paper was used to form a little guide for the sail panel to block most of the direct sound so that I'm only using the reflections.



















The sail panel was covered in grill cloth and the cover was wrapped in the same suede as the pillar inset:




















With this setup, the stage is easily the widest it's ever been.


----------



## strakele

Lastly, as you can see in some of the pics above the dash mat was a bit too light, so I replaced it with a new black suede dashmat to match the other suede accents.

I also decided to make it further match by adding some red stitching around the seams.

Stock:










Halfway:










Done:










That's all I've done for now. Considering doing a line across the front too. But that will definitely take a while doing it by hand. 

As it sits now:










Also, one of my Morels started making a scratchy sound every once in a while, so I'm using the Xtant versions now. You can see in the pic how there's no notches in the frame of these which looks nicer. They have a very similar response curve to the Morel branded ones, as expected.


So with that, it's pretty much done for the next year or so. I'll still be working on the tune every so often, but for now it's pretty damn good.


----------



## Kevin K

very cool and looks great


----------



## SkizeR

interesting. so how do the tweeters sound being installed like that?


----------



## Bluenote

Very unique tweeter install!


----------



## strakele

The tweeters sound like tweeters... that are mounted in the side view mirrors outside the car.


----------



## Bluenote

That's cool. With them bouncing off the window they must be pretty hard to localize I would imagine.


----------



## strakele

Yeah. In my previous install with the tweeters on axis in the sail panels, they did localize more, and sounded more... choked. Now it's more open, wider, more spacious. It works quite well. One of the biggest positive differences, really. Can't take credit for the idea though. Todd came up with that one, and I made it work in my car.


----------



## Bluenote

That's sweet and Highly unconventional!


----------



## JayinMI

Pun intended? Lol.

Jay


----------



## Bluenote

Ha! Just caught that. No pun intended but it makes complete sense.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Wish that you were closer Gray. I would love to get a listen.


----------



## RocketBoots

I know you stated the soundstage widened and the tweeters were more difficult to localize aimed at the windows like that, but compared to the tweets on-axis, did you find the imaging any worse??

Also, how did it effect or change your tune? Was time alignment more difficult??


----------



## strakele

Imaging is just as good if not better. Time alignment is the same level of difficulty.

The tune is completely different since I also changed the tweeter drivers as well as the install.


----------



## captainobvious

Interesting tweeter integration. I remember hearing and seeing Ally's in a similar design by firing off of the window glass in an angle that puts the reflection coming from the side view mirror area. Good width in the Monte as well.


----------



## req

very cool grayson! ill have to give this type of aim a test when i finish my sail panels


----------



## boricua69

Nice looking pillar! What about the mid performance in that tight cone pillar desing? Can you achieve 280hz, 300hz with full body live performance?


----------



## strakele

Tough to say exactly, but the mids probably would be happier with more airspace directly around them.

I don't try to run them down super low. 250 or 300 they do just fine


----------



## Yepvegas

Not that any critical listening is done while driving with the windows down. Just curious do the tweets keep up?


----------



## strakele

With the windows down? No, with the windows down there is nothing for them to reflect off so all the sound goes right out the window and none of it to your ear. It's like not having tweeters at all. 

I've driven this car for 8 years and never driven more than a few minutes with the windows down, and that's not about to change, so I'm not worried. But it is a limitation of this type of install.


----------



## strakele

So, barring any equipment failures or miraculous new products* this build is pretty much done. I know I've said that before, but at least for the next year, it's for real. With pilot training ramping up intensity every week, I'm not going to be doing any more big projects on this car. I do intend to make a tune or two with a further back seating position, but that's about it. I can absolutely say the car sounds the best it ever has, and I'm very happy with it.

I'll be around to answer any questions and I'll probably post some more graphs if anyone is interested. But v6.0 of the system is done.


*This includes: a company making a head unit that I don't hate or Stereo Integrity or Kravchenko or someone making a shallow, long throw 7.5" midbass.


----------



## Bluenote

Congratulations! You put a lot of thought and work into this!


----------



## strakele

Thanks. It has definitely come a long way, that's for sure 

Learned a lot about sound/tuning as well as fabricating/installing.


----------



## subwoofery

strakele said:


> Haha yeah, Clay likes to rock, that's for sure. And I believe that you have good success with the 172's and I'm glad and would love to hear it. I just rarely have the same experience in my car for whatever reason.
> 
> 
> Kelvin, I've tried and modeled a lot of midbass speakers in my car. I've ran:
> 
> - stock Infinity woofer
> - Alpine Type S
> - Boston Acoustics SPZ60
> - Usher 8945A
> - Audible Physics AR6K
> - Peerless SLS6
> - H-Audio Ebony
> - Audible Physics Arian
> - Dynaudio MW172
> 
> The only ones that could take a crossover below 80Hz were the Usher and Peerless. The Boston SPZ probably could as well but I didn't have much processing available back then. It was either 80Hz or no high pass.
> 
> Feel free to PM or discuss in my build thread so we don't get Casey's too far off topic





strakele said:


> Only reason I changed the Usher was due to getting a package deal on the AR3K/AR6K.
> 
> Changing out the SLS was partly due to switching to team drivers, partly to see if there was anything to the 'high qts speakers are more snappy' talk, and party because every time I rolled down my windows with the SLS I was scared something might have shifted half a millimeter and the magnet was going to scratch my tint (which did happen). It also had fairly low cone area due to the huge surround.
> 
> Minus the size issue of the SLS, I'm pretty sure I'd be content switching back to either of those.
> 
> I'm currently keeping an eye on the new XBL mid that SI is about to come out with, as well as any potential shallow offering from Kravchenko.


