# 2010 Mazdaspeed3 (Audio & Deadening)



## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

Well I'm finally done. The whole install took about 40 hours. Spent most of a weekend and a few nights just nailing it all down at once. 

Products used...

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JL Audio CleanSweep (Wanted to retain factory headunit. Wasn't interested in going active and didn't want to mess with setting up the RF 360 or Bit One.)
Front Doors - JL Audio ZR570-CSi
Rear Doors - JL Audio C5-570
Sub - JL Audio 10w7 ProWedge
Amps - JL Audio HD600/4 & HD750/1
JL Audio 0 Gauge PowerWire
JL Audio Speaker Wiring and RCA's.
Second Skin Damplifier and Overkill Pro
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*Amplifiers*
My approach was pretty straight forward on this. I removed the spare tire to mount my amps and the CleanSweep. I didn't like the idea of mounting them to the seats and didn't wan't to mess with a panel on the sides of the trunk. I could've attempted to go under the seats but the space is still quite a bit tight under the Mazdaspeed3 seats. I built a simple circle out of 3/4" MDF and once I had them placed in the right pattern I cut simple 1" holes under the amps for wiring. I bought some aluminum spacers for my mounting hardware that floats the amps above the MDF circle so the wiring can route to the holes underneath the amps. It left it looking pretty clean and I only have the power wire visible as entering under the MDF rack. I bought an 80mm M10 1.25 bolt to use the same hole that's used to secure the spare tire and Bose subwoofer. I had to add 2 more spacers on the underside of the MDF circle to lift the rack enough to allow for the wiring to be routed underneath the amp. I covered the amp rack in cheap charcoal colored vinyl from the local fabric shop. It was $10 for the vinyl and it gives it a nice finished look.

The Amps, MDF Rack and CleanSweep weigh no more than my spare tire and Bose Sub did so I did good in this area.

*Speakers*
The woofers would've been a straight drop-in had the front doors had the space behind them needed for the magnet. I cut simple 3/4" spacers from MDF and sprayed the with 3 coats Plasticoat from HomeDepot to seal them from the environment. I used a thin stip of Butyl Rubber robe in between the MDF spacer and the door panel and also between the woofer and the MDF spacer. I used my dremel with a heavy duty cutting wheel to cut the small portion of metal out to allow for mounting the front woofer. The front doors are tight on the 2010 no matter what you do. The ZR woofer only needs 2.5" in mounting space but I couldn't mount them even with the spacer.

The tweeters were no problem. The ZR's up front called for a 2" hole and the rear C5's needed a 1.5" hole. I mounted them close to the woofers. I've had both speakers in the past and they are very bright on highs. Even down low I needed to set the crossovers on the -1.5 dB setting to tone them down a bit.

*Molex Plugs/Running the Speaker Wire*
I've never had to deal with these in the past and didn't know how hard it was going to be. I don't know if anyone's tried the method I used. I came up with the idea falling to sleep one night during the install. Most everyone I've seen has used everything from a Dremel to a typical drill and picked the best spot on the plug to enter the doors. Another user even suggested re-pinning the terminals but I still wouldn't have had room without drilling. What I did was heat up a simple angled pick with a small butane torch. When it was red hot I simply pushed it through the area I needed my wire to run. It took a couple plunges but it was amazingly easy and very accurate. I was worried with a Dremel or drill that I'd skip the drill bit or twist a wire creating a real mess for myself.

Truly the toughest spot in running the wires through the doors was the passenger front door. I even with the molex plug completely disconnected I could shine a light through the hole and didn't see one ounce of light exit on the inside. The wiring was impossible to get my hand up into unless I would've removed the dash. Finally I used a small mirror and flashlight to get a look inside the hole (looking from the outside - in), and could see that the harness for the door went up about 5" then came back down. It goes up over a panel, then down. What pain. So I removed the A-Pillar interior trim. I was somehow able (with about 30 tries) to get a fish line down from the bottom of the a-pillar area to the hole exiting the body. I fished the wire back up through there, then down the a-pillar again to the kick panel area. Just that wire alone took me about an hour. Not fun. The others were a piece-of-cake compared to this one.

