# Fountek FR8-EX finally arrived! Preliminary review.



## vageta (Oct 11, 2006)

So my Fountek finally arrived yesterday and I eagerly installed it in a temporary setup in my Scion. I'm using a 3", 45 degree PVC elbow installed into my dash. The Fountek fit perfectly flush with the 3" male end, and fully inside the flared female end. For now I just dropped it in the male end with some double sided sticky tape to seal it up. Will be trimming about an inch or so off of the pipe so they sit farther back away from me, and will trim the other end as well so it can sit deeper in the dash and lower them in height. For now they're running IB, but I will experiment with sealing up the PVC and possibly drilling a few small holes to make it a "leaky" enclosure if it's not quite big enough.

Previously I was using a 4" Rainbow mid in a similar setup so I basically just dropped in the Fountek with the same xover and EQ settings and fired it up. It's crossed over at 200hz/24db and then again at 5k/12db which blends with my NX30 tweeter also crossed at 5k/12db. Bringing up the low end was the ID OEM 6.5's crossed at 180/24db. My Peerless SLS 6.5's came in last night and I put them in this morning, but my thoughts are based on the Fountek while still using the OEM's.

Before I start let me just say that these things are fockin` small. I knew their dimensions when I bought them, but until you actually hold them in your hand you don't realize just how small they really are. I took a pic of it next to my mouse just to give you an idea of relative size. With that in mind my first impression was they simply wouldn't be able to play down to 200hz like the Rainbow which was much larger, or achieve any sort of volume. Thankfully I was wrong.










As soon as I fired them up I realized that their small size is deceiving. They can achieve respectable ouput and I heard no sign of strain even at full volume. They sounded just a tad bit quieter than the Rainbows, but my gains have been set conservatively so I have plenty of room to play with to match these guys with my midbass. 

First thing I noticed is a lot more definition in the midrange. The Rainbows had a very warm and pleasing sound, and very forgiving with any kind of music. The fountek's however were more revealing and I was hearing more detail in music I hadn't noticed before. I've never ran a 3 way system, let alone a metal cone 3" driver, so this was a new experience for me. I've been on a Black Sabbath binge lately which has some very heavy bass lines. The rainbows were doing a great job bringing out some level of detail in the bass, however the Fountek's had me hearing Geezer Butler's fingers plucking the bass. Overall very impressive.

The other thing that really stood out to me was my soundstage really opened up. These things threw out an image that my Rainbow's weren't doing. The Rainbow's imaged very well, or so I thought, but it's much easier to place instrument across my dash now and they seem to hold my center image much stronger. I'd dare say that mids can sound "airy", but in a sense this is what I felt when listening to them. They stopped sounding so much like speakers on my dash and started to sound more like a band playing on my hood. This brought a huge smile to my face and I knew I had made a good choice with these guys. 

I have to keep this short as I'm running to the beach today but all I can say is I'm very impressed and I haven't even really gotten time to dial them in. My Tang Band ceramics should be here today and hopefully tonight I can drop them in and really see what this new front stage can do. Once I get everything dialed in and installed I will be giving a long detailed review on my very meager ~200 dollar front stage. I have a feeling it will be a giant killer and will hopefully change my views on how much money one should spend on great sound.

I'll keep you guys posted.


----------



## James Bang (Jul 25, 2007)

SLS + Fr88 + TB ceramics... Sounds like a winning combo.


----------



## bassfromspace (Jun 28, 2016)

Excellent review!


----------



## fish (Jun 30, 2007)

This one might have actually pushed me over the edge to actually buy & try these things. Thankyou.


----------



## bassfromspace (Jun 28, 2016)

Btw, how's the high end?


----------



## Melodic Acoustic (Oct 10, 2005)

Nice. Glad you like them.


----------



## captainobvious (Mar 11, 2006)

Excellent review, thanks for posting it. Its funny you mention the 45 degree pvs elbows as I have a pair of the FR88's waiting to be installed/tested (just need my speaker rings to arrive from Marv) and I already prepped some of the exact same PVC elbows as you to use as test enclosures. I got the back side of them sealed up with a cover plate, hot glue and then lines the inside corners with NH modeling clay.

Cant wait to get them in and have a listen now.


----------



## vageta (Oct 11, 2006)

So the Tang Band ceramic tweeters arrived and I was able to get them into some temporary pods and play with aiming. Did some minor tweaking and playing around with xover points and right now I'm still crossing them at 5k even though the Fountek could easily cross much higher. To be honest I don't hear much of a difference between 5k to 8k, except I seem to get a little better imaging with it crossed low. It may be because my tweeters are aimed a little better than the Fountek's so they image better, or it may be that the Tang Band's dispersion guide(that plastic thing in front of the dome) is working as intended and dispersing the sound in a way that helps the soundstage. Either way I can notice it.

SLS's were surprising as well. Actually when I first installed them I thought something was wrong because they didn't seem to be any different than the OEM's. After they broke in a bit they started outputting more however and in the end I crossed them lower than the OEM's. I have them crossed at 63hz/18db and they don't strain at all. In fact I can't even really hear them persay, they blend well with the mid/tweeter and also reinforce the subs so it's hard to even tell where all the bass is coming from. Ended up dropping my JL 13W6v2's to 50hz/12db to tone them down a bit. While the JL's tonality is really good, they just don't blend as well as the DIYMA 12 but I beat that poor thing up. Was hoping to get rid of the JL's and get 2 Mag's but that ain't happening now. Still thinking of the JBL WGTI's, but that's another topic. All in all they blend really well, I think I was just spoiled by the highly detailed DIYMA.