Here's a pic with a few tests done in a german magazine: (from left to right DYN Esotec 342 - JBL 660Gti - Focal Utopia Be N°7 - Rockford Fosgate T3 set 









What you should focus on here is the Max. Shalldruck numbers to whichever comes first: 3dB compression or 10% distortion. 
The Dyn set is with the MW172 driver you are using. 
I choose to show the JBL 660Gti set coz it has been Klippel and posted on the forum as being a great driver with a nice Xmax figure. 
The Focal set has 3dB more usable output than the MW172 set but am not sure it'll satisfy your midbass need if crossed @ 63Hz. 
Last set is the RF, I find it interesting that it has everything from power handling to usable output rivalling sets much pricier. Wish they tested the T5 set 

Not sure how this can help you but that is all I could come up with  

Kelvin 

Edit: other than those, yes the SI driver is worth looking into. I know I am


----------



## strakele

Cool, thanks for that. I wish there were more reviews out there that gave useful data like that.

At this point, the Dyns are staying where they are. The midbass in the Lancer certainly doesn't suck.

Now if I want ridiculous midbass, I'll just listen to the truck. Ported 12" midbass on 250W each > any 6.5 or 8" ever made


----------



## mikey7182

strakele said:


> Cool, thanks for that. I wish there were more reviews out there that gave useful data like that.
> 
> At this point, the Dyns are staying where they are. The midbass in the Lancer certainly doesn't suck.
> 
> Now if I want ridiculous midbass, I'll just listen to the truck. Ported 12" midbass on 250W each > any 6.5 or 8" ever made


Lucky you have two setups to choose from! That was my first impression when I first did the 12s... There was just no going back after that. 8" were now and are forever midranges.


----------



## JayinMI

strakele said:


> Cool, thanks for that. I wish there were more reviews out there that gave useful data like that.
> 
> At this point, the Dyns are staying where they are. The midbass in the Lancer certainly doesn't suck.
> 
> Now if I want ridiculous midbass, I'll just listen to the truck. Ported 12" midbass on 250W each > any 6.5 or 8" ever made


You have a truck, too? Didn't know that. Did you do anything cool in it, or is it just a driver?


Jay


----------



## claydo

Jay, check the bottom linky in his sig........


----------



## mikey7182

He bought my S10 Jay.


----------



## JayinMI

Pretty recent. No wonder I didn't know that. lol

Nice.

Jay


----------



## strakele

Yup. Just as of last weekend.


----------



## Black Rain

Strakele you have done a hell of job on those apillars. I'd live to herlar it tonsee how those tweets really do perform facing the glass.

I've been meaning to ask people, but what does the dash mat do others than protect the dash? Is it carpet and some sort of deadener?


----------



## strakele

Some people feel it helps by absorbing some high frequency reflections from the windshield and stuff. In my install it probably doesn't really do much since my speakers aren't far back on the dash. Certainly doesn't hurt though, and like you said it does protect it and in my car it matches the suede on the pillars/sails pretty well.


----------



## strakele

As I have mentioned in several posts around the site, I'm currently a couple months in to USAF pilot training. It's a ton of work and cuts down a lot on the time I get to work on car audio, but today was a cool/special day and I figured I'd share.

Just after noon today I flew the T-6 solo for the first time. For those not familiar, the T-6A Texan II is the first trainer that all military pilot students fly. It's a high performance aerobatic 2-seat turboprop plane powered by a 1,100 HP turbine engine. We can pull up to 7 G's and fly up to 300 knots.











Here's some pics from today after my flight, and getting dunked in the solo tank.


----------



## bkjay

Big congrats! Thats is so cool!


----------



## captainobvious

Congratulations Gray! I know you've worked hard for this, so enjoy it. What a fantastic photo of your T-6 in flight too. I'm sure that will be a memory you'll cherish forever. Way to go bud !


----------



## strakele

Thanks guys!


----------



## sirbOOm

Congrats!


----------



## strakele

Man, it's been a looong time since an update. I've been super busy with pilot training - in December I finished up in the T-6 as "Top Stick" and moved on to the T-38 which I've been flying since then. For those of you unfamiliar, this is the T-38 Talon. It's a high performance 2 seat supersonic jet fighter trainer.










I'm just about to take my final checkride and will find out what plane I'm going to next in just a few weeks! 

I'm hoping for this:














Anyway, for most of UPT I've just been enjoying the car (and the truck I had for a while) without much time to do any real work to it. But now that Ally is out here with me she helped me acquire the motivation to make some updates. This is the first part of a multi stage process with the goal being getting as much of the dynamics and impact that I had in the truck as I can into the Lancer while retaining all the SQ aspects that I require. I'm hoping to achieve this mostly through the use of higher efficiency speakers and probably some new power and processing. 

Step 1: Midbass. The most often switched component in my car. I was able to find one more real 8" speaker that would fit in the very limited depth I have available in the doors - the Beyma 8BR40/N. Given the specs and manufacturer, I was hoping this woofer would bridge the gap between 'normal' hifi speakers and pro audio speakers and I think it does that well. For those looking for a shallow, powerful 8" midbass/woofer, I'd highly recommend it, especially for the price.


