altoncustomtech

Damn ... what a detailed description !!! Thank you Sir !!!How is your time alignment ??? Can you actually tell where your stage and image is ?? ... or can you actually tell where your drivers are located ??? ... and most important, When listening to well recorded music ... Can you actually tell where your Sub stage is located ??? Reason I ask this is because once I got my substage time aligned to "match up" with my midbass drivers ... my midbass got tremendously strong, more dynamic, and ALOT easier to tune ... It's almost like there is a seemless transition between the midbass and the sub bass ... Somehow I missed this post, lol. The time alignment is pretty good I think since the stage and imaging are pretty good. The stage is up high, above the dash, pretty much where it should be. Imaging is fair but it does move around which I attribute completely to the installation and the fact the mids in in the factory locations near the floor aiming at each other and way off axis, especially compared to the tweeters. So yes, you can tell where the drivers are, it's not a transparent representation but compared to how almost anything I've listened to sounds it's really damn good. The subs are time aligned and sound just like they're right in the front of the van (when it's not loud enough that everything is rattling, all that sound deadening and the Q's still broke shit loose) and they help keep the midbass response decent but the upper end of the midbass still suffers and I still really think it's due to the mids being choked where they mount in the doors and baffles, it's just too damned tight for the to breathe right. Oh I'm not swapping anything at any kind of fast. The only thing I'm doing with all these drivers is getting an ear for the differences between them for now. I am slowly working toward getting the second two channel amp in so I can run the current component set active first and see what that does to the blooming midrange and see if it gets any easier to dial in with the EQ. The full ranges, extra mid basses, and all that is simply for playing around with the idea of different setups and what they could help or hurt in the future. I already know I want more than the current component set can bring to the table as they sit and if they end up falling short after taking them active then I have some other things to try out. This will be an ongoing effort to get it where I want it, I have accepted that, but I have little experience with an active setup (more like none of my own) and I've never had any experience using a full range and dedicated midbass either. I figured there's no time like the present to start getting some familiarity not only with what I'm trying to work on and correct right now, but the kind of setup that I've been thinking about doing in the future. The other problem is I can't spend a great deal of time tweaking and tuning the truck since I can't drive it, so I figured play with these little things gives me an opportunity to get some experience with them and continue to learn about this stuff.

Yeah, I don't even see how they would allow that for competition, then again I know nothing of the rules. How they did the setup sounds neat but had to have been way more trouble than it was really worth. The van does really damn good, but the components in the Jimmy leave a lot to be desired. They have incredibly strong midbass for 6.5's. They're powered by a Sundown 125.2 and give enough midbass to kick your pant leg around. I have them crossed fairly low (50hz iirc) but I also have the EQ turned down at 40hz and 125hz just to keep the sound halfway even or else the midbass would outrun everything else. The midrange is where they have the most trouble though and it seems to be most of the range too. It's the worst in the 2.5k neighborhood (break-up node, feels like it could rip your ears off) but the entire midrange sounds as though they're playing into a great big cardboard box. It's dull, exaggerated and lifeless, clear as a bell with no distortion at all but completely BLEH. The tweeters aren't bad at all, or don't seem to be, but they kinda wash out in all that's wrong with the midrange. I have begun to wonder if some of the components of the passive aren't actually going bad or something like that in the signal chain is going wrong because it's far worse now than it was when I first installed the components and amps. Part of my testing is to get a little listening time on these 3 inchers to get familiar with how they sound on a different amplified source then throw them in the Jimmy and see if the dull and bloated midrange problems still exist. If they do then I have a signal issue somewhere in the HU or amp, if not then I know there's definitely something going on with the components and my goal then is to discover if it's possibly in the passive crossovers or if it's an actual driver issue. Aside from that, giving their less than ideal locations and aiming the stage and imaging aren't bad at all but I know it can be considerably better. I'm really looking forward to playing with the full ranges though to see just how good my stage and imaging could possibly get with something like them up high and on axis. Also I've got an idea on how to build some enclosures to fit into the doors that will take up the whole cavity at the front of the door in front of the window track. It will definitely require some sheet metal removal but I think if I do it right the results will be well worth the trouble of all the modifications. The thought of having a pair of 8" dedicated midbasses in ported enclosures tuned to about 65hz just sounds like lots of fun and smiles.