*Power Wire* 
Second hardest part of this install was trying to find an entry point for my power wire. First off, there isn't a good entry point for 0 gauge wire. Might've went overkill on the wire but it is rought 1300-1400 watts so people kept telling me I was right on the edge of 2 gauge and 0 gauge. Even with the 2 gauge there isn't a grommet that will accept it. There might've been on the 2005-2009 but on the 2010 it's not there. Having no decent spot to enter on the driver's side I had to remove the wiper assembly cover and route it under the wiper motor to the passenger side. From there I checked and double checked the interior and exterior firewall for the cleanest entry point. I went with a spot just next to the ventilation system and where it enters. I used a Unibit that made easy work out of making the right sized hole. I used the JL Audio supplied grommet and heavy duty 3M 77 electrical tape to really close it up good. From there it was no problem getting back to the spare tire mounting rack. I will say I needed about 18-19' to get there having to run to the passenger side and then all the way back. Lucky for me the JL Power Kit came with 20'.

*Deadening*
Ahhh, the fun part. Time consuming but actually relaxing compared to all the other crap that goes into these systems. I enjoy it. I will say first off, I could've done more but held back. The Mazdaspeed3 is a sports car. I didn't want to add 100+ lbs to it. I used about 80 sq ft of Damplifier and 70 sq ft of Overkill. I did about 90% of the trunk and floors. On the doors I only did the exterior panel. Why not seal the inside panel?? Simple. The Madza door panels are a work of art compared to most other manufacturers panels out the there. It's a glass filled polypropylene material that is hardly resonant to begin with and it's seals up almost perfectly with the exception of where the door latch and lock wires run from. I used more butyl rubber around those areas to seal them up. I used SPL tiles on the exterior panels of the doors, on top of the damplifier, then covered both with overkill pro cut to fit the areas as best I could. I didn't use a solid barrier from edge-to-edge in the doors. 

The only comparison I have to put the Secondskin product up against is eDead. There is no comparison. The Damplifier/SPL Tile combo on doors is insane. They are dead, dead, dead. No rattles anywhere at this point that I can hear. All said and done I only used about half what I ordered. I scaled back and am happy I did so as again, weight was a big concern of mine. I'd highly recommend SecondSkin products to anyone who's looking do a serious install. 

*CleanSweep*
Good Lord this was easy. JL Audio sells a single wire called multi-purpose wire. I'd highly recommend it to anyone doing this install or a similar install integrating a stock head unit. It' nine color coded wires in a wire about the same size a 2 gauge wire (covers 8 wires for 4 speakers and an ACC wire from the head unit). I tapped into the appropriate signal at the head unit for the 4 channels and the ACC wire and ran it back to the CleanSweep. I have the color coding for anyone with a 2010+ Mazda 3 or Mazdaspeed3 with the Bose unit if anyone needs it. I tapped in at the head unit to avoid having to use a signal summing interface after the Bose Amp. While I was in there I disconnected the center channel Bose Speaker. I assumed that turning the Bose Centerpoint Surround off would automatically turn off the Center channel. It doesn't. Don't ask me what the Centerpoint Surround does. It's one of Bose's tricks. There are also 2, 3.5" speakers in the rear hatch area. I disconnected those as well when I deadened the hatch. The multi-purpose wire I simply soldered to the CleanSweep harness and from there it's a direct plug in. There's a 12V constant and ground wire also coming from the CleanSweep. I took them both and went to the same source feeding the amps. The CleanSweep comes with a calibration disk and it calibrated perfect on the first shot. It also comes with the appropriate test tones for setting the gains. The CleanSweep also comes with a master volume control. While this might a big issue for some people I really, really like it. The reason for this is that you set and calibrate the CleanSweep at a specific volume on your head unit. While you can continue to use the volume on your head, it's still applying an equalized signal like it always does as you increase or decrease the volume. For me I found a spot that I have my hand at 99% of the time in my Mazdaspeed3 which is right next to the shifter.  I like the way it looks and turned out.

*First Impressions....*
Wow. It really sounds fantastic. I did some minor adjustments to lower the output on the rears and it really sounds incredible. Everything sounds well defined and the car is tight and for the most part free of rattles. I had a small rattle in the headliner right in front of the rearview mirror but I didn't hit the headliner to begin with. I cut a small piece of overkill pro, folded it, and then stuffed it in there. Rattle is gone now.