Beyma 8BR40/N 8" woofer for all hi-fi and studio monitor bass speakers




















It's a really tight squeeze to get it to fit in my car, but I made it work. Pretty standard install procedure-wise...

Terminated as usual with solder/Techflex/heat shrink:










Cut baffles - birch this time:










8-32 T-Nuts:










Sealed for moisture protection:










Bolted to the car with a pound or so of duct seal all around:










And speaker installed:




















These things pound like no other midbass I've used before. Run with no highpass there are plenty of people who'd be totally happy without a sub. I just got them installed yesterday and have done very little tuning so I don't know if they'll be quite a snappy as a higher efficiency pro audio driver like a B&C 8NDL51 or 18Sound 8NMB420 (which wouldn't fit due to their large octagonal flange, but I know without a doubt that they play lower with loads more authority. For $70 each, I'm very pleased with them :rockon:


----------



## SkizeR

glad to see some updates grayson. ive wondered where you and ally disappeared to. and the whole fighter jet piloting.. bad ass!


----------



## BigAl205

That looks badass, Gray!


----------



## quality_sound

Do work, son!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## strakele

Thanks guys. I'm very happy with these so far. Gonna try to do a little more tuning soon but I have to wait till it's dark before the temperature drops into the realm of reason.


----------



## req

dang grayson! it has been what, since finals since I saw you and ally? looks like you have been working hard man! glad you two are back together and you've got so far in your training.

keep up the awesome stuff bro. the midbass you are using look like they might be the perfect cost\performance ratio if your little review is that good


----------



## AccordUno

Glad to hear that the 8BR40/N are working for you. I have them as well. just need to finish the kicks or doors, haven't decided yet.. Where do you have them crossed over at?


----------



## strakele

Modeling suggests they want a large sealed enclosure, about 1.5 cubic feet. I doubt you'll be able to get that in kick panels. Ally used them (I think a previous version) IB in her kicks and they were pretty good but I think I get a lot more low end out of them in my doors. When I first put them in I just added a 20Hz high pass and 250Hz low pass and let em rip. Even on heavy bass music they never complained a bit. I've never been able to cross a speaker that low and play it that loud in my doors before.


----------



## sirbOOm

Beyma 8BR40-High Value, Low Cost?

Interesting that you're getting your results and these know it alls are saying it won't work in a car door...


----------



## strakele

With most pro audio type speakers, I'd agree with what they're saying, but when you look at the specs and model the 8BR40, especially this newer version, you'll see it works quite well for a car door.

Its EBP is 62.5 which is much lower than most PA midbass that really need a ported enclosure. You get a .7 Qtc in 1.4 cubic feet. 

Here's a model along with some other popular speakers that people use for the same thing. Titles are at the top of each little window and the corresponding color for the graph is at the bottom. Recommend viewing full size to be able to read everything

This first picture shows the natural roll off of each speaker in a 3 cubic foot door with no high pass. Each window shows the Qtc of each speaker in that door. As you can see, the Beyma rolls off later than all but the Peerless SLS8 - much later than a more typical pro audio speaker like the B&C 6NDL38.










This next picture shows the actual SPL produced by each speaker with the power required to hit xmax with a 50Hz/12dB high pass (lower than you'd normally use for a midbass, but for demonstration purposes to highlight the low end extension). The power for each speaker is shown in the corresponding window. The Beyma matches the Peerless using 30% less power and is only exceeded by the TM65 above 130Hz, while the TM65 is using twice the power to do so.


----------



## strakele

Now that I've graduated pilot training I have a bit of time on my hands to do something I have wanted to do for a while but never had the time - make my own RCAs. I currently have some pretty nice IXOS cables but to get everything wired the way I needed required a couple different product lines. I want to make everything matching and I can't find any that I like that had all the lengths and necessary Y cables to do everything I need.

So after some research and talking to a few guys I ended up with red Gepco 61801EZ cable, some eBay RCA ends that I was able to find matching male/female versions of, red with black spiral Techflex, and some solder and heat shrink.










Made a 1F-2M Y adapter first to test out stripping/soldering/shrinking techniques and now have a way to do everything that I'm happy with. So here's an example of how the rest of them will look.











I do have a question though...

For my amps that require 2 inputs when bridged to make full output, is there a compelling reason one way or another to use a single cable for the majority of the run then split off with a Y cable right before the amp, vs making just a big Y cable like pictured above and splitting it right out of the DSP? The first way has a lot more connections to go through, the second way uses more cable, splits the voltage earlier, and is tougher to solder at the source end. I'm fine with either way, but was wondering if anyone had any scientific reason as to why one would be better.


----------



## SkizeR

i just made about 30 rca cables. im warning you, it isnt fun lol


----------



## strakele

Yeah, I've done like 20 ends so far and my fingers are pretty sore lol.


Robert said he used these ends and had an issue or two with the clamping piece (where you solder the negative) being kinda loose where it connects to the main body. So during construction I did a couple things to try to keep everything really solid. 

Here's my process:

Carefully strip the end










Twist together black and shield (source end)










Add Techflex, insert into RCA end, screw down positive, clamp down wire










Solder ground/shield with a bead of solder running from the hole where the wire goes through all the way up to where it touches the main body to help guarantee connectivity and add strength. When soldering, I'd also plug them into a female end to keep everything perfectly centered just in case the heat made the plastic soft or something.