Yep, I saw the PM and replied. Just went through your entire Van's build log (Nice Ride BTW) and I did not see exactly how you have your front stage set up ... I see in the vids that your dash in nice and flat, but couldn't tell how you have everything installed ...I was just wondering if you could give me an idea on what you have going on there ... I seen a van similar at USACI Finals one year running advanced SQ classes and thought I could go back though my pics and see if I could figure out how he had it set up ... I'm almost positive everything was countersank into the dash with agressive angles and vented through the fender wells ... and I'm thinking his midbass drivers were in the Kicks vented through the fender wells too ... I would like to go back and check, but I do remember that it sounded AMAZING !!! There's no pictures of it because I built the baffles and installed all that before I had joined any forum and before realizing anyone would really be interested in seeing pictures of any of the builds I've done. It's really basic though with the passive crossover's each mounted under the driver/passenger seats. The window track, window motor mount, and factory speaker baffle are all one big plastic frame that bolts to the door in these vans. I took a grinder and eliminated the factory baffle from the frame then built a baffle that covered the frame where the factory baffle used to be. I then put CLD (more than necessary) on the outer door skin along with a CCF egg crate type foam behind the speakers. Then because the plastic frames were impossible to cover with CLD or anything else I picked up some sheet metal that's a little thinner than the door itself and skinned it over the plastic frame. I applied CLD and CCF to that and then mounted the baffle to the door and installed the mids. I mounted the tweeters up on the dash as far forward as I physically could. Everything is in phase and like I said before, I got really lucky it all sounds as good as it does. The description of that van seems as though it should definitely sound good. That guy definitely has skills that I sure don't possess. On top of that, when I did the original build in the van we hadn't had it that long and my wife didn't want it to be heavily modified so I did as much as I could to make her happy and make it still retain the stock look. Of course that went out the window as the build's progressed but that's how it started out. I'll hunt through all of my pics and see if I can find ANYTHING of the doors behind the door panels. I just realized you said videos too, LOL. I can't believe those shitty ass videos are still up!

I'm starting cheap and moving up. The FE85 was almost 1/3 the price of the FR88EX so that's why I went that route. I've read a lot about the FR88 and if it works out I'll probably get around to playing with a set eventually due to the outstanding reviews it's gotten. The only thing I knew about the Faital's going into it was that Sean seems to think a lot of the brand and they were about the same price as the FE85's. I studied the specs, response and impedance curves on it before purchasing it and it looked to me like a great candidate. Initial listening it seems pretty damn nice, I'll post more about it as I play with it more.

In the interest in trying to do as Sean (///M5) had told me I needed to do in my ON/OFF Axis thread I've been playing around with everything. I've been going through crossover and EQ settings on the components in the van, I've spent time playing with the components in the Jimmy (I can't drive it, may as well work on the audio, right?), and I've also been slowly buying up some other stuff to play with. I bought the Dayton RS180-4 mids from Ricksi, I bought a pair of Aura NS3 3", a pair of Fountek FE85 3", and a pair of FaitalPRO 3FE25 3" full rangers all for the sake of trying to train my ear and learn what problems and anomalies can and are occurring in the hunt to get the sound I'm looking for. I have to say that aside from an awful lack of midbass the components in the van are pretty much what I'm looking for. Even running passive they don't have any issues with breakup, overbearing on any particular frequency and aside from the loudness setting turned on on the HU the EQ is dead flat. They're actually fairly impressive speakers for the money I paid and the fact they've lasted as long as they have taking the beating they have I've more than gotten my money's worth out of them. Even with the loudness off the only real problem I hear is the midrange being a little more in my face than I prefer to hear, of course that makes sense being that the loudness setting boosts a little on the bass and treble ends of the spectrum thus quieting the midrange down some. I can't find any real benefit doing anything else with the EQ besides that. I've had to come to grips with the fact that the less than stellar job I did installing the baffles for the components is the most likely culprit for their lack of midbass. There's not enough breathing room around the large motor's on them to allow them to work right. Without doing some careful work I'll have the same problem with the woofers in the Bravox CS603CF's when/if I ever get around to putting them in. Aside from that I think the limited number of people who've heard the van would agree the highs are as clear and even sounding as anyone could ask for with fairly good stage and imaging. All that amounts to is that I got really lucky with it and that luck didn't follow me into the Jimmy. Well, that's enough of that mess. The point of the thread is to share my opinions on as I make my journey through testing and playing with all this stuff. Hopefully those thoughts and opinions and discussion on the topic can help others as well. I'm going to start by setting up the current components in the Jimmy in an active setup. I'm going to get the Solid 2 installed and wired up to the tweeters and set the crossovers on the Clarion accordingly to see what kind of difference that makes with the set. A little preliminary testing (mids hooked up without passives) shows that it may be a promising move. Once all possible scenarios with that set have been exhausted I'll be testing with every combination of speakers and settings. Another thing Sean said was to never buy a set of speakers and expect it to be the last ones a person buys. I'm slowly getting an arsenal of drivers amassed so as to figure out what combination of what configuration I like best and I figure the more options I have, well the longer it will take (this is fun stuff!!) and the more I can learn from and grow from the experience. Here's the full rangers. I already had in my possession some Tang Band 3" full range speakers from a Logitech Z-560 (580, 680, something like that, the 400+ watt 4.1 set) computer speaker set that blew the amp out many years ago. I'm using the enclosures from them for all four sets to do the testing with so I don't have to build any. The size and configuration isn't perfect for all of them but at least it lets me test them in an enclosure of some kind. I have to say from initial testing the Faital's are leading the pack. They're super smooth and seem to extend way farther up in frequency than the others though the low end sounds kinda hollow. I assume that's from the super flat impedance curve that's published for them. Second is the Fountek's as they seem to have the most realistic sound, but they don't sparkle on the high end much and the low end is pretty hollow sounding as well. Third in line is the Aura's with a surprisingly rich lower end but they have a very tame sounding midrange and high end. They don't sound bad, but they're not quite out there and realistic as the other two. I still have to get the solder off the terminals on the TB's before I can make any sort of comparison with the others. I listened to them for years and thought they were great but who knows what kinds of built in EQing, crossovers, etc. Logitech had built into the amp for them and it's been years since I've heard them so I don't think it's even remotely possible to comment on them from memory and in that context. Here's a couple of pics just for fun. The Fountek's in the enclosures with the Aura's and Faital's sitting next to them. I just had them hooked up to a cheap little Lepai amp that I had lying around connected to my iPhone. It's not great, but it works. I plugged the ports on those little enclosure's to attempt to make the playing field just a tad more level. I'll get a little more industrious about it when I can get a bit more serious about the testing. I did have them the same height, angles, etc. on axis while testing as well.