I didn't know what to expect out of the 10w7 ProWedge. I had the 12w6 ProWedge and loved it. The 10w7 hammers through notes every bit as well as the 12w6.

All in all it was a fun install. A little more time consuming with running the wire through the doors and the finding a suitable entry for the power wire but it was a lot of fun and I'm really enjoying the fruits of my labor. 

Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)




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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

I will add more pictures tonight of the amp rack. Didn't have them uploaded like I had hoped.


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## Dr.Telepathy SQ (Nov 17, 2007)

Why are the tweeters mounted so low in the door, and the cost that you put into buying high cost JL Audio eqt, why are you running a passive comp set up in the front doors? You have a cleansweep, but nothing to tune the output with. You could have passed up the cleansweep, because the Mazda decks via/Bose put out a flat signal response before the amp(2-2.5v). You could have tapped into that for free.


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## MaXaZoR (Apr 1, 2007)

Nice start, I have to say I don't know how I feel about the placement of the tweeters firing right into your leg. I would have tried them in the A pillars or higher up on the door.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

Dr.Telepathy SQ said:


> Why are the tweeters mounted so low in the door, and the cost that you put into buying high cost JL Audio eqt, why are you running a passive comp set up in the front doors? You have a cleansweep, but nothing to tune the output with. You could have passed up the cleansweep, because the Mazda decks via/Bose put out a flat signal response before the amp(2-2.5v). You could have tapped into that for free.


I don't know, same applies to the midrange driver. Why are the drivers so low in the door as well? I don't know it's just what I'm working with. I've followed JL Audio's suggestion on the last 3 installs I've done to place the tweeter within 8" of the woofer and it's sounded fantastic on all of them. I've mounted passive components in the fronts and I've mounted the tweeters both high or low. Anytime I mounted them high in the doors or on the A-Pillar they've sounded awful.

_*"As a general rule, the tweeters should be placed relatively close to the woofers for best tonal balance and most coherent imaging (the closer, the better). Any separation greater than 8 inches (20 cm) is likely to result in degraded sound quality."*_

I don't believe the Bose unit has a flat signal before the amp. The JL Audio dealer I work with has run an RTA on one and said their is significant equalization being applied from 50% and above.

I might have to put the flame suit on for installing the JL Audio gear but hey I'm happy. I bought this gear JL Authorized at just above dealer cost.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

MaXaZoR said:


> Nice start, I have to say I don't know how I feel about the placement of the tweeters firing right into your leg. I would have tried them in the A pillars or higher up on the door.


Thanks. 

Like I mentioned in the previous post they match the placement of the midrange drivers. I actually had to set them on the -1.5 dB setting to tone them down a bit. They do fine where they're at, for what I was looking to achieve.


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## Lanson (Jan 9, 2007)

wrxified said:


> I don't know, same applies to the midrange driver. Why are the drivers so low in the door as well? I don't know it's just what I'm working with. I've followed JL Audio's suggestion on the last 3 installs I've done to place the tweeter within 8" of the woofer and it's sounded fantastic on all of them. I've mounted passive components in the fronts and I've mounted the tweeters both high or low. Anytime I mounted them high in the doors or on the A-Pillar they've sounded awful.
> 
> _*"As a general rule, the tweeters should be placed relatively close to the woofers for best tonal balance and most coherent imaging (the closer, the better). Any separation greater than 8 inches (20 cm) is likely to result in degraded sound quality."*_
> 
> ...



Actually this was the sacrifice you had to make because you used a cleansweep instead of a dedicated time-aligning processor (3sixty.2, etc.) and because you didn't go active. If you put your tweeters higher up like I did in my speed3 build years ago, then you would have to align the woofer and tweeter at different levels of time delay which would correct the issue but leave you running active and with a processor. 

For what you had, I think you made the right call. You can't make separate woofers and tweeters coherent without time delay if you don't have equal pathlengths. you could have also done some very intense math on pathlengths and drilled a tweeter hole in just the right spot, but chances are the passenger and driver's tweeter hole would be _in two different locations! _Most people would frown on that and I would be one of them. Again, you did the best you could with the situation at hand.