Solder the positive as well










Add hot glue inside most of the plug, so nothing can move around










Heat shrink over it










Then screw the shell of the plug on with a trail of heat shrink with extra red ring to denote source end











They seem pretty solid so hopefully they'll all work.


----------



## SkizeR

So how many times did you solder, then realize you forgot to put the back side of the rca on the cable first lol

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk


----------



## strakele

ONCE.

It was the last one of a Y cable so I couldn't just cut it off and redo it. Had to cut the shrink off, cut the glue out, pry the clamp open, desolder the ends, and get it all apart without ruining any of the small wires. That was not fun.


----------



## SkizeR

strakele said:


> ONCE.
> 
> It was the last one of a Y cable so I couldn't just cut it off and redo it. Had to cut the shrink off, cut the glue out, pry the clamp open, desolder the ends, and get it all apart without ruining any of the small wires. That was not fun.


Don't feel do bad. I did it with more than half of them

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk


----------



## strakele

Haha that sucks.

I just got my front bumper repainted and will post a couple pics of that soon. I have most of the RCAs done now. Gonna make a couple extras too. Waiting to put them in till I get my new sub so I only have to take the interior apart once. Always hate doing that.

I also have had these guys sitting around for a while. Still haven't decided what exactly I want to do with them. First thought was trim off the mounting ears and drop them in where the Morels are to test. Other option was doing what I originally wanted and build a modular setup that can be used to fit multiple different speakers. That's a lot more work and results in a moderately bigger pod though.




























They're more efficient and will play higher than the Morels. But less cone area. Meh. They seem to get good reviews and aren't expensive so we'll see what I can do with them.


----------



## captainobvious

Good to see you back on and posting Gray. Congrats on completing the pilot training bud!


-Steve


----------



## strakele

Thanks Steve! How's your car? Competing this year?


----------



## captainobvious

strakele said:


> Thanks Steve! How's your car? Competing this year?



Have some changes I'm working through on it, but yes I'm competing. If I get the needed points in the next couple weeks here, I'm looking at doing Iasca and Meca this year at finals.


----------



## strakele

Cool. Interested to see the changes!



Took some pictures after a wash but I guess it was just a bit too dark for my little camera - they didn't come out as nice as I was hoping but here's a couple that didn't suck too bad. Of course it rained the next day...


----------



## quality_sound

Bring up the outer edge eyelid termination point. It makes the headlights look droopy instead of aggressive.


----------



## strakele

I agree - but only from some angles. It's weird. From other angles it looks just right and bringing it up would look strange as well. That's the best compromise I could get.. I think. I'll take another close look at it.


----------



## wdemetrius1

Congratulations on finishing school. I'm looking forward to see what you do to your car this time around.


----------



## strakele

Updates on the... updates.

Got the RCAs done.










Along with the RCAs, I'm also doing some work to tidy up more of the wiring in the trunk. Screw down zip ties, barrier strips, etc.

Here's what it looked like under the beauty panels. 




























It'll look a bit cleaner once I'm done.


Also, I had mentioned new sub. Here's what I had..



















Out with the old, in with the new. Acoustic Elegance TD10X-4. 



















With the direction I'm going with the system now, I'm less concerned with being able to get under 20Hz from the front sub enclosure and am instead looking for more detail/attack/impact and a higher efficiency, higher energy type sound. This sub, while providing just a hair less output in the low bass, is nearly a full 10 dB more efficient than the Alpine. And in the enclosure I have, has a lower qtc. All of which I'm hoping will provide the sound I'm looking for. The Alpine was a beast. It could get looow and loud and pound. No EQ necessary to get 20Hz flat. But the box was a bit too small for it so it could be a bit muddy in the midbass. 

Here's how they model.











Today I have to recarpet the sub enclosure and amp rack, terminate the speaker wire in the trunk, run the new RCAs, install the new sub, and put everything back together. Hoping I can get it all done today. We'll see.


----------



## strong*I*bumpin

I always wondered how subs with the phase plug sounded,interesting.


----------



## strakele

I'm about to find out I guess. I'm sure it will be great.

I believe the idea behind the phase plugs is A) it lowers power compression and B) it aids top end extension. On axis in a home build, with the ultra low inductance, these can play up high enough to meet a tweeter/ribbon.


----------



## strakele

Well as it turns out, the phase plug is an issue. It allows air to pass from inside the enclosure, resulting in that leaky sealed box sound 

Depending on how they're used, it wouldn't necessarily be an issue, but for me since the enclosure is in the cabin with me, it has to be perfectly sealed. So I asked John about the effects of replacing the phase plug with a standard dust cap. I'm thinking it won't be much change in the frequency band I'm concerned with.

Otherwise, it definitely has the lively, aggressive, higher efficiency sound that I was after.

So here's the install so far, pending further developments.

Pulled out the Alpine, ripped off the old carpet, and enlarged the cutout 1/8" for the wider spokes on the TD10's basket.










Gave it a quick shot with some black paint as background for the carpet later.










Threaded inserts for 10-24 machine screws










Carpeted










Stuffed










And speaker installed. Not shown, a ring of carpet for a bit of gasket material since I'm not using the thick rubber gasket supplied by AE.