bored with a little time to spare at work.....

I have to say I too have always wanted to play with one just for the sake of playing with it. That being said, if the manufacturer doesn't have any enclosure recommendations on which to start from then put the T/S into WinISD and model it to see how it will perform in the airspace the space constraints give it. Once you have that then what you're doing with Torres should be just fine. It seems plenty accurate from the playing around I've done with it. Use WinISD to model it and Torres to bring the model to a set of dimensions you can build with. I'm only being so general about it because this is a driver I highly doubt many have had any experience with. Even so, it's still just a driver, like any other and the process for designing and building an enclosure for it won't fundamentally be any different from anything else. From the grade school level understanding I have of T/S parameters it seems like the specifications show it to be a fairly decent driver.

I second this ^^^. I've never had a sub/port firing forward into the cabin setup work right without sealing around the box. Using old sheets, blankets, sweatshirts, etc. is a good, non-permanent way to test and make sure it is going to produce the results you're looking for. Then if it doesn't work out there's no fuss or mess to trying something different. On that note I've always been a fan of firing forward like that. It's always sounded the most natural to me and it greatly reduces (or completely eliminates depending on the vehicle) trunk and light rattle in the back of the car. As mentioned by Brendan when you seal up around the enclosure be sure to leave your rear deck sealed up as well.

yay....

Happy Birthday brother!!

I agree; thats precisely why I want to know this sub limits. You're asking a loaded question though. Whether or not the sub can take 20hz at full power depends completely and totally on the enclosure design. Every driver has a rated xmax and aside from testing the only way to see that you don't exceed it at a given frequency is to model it. Keep in mind that EVERY change you make to an enclosure alignment compromises something else it does. Making an enclosure that allows full power handling at 20hz would likely kill it's response on the upper bass frequencies, or kill power handling at those frequencies, or simply hinder the output capabilities. The next question is why the hell are you worried about what it can do at 20hz? Unless you're using it for home theater you'll never REALLY have a need to play it that low in the first place. Music, even edited music, just doesn't go that low. On top of that you're modeling the enclosure as being tuned at 35hz per your original post. No matter what sub you choose it's going to unload below that and get destroyed in a big hurry. The reason I am asking is directly related to the fact that I will be tuning the enclosure at 35hz, so at 20hz it will be practically free air however I wont have a subsonic filter to avoid damage on low frequencies so if a certain song happens to have a 20hz tone at some point I dont want to worry about any damage to the speaker. The sub will have 1000w rms; and Ive had other subs in the past that handled more than 1000w rms on free air without bottoming out. I just want to see if someone has pushed this sub to those limits. I have to call complete and total BS on that one. First of all you don't have any idea how much power you were really applying to those drivers, you didn't measure it. Even if you did the results would be dubious at best. Second, even if the sub were to take the power without bottoming out I guarantee you're stressing the spiders and surround so badly that it won't last long doing that to it. If you don't have a sub sonic filter on the amp then buy one, at least something like a Harrison Labs FMOD. You should not run a ported enclosure without an SSF no matter what driver you're using. Doing so is plain and simply asking for it to get damaged.