Anyways after getting everything dialed in I can say again that the detail is amazing. The mids detail was already great, the tang band's just seem to add another level. As I mentioned before I've never had hard dome tweeters or metal cone drivers so I wasn't aware of the detail they can produce. I like the forgiving sound of a soft dome tweeter and the warm sound of a paper cone, but after hearing this kind of detail I prefer it. It just sounds more analytical, but still very musical. Whether it's good or bad, I simply can hear more in the recordings than before. Considering most of my recordings are pretty good this isn't a problem. The less than stellar recordings just end up sounding a bit too harsh. The Rainbow's were a bit more forgiving on those recordings but it wasn't enough to make a huge difference. So I'd much prefer the detail and soundstaging I'm getting to a more forgiving setup.

One thing about the Tang Band's. You don't need much power to make them sing, and they seem to image well on or off axis, again probably due to the dispersion guide. I'm using a Denon 40x2 amp on them and not only is the gain all the way down, but I also have to attenuate them a bit from the head unit. Mine sounded a bit harsh until I cranked them down a bit and let the mids do most of the work. I think I'll probably have to do some EQ on the upper end, in fact I had my 16k boosted by a few db with the NX30's and I can probably turn that off now. 

Put in some Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon, track 10 Time. The clocks ticking in the beginning were awesome to listen to. I could hear much more detail than before and the different clocks seemed to be placed both vertically and horizontally across my windshield, even beyond I should say. Popped in Wish You Were Here and the opening actually sounded like a guy sitting in a chair listening to the radio. Before I could hear him breath at one point, but now there's just much more of a presence to this opening and I can hear him moving around more. This kind of stuff just amazes me and realizing how much I enjoy the detail of these speakers.

Last but not least I listened to Alice In Chained Unplugged and needless to say the live recording really opened up. It's like a veil was pulled off the recording compared to before. Not to say that it didn't sound great before, but there's just an extra presence there now that I didn't pick up on with the previous speakers. Every little thing in the crowd or what the guys on the stage are doing stands out much more than before. The music itself also sounds more intimate as a whole. I could always kind of hear the guys fingers plucking the strings, but now it's a lot more evident and engaging. 

I still haven't gotten a chance to do a lot of tweaking and I'm still trying different speaker placement, but once I get everything installed and tweaked I'll be doing some more critical listening and will do a full review. I can say that for ~200$ I'm very impressed. I haven't heard a pair of Dyne's or other super hi end stuff, but it had better be a ton better to warrant the drastic price difference from this meager setup. And if one is to believe that amps and electronics change sound then these speakers can probably sound even better, though I'm quite pleased right now.

I'd love to hear some other opinions of the Fountek and Tang Band once everyone who's ordered them get's installed. I can't imagine hearing anything too negative.


----------



## fish (Jun 30, 2007)

Wow! Excellent! I know what you're talking about with "Wish you were here" cough. Just to know you can hear more detail before the vocals begin gives me high hopes.

I also own the AIC unplugged... I've heard faint conversation in the background, but looking forward to hearing more.

Thanks so much for sharing your experience. I think I'm sold on the Founteks.

BTW... are you gonna keep 'em sealed or open 'em up a bit?


----------



## VaVroom1 (Dec 2, 2005)

A little OT

Does PVC bonds well with resin? I assume these will be eventually molded into the dash.


----------



## WLDock (Sep 27, 2005)

James Bang said:


> SLS + Fr88 + TB ceramics... Sounds like a winning combo.


 This may be the cheap 3-way combo of the year for the guy that wants a small mid on the dash with an 6.5" or 8" Midbass option. Seems like a smooth and detailed set from the start.

Myself, I plan to check out the Hustler Audio version and would love to take a listen to the TB. I have the 8" SLS's already....Hummmm.


----------



## captainobvious (Mar 11, 2006)

vageta said:


> I'd love to hear some other opinions of the Fountek and Tang Band once everyone who's ordered them get's installed. I can't imagine hearing anything too negative.


My review is finally up, my friend. 

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...ws/62906-fountek-fr88-3-fullrange-driver.html


----------



## s4turn (Jun 17, 2009)

not to dredge an old thread up, but what enclosure size are you using for the founteks?


----------



## captainobvious (Mar 11, 2006)

s4turn said:


> not to dredge an old thread up, but what enclosure size are you using for the founteks?


0.75-1.0 liters sealed should do nicely.


----------



## littlejuanito (Apr 29, 2010)

Sorry to dig up this old thread but could you tell me what PCV elbows are these?

If you have pics of the elbows you used that'll be great.

Thanks.


----------



## fish (Jun 30, 2007)

littlejuanito said:


> Sorry to dig up this old thread but could you tell me what PCV elbows are these?
> 
> If you have pics of the elbows you used that'll be great.
> 
> Thanks.



Here ya go...

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...members/62874-quick-easy-test-enclosures.html


----------



## littlejuanito (Apr 29, 2010)

fish said:


> Here ya go...
> 
> http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum...members/62874-quick-easy-test-enclosures.html


Awesome!!

Thanks :2thumbsup:


----------



## littlejuanito (Apr 29, 2010)

BTW, where these PCV enclosures only used for testing purposes, or did you end up using them permanently?

If so, do you have pics of the finished install?


----------