Got the amp rack back in today but the wiring isn't quite finished being organized yet. Everything makes noise again though, so that's good.


----------



## Coppertone

Good deal so far, how is the enclosure secured in the front of your vehicle ?


----------



## james2266

Coppertone said:


> Good deal so far, how is the enclosure secured in the front of your vehicle ?


This is something I have wondered about for a while. I would love to do something similar but have no clue really how to secure it without punching more holes in the frame. That's something I am really scared of on a Lexus Hybrid.


----------



## strakele

Take off the glovebox and kick panel, shoehorn it in under the front edge of the dash (it's ridiculously tight) and then reinstall the glovebox/kick panel and it's held in.

Mic did a similar install in his Lancer and bolted it through the floor and said it helped, but I didn't want to have to remove the speaker every time I wanted to pull the box out. And also didn't want to drill through the floor.


----------



## james2266

strakele said:


> Take off the glovebox and kick panel, shoehorn it in under the front edge of the dash (it's ridiculously tight) and then reinstall the glovebox/kick panel and it's held in.
> 
> Mic did a similar install in his Lancer and bolted it through the floor and said it helped, but I didn't want to have to remove the speaker every time I wanted to pull the box out. And also didn't want to drill through the floor.


Thanks for that man. I don't know if that will work for my ride as the glove box sits really high being an suv. Something to seriously consider when the time comes. Whenever that may be. Money issues right now. That, and looks like the SI BM MKV might not happen which was the end plan.


----------



## bertholomey

strakele said:


> Take off the glovebox and kick panel, shoehorn it in under the front edge of the dash (it's ridiculously tight) and then reinstall the glovebox/kick panel and it's held in.
> 
> Mic did a similar install in his Lancer and bolted it through the floor and said it helped, but I didn't want to have to remove the speaker every time I wanted to pull the box out. And also didn't want to drill through the floor.


My car already had a bolt coming through the fire wall that held some plasticky stuff......Just added a clamp to the enclosure and used the existing bolt / nut to secure it to the firewall....it just takes a LONG socket extender and a 10mm socket to get mine out.


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## james2266

Another question for you gents. When you guys built these enclosures did you take out your floor carpet or did you build these enclosures over top of the carpet? If you guys pulled the carpet, how did you go about it? Mine is all one piece and would have to be cut out. Really don't like that idea but it would allow a fair amount larger enclosure volume likely. Anyways, curious what you two did.


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## strakele

Over the top of the carpet, but took out the big foam block behind it to gain more volume. With the enclosure out and speaker wire tucked away, it looks stock.

Good to see you back here Jason


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## james2266

strakele said:


> Over the top of the carpet, but took out the big foam block behind it to gain more volume. With the enclosure out and speaker wire tucked away, it looks stock.
> 
> Good to see you back here Jason


This is kind of what I have planned actually. We'll see if I ever get around to actually doing it. This year is now out due to money and now weather.


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## bertholomey

strakele said:


> Over the top of the carpet, but took out the big foam block behind it to gain more volume. With the enclosure out and speaker wire tucked away, it looks stock.
> 
> Good to see you back here Jason


Same exact thing here......the styrofoam pad under the carpet was taken out, and the enclosure is molded in over the carpet - I'm not sure a credit card could go between the enclosure and the center console. 

I'm enjoying seeing what you are doing here!!!


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## strakele

While being away at some training I've been discussing the phase plug issue with John at AE. Since there's no pole vent on the TD woofers, it's not as simple as just unscrewing the phase plug and gluing on a dust cap. So, he's going to build me a custom speaker with the TD10X soft parts, a motor with a vented pole piece, and a dust cap. The existing parameters should change very little, so it should be exactly what I need! Pretty cool.


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## edouble101

strakele said:


> While being away at some training I've been discussing the phase plug issue with John at AE. Since there's no pole vent on the TD woofers, it's not as simple as just unscrewing the phase plug and gluing on a dust cap. So, he's going to build me a custom speaker with the TD10X soft parts, a motor with a vented pole piece, and a dust cap. The existing parameters should change very little, so it should be exactly what I need! Pretty cool.


That is awesome! I am anxious to hear how you like it.


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## Basshertz1

I just went through the many transitions of this build very nice build digging the a pillars


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## strakele

Thanks man I appreciate it. Where in Texas are you?


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## Basshertz1

I'm actually about 10 miles south of Waco which is 2 hrs north of Austin. I was raised in Waco though


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## strakele

Cool. I'll be moving to Abilene soon and will occasionally have get togethers there once getting settled in.


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## Basshertz1

strakele said:


> Cool. I'll be moving to Abilene soon and will occasionally have get togethers there once getting settled in.


I'm always down to check out another ride especially one that has had this many hours put into it. I haven't started my 08 Chevy crew yet still getting my equipment together but I've been in audio for 20 years always built for others it is finally my turn


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## quality_sound

strakele said:


> Cool. I'll be moving to Abilene soon and will occasionally have get togethers there once getting settled in.



Seriously? I was stationed there between Germany and New Mexico. Not a bad little town, actually. You and Allie should find quite a few outdoorsy things to do. Warning, don't count on any of the shops there being of any use at all. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## strakele

It's ok, we'll have our own shop 

And yeah it seems like a pretty decent town. Nothing is too far away. Dyess is definitely a "real" base compared to Vance.