HOWEVER, I can't for the life of me figure out why you bothered with the rear speakers...


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## mattyjman (Aug 6, 2009)

ii thought my molex plugs were a *****...it sounds like yours were a little worse. with what your install goals were, it looks like you achieved them. Clean and simple. 

I second the comment on the rear speakers though.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

fourthmeal said:


> HOWEVER, I can't for the life of me figure out why you bothered with the rear speakers....


I don't discriminate against my rear passengers! LOL yah I know it's totally overkill and really not at all appropriate if you're setting up the proper system. I have them faded to the front about 4 clicks. I do however plan to add a couple headrest monitors for my kids and thought that it would be fun for anyone in the backseat.


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## Lanson (Jan 9, 2007)

mattyjman said:


> ii thought my molex plugs were a *****...it sounds like yours were a little worse. with what your install goals were, it looks like you achieved them. Clean and simple.
> 
> I second the comment on the rear speakers though.


LOL did you see the carnage of my molex on my speed3? I bent the metal all around the damn thing in the end because the connector's lock opened up INSIDE THE DOOR JAMB! That was 1/2 a day and many cut and bruised fingers worth of work. I have since that day bought and used a set of Stanley pick tools, which make this job 100x easier for $8.95.


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## Lanson (Jan 9, 2007)

wrxified said:


> I don't discriminate against my rear passengers! LOL yah I know it's totally overkill and really not at all appropriate if you're setting up the proper system. I have them faded to the front about 4 clicks. I do however plan to add a couple headrest monitors for my kids and thought that it would be fun for anyone in the backseat.



You sacrificed an active system for your rear seat passengers though. Dollars to doughnuts that if you took those rears off amp power and ran them off the head unit, you'd not hear a difference in performance at the volumes a kid would be watching a set of headrest tv's on. And if you powered those rears off the deck power, and ran your woofer/tweeter combo active (the JL amps will do that, right?), you would be able to ditch those passive crossovers and clean up the sound even more precisely. Basically I challenge you to try it if your amp will go active.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

fourthmeal said:


> LOL did you see the carnage of my molex on my speed3? I bent the metal all around the damn thing in the end because the connector's lock opened up INSIDE THE DOOR JAMB! That was 1/2 a day and many cut and bruised fingers worth of work. I have since that day bought and used a set of Stanley pick tools, which make this job 100x easier for $8.95.


Amen to the pick set. I bought the craftsmen set for $10 and it made removing and reinstalling the plugs quite a bit easier.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

fourthmeal said:


> You sacrificed an active system for your rear seat passengers though. Dollars to doughnuts that if you took those rears off amp power and ran them off the head unit, you'd not hear a difference in performance at the volumes a kid would be watching a set of headrest tv's on. And if you powered those rears off the deck power, and ran your woofer/tweeter combo active (the JL amps will do that, right?), you would be able to ditch those passive crossovers and clean up the sound even more precisely. Basically I challenge you to try it if your amp will go active.


I just don't want to mess around with an active system. I'm comfortable with the passive setup and I don't want an active system. It wasn't a sacrifice becuase it's what I wanted. FWIW I've been doing this a while. Enough to know what I like to mess with and not mess with. I've only been in two peoples cars with active system and every time I listen to their system they're constantly toying with and adjusting their systems almost to the point that they're making adjustments through different types of music and songs. Not for me. I'm the ronco "set if and forget it type". Just want to enjoy it and not mess with it every 15 minutes.

The only right way is the way you want it done. I did it this way so for my car, it's the right way.


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## t3sn4f2 (Jan 3, 2007)

Will you be using the headunit volume as your master volume?


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

t3sn4f2 said:


> Will you be using the headunit volume as your master volume?


No I am using the CleanSweep's master volume.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

These are the pics of the amp rack, power wire and volume control.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

The black bars over the amps were a trial. Because I removed the spare tire and Bose sub I needed to find a new way to support the stock carpet floor. I picked up some aluminum J Channel from HomeDepot for $8. Cut it to fit and painted it flat black. It's not as sturdy as I'd hoped. The floor still sags a bit with the sub in place.