I agree; thats precisely why I want to know this sub limits. You're asking a loaded question though. Whether or not the sub can take 20hz at full power depends completely and totally on the enclosure design. Every driver has a rated xmax and aside from testing the only way to see that you don't exceed it at a given frequency is to model it. Keep in mind that EVERY change you make to an enclosure alignment compromises something else it does. Making an enclosure that allows full power handling at 20hz would likely kill it's response on the upper bass frequencies, or kill power handling at those frequencies, or simply hinder the output capabilities. The next question is why the hell are you worried about what it can do at 20hz? Unless you're using it for home theater you'll never REALLY have a need to play it that low in the first place. Music, even edited music, just doesn't go that low. On top of that you're modeling the enclosure as being tuned at 35hz per your original post. No matter what sub you choose it's going to unload below that and get destroyed in a big hurry.

um... pre-bedtime boredom.... anyone else? lol

to the forum!

to the forum!

In my worthless opinion, if you're driving a sub to the limits of it's XMAX so hard and so often that you're able to get the leads to make noise on the cone then you probably really need to be using a different driver. Either that or the enclosure design isn't right for the application either. Whichever it may be the driver can't be faulted for the noise or the imminent premature failure that will occur because it was being abused. I call it abuse because if a person is driving a sub that hard that much it's probably not getting loud enough for them. If that's the case then wouldn't something else be in order, not the continued abuse of that driver(s)? At least that's how I see it.

Aside from having any more information, such as the recommended budget, I would toss the Fi X series and SSA GCON's out there as the primary recommendations IMO. They will both work well in sealed enclosures and give more than enough output to go along with the speakers you have. Listing your budget for the subs, the particular vehicle they'll be going in, the reason why the space restrictions exist (could be self explanatory by make and model of the vehicle) and other such pertinent information can really help dial in on what you really need.

to the forum! Having no local place with the skills and knowledge we require is all too common an issue. Thankfully there's this great place with good knowledgeable people who are ready to help.

Hey there guys, I don't know if anyone's mentioned it anywhere yet or not, but chat room is broken. Right after one hits the "I Agree" button it pops up an error page and says "The IP.Chat room limit has been reached. You will not be able to join the chat room until some users first leave."

Happy Birthday my friend!

I agree with the 3/4" depth to get the gasket flush. I only went 9/16" on mine because I was wanting the rounded edge of the gasket to be just above the baffle. As for the outside cutout, you really don't want it to exactly match the outside diameter of the sub/gasket. If it's too close in tolerance it makes the sub difficult to drop in and take back out. I always try to add ad least an extra 1/8", sometimes more so that there's not any problems with clearance going in or trying to take them out. I went 3/16" larger with my 10" cutouts on the enclosure for my Jimmy and the fit was about perfect for them.

That takes the meaning of "BOOB" style cap to a whole other level.

Oh yeah, that's a winner.

You could also loose 1 or 2 dB by moving the box 1 inch closer to, or farther away from, any reflective surface. What does that mean? Absolutely nothing in the world of everyday listening. Your ears are not really ever going to notice 1 or 2 dB. Even if they could, without extensive testing of orientation you'd never know if you lost or gained it in the first place. There are a million more important things to worry about than the loss of 1 or 2 dB from the sub in a daily driver. In competition, of course, tenths of a decibel can mean the difference between winning and losing. One or two whole decibels is a big big deal in that case, but for the everyday vehicle, for the everyday listener, with an everyday music selection it's just not that important. As I had said before, without having already done the extensive testing with the exact same equipment, enclosure and vehicle none of us here can tell you exactly what you would gain or lose with a given orientation and placement.

Aside from LEAP's capabilities, is there any software out there anywhere than can graph, plot, or otherwise visually show a person what happens to the response curve (from a 0dB reference line) when they would apply say an 2.5khz LWR LPF -12dB filter, or even a 3.5khz HPF -6dB filter, or perhaps have 5 bands of parametric EQ each with the frequency, Q, and level to show what the effect those settings have on the baseline. My thoughts is that it might help to show and understand exactly what those adjustments are doing, how much they're affecting, and maybe to help get a healthier understanding of the interaction between all the settings by being able to see it without spending crazy amounts of time graphing it out by hand on graph paper. I've done a little searching around the web only to find there's either VERY little out there with any capability of doing this, or the search terms are just too general to elicit a good return of search items that really fit what it is I'm looking for.