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## quality_sound

I meant in terms of supplies and such. If you don't have Amazon Prime, get it. You'll need it. 

I really like a restaurant called Skeets. Good, basic food. The community LOVES the military and its not uncommon to have meals paid for without them ever saying anything. 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## strakele

Will check it out. Also heard about a great bbq place and a great steakhouse. Can't remember their names right now.


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## strakele

Exciting update while I wait for the new sub...

Finally got back from Washington and had this birthday present waiting for me


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## captainobvious

That's a hell of an awesome bday present! Based on my experience with it- you'll love it. Great dsp with tons of processing power.


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## bertholomey

Yep....it will be a hard ask for Vicki to top that for my bday......she can start with a Geissele trigger perhaps


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## strakele

That would certainly not be a bad option! I've heard great things. I think I fired one once on a 7.62 AR that the dude next to me at the range had. Very nice.


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## Notloudenuf

bertholomey said:


> Yep....it will be a hard ask for Vicki to top that for my bday......she can start with a Geissele trigger perhaps


It "triggers" her to show up?









How does THAT work?????


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## claydo

I don't know....but I needs me one of them.....


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## bertholomey

Notloudenuf said:


> It "triggers" her to show up?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> How does THAT work?????



Not sure what that is....I'm talking about shootin stuff.


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## SouthSyde

Happy belated bday bug!

Nice present wow!


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## strakele

Thanks Chad!


Finally got the wiring finished up today! All new matching RCAs, barrier strips for speaker wire, zip ties, etc.

Post barrier strip speaker wire ran under amp platform with screw down zip ties.



















Platform pre-wired as much as possible:




























And then back in the car.



Before:












After:






































Once I get the new front sub in, I'll start on a fresh tune.


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## Basshertz1

The trunk looks great man, I really like the rcas is that just a flex around the shielding? How big of a difference good or bad switching from the mosconi to the helix? Or is it too early to tell yet


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## strakele

Yup, Techflex on the RCAs. Black/red stripe for RCAs, carbon for speaker wire/accessories/ground, red for power.

Can't say much yet on the Helix. I fully expect it to be better overall, but right now it just has some basic crossovers. No EQ/levels/phase/etc. Car is currently at the shop having a scratch fixed from where someone backed into it in the parking lot while I was away at training. I'm gonna have to add one of the accessory things to get some more presets. But otherwise, more EQ, full phase control, very precise levels and t/a... I really have no excuse not to have the car sounding great after a full tune.


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## captainobvious

Looks great Grayson. The RCA's came out really nice.
I think you'll like that DSP Pro. I'm definitely digging mine.


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## req

Very cool man!! I am really interested to see how you like the helix processor!

I really liked mine. everything saves quickly, all the inputs work at the same time, built in rta software, graphic picture of the frequency response that the crossovers\eq looks like.


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## Basshertz1

strakele said:


> Yup, Techflex on the RCAs. Black/red stripe for RCAs, carbon for speaker wire/accessories/ground, red for power.
> 
> Can't say much yet on the Helix. I fully expect it to be better overall, but right now it just has some basic crossovers. No EQ/levels/phase/etc. Car is currently at the shop having a scratch fixed from where someone backed into it in the parking lot while I was away at training. I'm gonna have to add one of the accessory things to get some more presets. But otherwise, more EQ, full phase control, very precise levels and t/a... I really have no excuse not to have the car sounding great after a full tune.


They look really good I will have to borrow that idea for my own build when I get to it after the new year. Keep us posted on the Helix I'm anxious to hear what ya think I haven't used one of those yet but always interested in new toys. Great build so far


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## strakele

Thanks guys! Can't wait to play with it more, but it'll be early next week before I can.


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## estione

Just spent the last couple of hours reading this and totally enjoyed it, I am now wondering with the way you are heading if we are gonna see horns put in?


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## strakele

Thank you. It's been a long, mostly enjoyable process. It's fun to look back on everything that's been done.

I had a truck for a while that had horns in it (as well as JBL pro audio mids, midbass, and subs) and it was truly impressive in dynamics and impact. There were some issues that limited SQ potential at the end of the day, but man was that thing fun.

With these updates, I'm attempting to create a cross between that and a more 'standard' SQ car. It's gotta stage and image like a world class competition car, but it's also gotta be able to just make you giggle in awe at the concert-like feeling it can create. All while being a useful daily driver and looking good and higher end inside. So I'm trying for the best of all worlds. Naturally, some concessions will have to be made, but with careful equipment choice and install, I think I can achieve what I want. 

As it is now, I'm not sure I'd be able to fit horns on the drivers side with the clutch and kick panel that has a ton of wires running through it. And there's zero room whatsoever on the passenger side due to the front sub enclosure which I'm not willing to give up.


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## estione

Totally understand where you are coming from as it's just what i am trying to do but boy its no easy task, So i do wish you luck in it and will be watching for more updates.


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## strakele

Haha yeah you're right. I've had it _almost_ there in previous installs, so I'm convinced it's possible. Right now I'm concentrating on finding drivers that are the best balance between fidelity, efficiency, and ability to play the frequency range I need.

The JL tweeters are very detailed and their top end extension is excellent even in the non-standard install I have them in. They aren't the most efficient out there, however, and they can't play real low. But the other thing they have going for them is the small size and super short mounting depth which allows the install in the first place.