I ordered these aluminum rods yesterday on ebay. Going to give them a shot. Should be quite a bit more solid.


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## AudioBob (May 21, 2007)

Nice Install. I used the CleanSweep before and it really puts out a nice clean and hot signal. I really like the sound of the JL ZR570. The passive crossovers are really nice and offer plenty of adjustment for most people, even if they are picky about their sound.

I am a set it and forget it type as well so I don't mind a good set of passives if I can get them to sound balanced. I am running my current set-up active and it sounds marginally better because I am able to choose crossover points and slopes that better suit my speakers and locations. 

I totally agree on the tweeter mounting with JL speakers. Anytime they are mounted far away from the woofer they just don't sound right. JL generally crosses their tweeters in the 4,000 to 4,500 range and I believe that is why.


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## Eiswritsat (Nov 19, 2008)

looks nice very clean


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## Paulo Sillas (May 22, 2009)

Very nice setup, lot of points in common with mine. 

Just one tip, you should buy another aluminiun knob for the Remote Level Control, just like the cleansweep's one.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

Paulo Sillas said:


> Very nice setup, lot of points in common with mine.
> 
> Just one tip, you should buy another aluminiun knob for the Remote Level Control, just like the cleansweep's one.


Thanks. I was wondering if JL Audio sold them individually. I should check because it would look better.


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## Paulo Sillas (May 22, 2009)

wrxified said:


> Thanks. I was wondering if JL Audio sold them individually. I should check because it would look better.


Yes, it would look much better. Check it out: JL Audio: Gear Department :: Audio Accessories :: Aluminum Knob (for use with CL441dsp, CL-RLC, HD-RLC and RBC-1) .


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

Paulo Sillas said:


> Yes, it would look much better. Check it out: JL Audio: Gear Department :: Audio Accessories :: Aluminum Knob (for use with CL441dsp, CL-RLC, HD-RLC and RBC-1) .


Paulo you are fantastic. Just ordered it. They didn't even charge me shipping!!! Will have it in 6-7 days!!!!!


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## silver6 (Nov 11, 2008)

Nice install!! The only suggestion I can make is...

Remove the blose emblems!! 

It was one of the first mods I did on my 6 

Mike

Oh, and for whats its worth, your 3 has more factory "deadening" than my 6 did...


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## bruther (Sep 22, 2009)

How do you like using the new JL power wire??


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

bruther said:


> How do you like using the new JL power wire??


It's much better than their old wire. The new stuff is extremely flexible. I like the idea of the outer layer being removable to turn a power wire into a ground however I notice on the thinner 4 gauge wire it wants to split open if you make too sharp of a bend.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

I had to ditch the lousy J Channel idea. The subwoofer weighed a little too much and started to sag. This was the cheapest, lightest idea I could come up with. I could've done MDF but that weighs a ton compared to this. Aluminum tubing was purchased on ebay for about $30. Bought some 120 grit sand paper to give it a little bit of a finished look. Then sprayed it with some clear satin spray paint because the tubing looked like crap with oily hand prints. To get the tubing in the foam I simply notched it out with a razor and just twisted it in. Once the grooves were opened up I used hot glue to secure it. Floor would hold me and my 4 kids now.


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## jimp (Jul 12, 2009)

you could mount the tweets in the sail panels higher on the doors, that's where my oem tweets and aftermarkets went in my 05 S, don't know if mazda changed the oem tweet location on all 3's in 2010 models or not. Nice work though, like where you mounted the x/o's, maybe mine will fit there in my 05.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

jimp said:


> you could mount the tweets in the sail panels higher on the doors, that's where my oem tweets and aftermarkets went in my 05 S, don't know if mazda changed the oem tweet location on all 3's in 2010 models or not. Nice work though, like where you mounted the x/o's, maybe mine will fit there in my 05.


I don't want them separated from the mids.


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## wrxified (Oct 13, 2009)

Thanks to Paulo on the suggestion for the matching level control knob for the sub. Looks a bit cleaner.


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## bassfromspace (Jun 28, 2016)

Great install and noone's going to knock the usage of JL equipment on here. They're well respected.


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