Ice Experts Needed!

[Karma Supra]

Right guys as the interior is totally stripped from my supra, I am going to put some of the sound system basics down...

Basicly I am not interested in pure volume, booming bass and piercing treble, I do not want and Extra heavy and space consuming subs, and I don't want ay of the Speakers to not look stock, for that reason I will be using the stock speaker locations and mounts. I am after a warm well balanced sound over everything else.

As I am doing a full interior swap my car will have the latest of late spec Speakers setups, this consists of:

(all factory) front 6" componants, in the front door, built into a sound deadened box

4 4" Speakers at the rear, two are free air, two are encliosed in a ported speaker box.

In my old car they were driven by a factory amp (not sure of the rating) adna factory double din cassette/CD head unit. all in all the sound was quite nice, but the speakers are 12 years old and could do with refreshing! Also the wiring was all intigrated into the car loom, making transfering a nightmare!

Also thrown into the mix is that the system will now be in a topless car... so although I am mot fussed about volume, I want to be able to listen to my music comfortably, over wind/turbo/exhaust noise :)

I will be using a Sony head unit (none of the harsh sounding Xplod tat, but an older high(ish) end minidisk/cd jobby, Sony MDX C8500R it sounds good) and thats about it for now.

What I need to know is:

Can I run two speakers in parralel off one channel? i.e. run the 4 rear 4" speakers from a 2 channel output without it sounding cack?

Am I likely to be happy with all 6 speakers running off a 4 50 watt headunit, if not can anyone reccomend a decent, compact, 4 channel amp that will not sound gash like so many of the cheap ones I have heard (but is still cheapish lol)

Can anyone reccomend some decent 6" componants (6" driver, 1" tweeter) that will work well in a box, as well as some 4" rears, one set to work well free air, one set to work well in a ported box).

I don't want to build a monster system, I want to build a good system, I don't want to spend a lot, but on the other hand I don't want to underspend and not be happy with the result! I just figured that while all the carpet is out and the speakers are actually accesable it might be worth doing.

I also need to get some cabling...

Cheers!!!!!!!!

[JAHill]

Sorry about that... Caught the wrong button with the bl**dy mouse-touchy pad thing.

What I was going to post was that I used a Phoenix Gold 4x50 amp and although 4x50W ain't the most powerful out there, the sound was clear and it gave good clean signals with no distortion when setup right and coupled with decent components.

[Jinxed]

Phoenix Gold 4x50 amp and although 4x50W ain't the most powerful

from what i understand the higher the amp rating the much more dificult it is to get serious fidelity. Sticking with a relatively low powered amp/system eliminates the inherent problems with the way high power amps step up the volume in octaves. With a nice low powered amp youll be able to achieve very nice sound quality(Speakers allowing) but of course this doesnt mean any low powered amp will do.... as always you will get what you pay for and an aldi £2.50 power special extreme 4 channel 50w amp(made up ;)) is really not going to compare well against a good brand or specialist company amp.

as long as you get a good amp, good matched Speakers that are appropriately wired up leaving the ohms, watts within the acceptable ranges of the amp and you use crossovers(you can get away with passive ones due to no sub, with sub really need an active or sub out from amp) you should be fine....

also remember though that quality is going to be affected by the wiring, and connectors.... if u use cheap thin wire and nasty connectors.... its going to really kill the quality. Also another thing to concider is keeping the power cables away from the rest of the wires for as absolutely long as possible... having a power cable running along the speaker wires can affect quality by introduceing nasty noises.... and one final thing.... SOLID GROUND..... ABSOLUTELY SOLID .... short as possible BUT SOLID ground :) number of times i misjudged the ground and ended up with a headache and a stereo not working cos of the ground is silly :D

the really, imo, dificult bit is correctly matching amp and Speakers .... with good kit rest isnt too hard :)

hope this helps some and if u need any very specific technical answers ill dig out the audio installation book i use at times :)

[Karma Supra]

Cheers guys...

I am not a total novice to sound systems, (I have done a few barry installations in my yoof lol) but I have never tried to make a good balanced system before.. (usually all my mods are performance ;))

I have found that wiring Speakers in parrallel is fine, but it will half the speaker impedance, so I need an amp that can cope with that. I totally hear you about budget amps... I won;t be using the 600w longmill one I have in the shed lol... I also know that manufacturers "alter" the output figures by quoting max wattage at various impedances....

I am guessing that what ever front componants I get should have some built in cross overs, the headunit has three pre outs (front, rear and sub) and I *think* it has configurable high and low pass filters in the front and rear channels (if not I am sure the amp will!)

Earthing should be easy as the amp is to go in the stock amp location, under the passenger seat, there are a few clean chassis fisings there that I should be able to take a decent earth from..

I will probably be looking at getting something like this as from my exeraince with amps, the technology doesn't change THAT much, and £ for £ a higher end used one is better then a mid end new one!

[Jinxed]

jus thought id mention this....

If you find yourself really having a hardtime id'ing the right Speakers you want... and if you find yourself just plain pee'd off with old tattered Speakers... maplin had some that might temporarily tide you over for peanuts. got me 2x 80w tiny speakers(approx 4 cm), 2x 150w Speakers (approx 4 inches) and 2x 250w 6 by 9's for around 40 quid all in a couple of months back.... they might still be doing them too and although i only used the 150's so far .... they sound alright. i dont mean great by any means(i didnt even bother putting xovers on them as it was winter installation n cold lol) but they are alright esp due to cost and cheap enough to blow up without really worrying about it.

[Karma Supra]

Good thought.. cheers for the tip ;)

-the main reason I am doing the audio stuff now though is because the interior is apart... On my car to get at the back Speakers I need to removed all the trim around the boot (its all trimmed) the rear seats and the rear inner quarter panels.... I don't want to remove and refit more then necesary as clips snap and trims squeak so the only reason I am trying to consider all this for now is because everything is out!!!

That and the fact that the carpet is out I can run all the cables properly, instead of just running them along the inside of the sills with the other car wires.

The sound system is the only thing that is stopping me put the interior all back together!! (trust me, its a bigger job then fitting an engine lol)

I need all the right kit by yesterday... but I am too anal to just go out and buy anything and bung it in

[Hou]

One thing you must please remeber is that max means bugger all, always remember when getting amps and Speakers that the RMS is the important number to be looking for and matching.

As long as they match well and you arent pushing your amp too hard to produce the required amount for the Speakers (resulting in distortion) you should be fine

[CarinaNL]

As for earthing your install go for one point in the car to lead all the earthing wires to HU, AMP(s).

As for an Amp I would search for a Hifonics, Audison, Signat, Alpine amp icw Focal or Hertz Speakers. You should be able to buy a 6" and 1" compo set, 6" coaxial and an 4ch amp for under 1000 euros new. That not a lot of money for a good SQ system.

Please leave them pioneer or sony amps alone they offer good price sound quality but there nothing more then that.