The Xtant/Morel midranges are decently sensitive for their size - many 3-4" hifi mids are in the low 80s, whereas these are 88-89dB 1W/1m, and their flangeless design allows me to fit a full 4" of cone area where nearly all other 4" and even some 3" nominal speakers won't even fit. Their weakness is top end extension - it take some work to get the transition right to the tweeter. The Faital Pro 4FE32 that I have sitting here to play with has much more top end and 91dB efficiency. However it has less cone area, so we'll see how cone area vs efficiency goes.

The Beyma 8BR40/N are just a little more efficient than your standard hifi midbass at 91dB 1W/1m, but they have none of the low end extension limitations of a typical high sensitivity midbass. I can cross them as low as I want without issue, and their shallow mounting depth allows them to fit their large cone area in my little doors without hitting the window.

The custom AE sub I'm having made for the front will be a good 8-10dB more efficient than most subwoofers, while still being able to play well in a small enclosure. It probably won't be earthshaking in the subsonic freqs like other really high xmax subs, but the detail/energy/quickness/impact that the higher sensitivity provides is what I'm looking for.

The IB15 subs are also more efficient than most, and they're also well known to sound great with excellent low end extension and accuracy which I can certainly vouch for.

So that's the idea behind why I'm using what I'm using and why I think it'll work.

That and power. Power is always good. More is better.


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## estione

Yep i am toying with faital,beyma, 18sound and dynaudio, whilst the first three def have the dynamics and efficency all three lack somewhat in the midbass, The dynaudio has the "class", but does not keep up with the horns imo, Its always a hard decision


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## strakele

The new sub is here!

This more or less custom speaker uses AE's standard 10" frame, TD10X-4 soft parts, a dust cap, and their vented motor. I spec'd it this way so that it will work in the relatively small sealed enclosure that I have without the air compression causing leaks around the phase plug.

Here it is 



















And in the box. Black socket head screws this time instead of the crappy stainless ones I had used before that strip if you look at them wrong.











I'll probably post a pic or two when it's light outside but I put it in the car and I think it's going to do just what I want. This thing sure is efficient! Much quicker and more detailed than the Alpine 40Hz and above. Less output below 40ish Hz as expected.

I'd love to hear a setup with the Seaton Catalyst speakers - they use dual 12" versions of this driver as midbass/midrange along with an 8" B&C coaxial mid/compression driver. Can't imagine the output a system like that is capable in a typical living room. The Catalyst - Product details & overview - Seaton Sound Discussion Forum


Anyway, I'm happy. System still needs a full on retune, but I like where this is going.


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## Basshertz1

Very nice looking sub, reminds me of the baskets used on some spl subs. What size coil is used on the sub?


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## strakele

They use 2" coils on most speakers. 2.5" on the 18's.


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## Basshertz1

They look like they'll handle the business end of this build for sure great job


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## Babs

Was just surfing along for good IB builds as I got some learning to do, and I got sucked into this thread again and have to say.. Epic build thread. 


Sent from iPhone using Tapatalk


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## strakele

Thanks! It's been quite a journey. And I'm definitely a fan of IB.

I see you're in NC... it's been a while since I've been to one of the NC meets, but they're always great and I highly recommend going to one if you haven't. I think there's a couple dudes who normally show up and have IB installs.

Or maybe you're always there and I'm mixing up names :blush:


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## claydo

He's become a regular grayson......but hadn't started attending until after you headed out.


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## Babs

strakele said:


> Thanks! It's been quite a journey. And I'm definitely a fan of IB.
> 
> I see you're in NC... it's been a while since I've been to one of the NC meets, but they're always great and I highly recommend going to one if you haven't. I think there's a couple dudes who normally show up and have IB installs.
> 
> Or maybe you're always there and I'm mixing up names :blush:



Definitely man please do come to the spring meet. I'd love to see/hear this car and pick yer brain etc and meet up. Good time. Yeah I'm the newb regular now. LOL


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## Golden Ear

Gray, how's the tuning coming along? Update us on your impressions of the 10" sub. 


Sent from my mind using telekinesis


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## strakele

With all the house stuff and starting a new job, I haven't done much progressive tuning.

What I did do is spend 6 or 7 hours on it one night in preparation for the Ft Worth meet a few weeks back. I had really intended to just tune it for the 'listening position' for demos with the seat all the way back. But I realized 4 or 5 hours into my tuning session that I hadn't moved it, so now I have my daily tune and the demo tune. Which is great now, but I was sure pissed when I realized it at first (which was around midnight or something). At this point the daily tune is better than the demo tune IMO. Kinda makes sense since I spent more time on it.

So, impressions on the sub. I really like it. It's currently playing 22-111 Hz, 24dB BW on both ends. Not a low end monster, but quick/articulate/aggressive - all the things I was looking for. And in the dust cap instead of phase plug configuration, seems to handle more power. I'm very pleased. It's much more lively than the Alpine it replaced.

Currently, the midbasses are high passed at 65 Hz, and the rear subs play up to 56 Hz. So parked with the engine off, it can be a bit much. And with all those different crossover points, the phase isn't perfect. But it's not too noticeable. Next time I go out to tune, I'm going to try raising the high pass on the midbass a little, and then crossing between the front and rear subs at around 40 Hz to simplify things a bit.

Other than that, my only issue is the mid to tweet transition - the midranges struggle to play high enough to meet up with the tweeters, so there's a bit of a dip in response between like 2.5 and 3.1 KHz. I know this wouldn't be an issue with the Faital Pro mids I have sitting here, but I haven't decided how exactly I want to go about using them. That and Erin's recent success with the AudioFrog GB25 mids has me kinda reconsidering my old speakers hidden behind the pillars install. But idk, the much lower cone area and much lower efficiency is kinda the opposite direction to the way I've been moving with everything else.

So that's where I'm at right now. When I turn it up, it makes me smile, so it doesn't suck.


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## JayinMI

I'd love to make it down to Texas again. I got to hear Grayson's car back in '13 (what was that? like 3 or 4 iterations ago? lol) and was impressed back then.
I love coming "down south." My friend Erick is hosting an all Korean car show, but it's in February, I'm already committed to go to Jason's meet in April. I don't think I can justify the time off for mini jaunts across the southern US.

Jay


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## quality_sound

strakele said:


> But idk, the much lower cone area and much lower efficiency is kinda the opposite direction to the way I've been moving with everything else.
> 
> So that's where I'm at right now. When I turn it up, it makes me smile, so it doesn't suck.



Didn't Erin and Andy both say that the efficiency numbers were misleading because they were full range or something?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## strakele

Thanks Jay!

Paul, that may be. I haven't really done much research. Just looked at the specs listed on the AF site and the dimensions. Probably gonna make a little mock up to see if it's even possible/worth pursuing.


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## ErinH

I will say that the GB25 is in my top tier of drivers I've used thus far. It's small footprint combined with wide range make it a great option.


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## quality_sound

strakele said:


> Thanks Jay!
> 
> Paul, that may be. I haven't really done much research. Just looked at the specs listed on the AF site and the dimensions. Probably gonna make a little mock up to see if it's even possible/worth pursuing.





ErinH said:


> I will say that the GB25 is in my top tier of drivers I've used thus far. It's small footprint combined with wide range make it a great option.


Your thoughts/review has me seriously thinking about using these instead of my C3CXs. Then again, I'm also thinking about horns as well sooo...


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## ErinH

quality_sound said:


> Then again, I'm also thinking about horns as well sooo...


brother, you have _no_ idea...


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## quality_sound

ErinH said:


> brother, you have _no_ idea...



I feel like I should be getting a message of some form... lol


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## subwoofery

quality_sound said:


> I feel like I should be getting a message of some form... lol
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk












^ it's called a horned frog... Choose your destiny and decide what kind of message is in the picture 

Kelvin


----------



## ErinH

not my thread to derail. 

but in short... I've had about 3-5 different front stage setups in my head this weekend.


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## LaydSierra

http://http://usspeaker.com/beyma%208BR40-1.htm

Are these the same 8s you used? It seems they lowered the QTS of them


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## strakele

Yes, I got them from USSpeaker after confirming with them that the ones they're selling are in fact the newer version with the specs listed on the Beyma site.


----------



## LaydSierra

Just making sure but you're using the new version with 0.39 QTS?

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk


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## strakele

That is correct.


And while I'm at it, time for an update.

Got the Helix Director remote wired up and installed. After getting the software and firmware and everything updated, it's working as promised. Fits just right in the little storage hole below the A/C. Here's a couple pics with different lighting.


----------



## LaydSierra

Is that a cig lighter voltmeter? That's nifty

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk


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## ErinH

are you using the director for volume?


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## strakele

LaydSierra said:


> Is that a cig lighter voltmeter? That's nifty


Yes



ErinH said:


> are you using the director for volume?



No.

Not master volume anyway. Sub volume and Aux if necessary. Mostly wanted it for the sub volume and extra presets and the corresponding ease of switching them.


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## ErinH

ok. I was curious from the ergonomics perspective... it seems it would be more cumbersome to do that, given it's location.


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## claydo

Looks made for that little compartment, lol. Would love to here this thing again one day grayson, bet it sounds awesome!


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## strakele

It's basically the same distance from me either way. I drive fairly far back so I have to lean forward slightly to reach the HU, A/C, or Director.

Clay I've done the NC trip from Georgia, Alabama, and Texas. Time for you to do the Texas trip


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## claydo

Yup, I know yall got a new house, having meets and everything........gonna have to man up and travel one of these days.....lol.


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## strakele

It's a very long and extremely irritating story, but after a series of unfortunate events caused by the incompetence of others, this car is at a body shop with no front bumper and hail damage. No accident occurred.

Currently awaiting a second opinion as to whether it's totaled or not. I'd sure like that not to be the case.

Send a bit of luck my way if you can spare any...


----------



## Kevin K

strakele said:


> It's a very long and extremely irritating story, but after a series of unfortunate events caused by the incompetence of others, this car is at a body shop with no front bumper and hail damage. No accident occurred.
> 
> Currently awaiting a second opinion as to whether it's totaled or not. I'd sure like that not to be the case.
> 
> Send a bit of luck my way if you can spare any...


Sure sorry to hear this and hopefully it'll have a happy ending


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## Coppertone

Here's all the luck that I have coming your way.


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## rton20s

I hope everything with the car works out in your favor. Hate to see it go as you have to start over.


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## Babs

Wow yeah hoping for the best.


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## ledzpg

Good luck with your car... =/


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## strakele

Thanks guys


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