old school Polk car audio eggs

veeman

Anyone have photos of these speakers...I used to have them c. 1990, but can't for the life of me remember the model numbers, and would love to see them again. I think they were a polk 3502 or something similar, and it included a 2" mid driver, and a 1/2" tweeter in an egg shaped enclosure. All I remember is that they sounded great back then in my car audio system.

skrol

Is this what you mean (MM2200)?

I used to run the old MM6510, MM6520, MM5520 and MM3a. I still have them in my basement.
Stan

RuSsMaN

God that is cool, how after so many years, you guys post something at least I haven't seen before?

veeman

Holy crap bro! that brings tears to my eyes...thanks man that brought back some serious memories. I had those, custom mounted in the upper doors of my 89 Mustang GT, Altec lansing 6.5" in the stock location, and Denon 3.5" coaxials in the dash. In the back was Boston acoustics 4x6 plates, and MTX blue thunder 12's in a ported box in the hatch. Denon Dca 3500, 500, and an Alpine 3528 did the amplifying with an Alpine x over and an Alpine 7390 deck and Changer. It was an Awesome system at the time, and now that I think about it, I might have had every manufacturer in that car somewhere...at least a lot of good ones.

Vette C6.r

Never new 6510's were ever in car speakers. Maybe I need to look in the car audio section to get one. lol

Skrol this isn't your first unique Polk posting. Bravo. Keep up the good work Stan.

skrol

Here are the other pages from the brochure. I have a few more tear jerkers that I'll post later.
Enjoy
Stan

skrol

This one is a little older and has the Mobile SDA.

skrol

The C4

This one is still grabs me.

veeman

awesome! I think I had the mm1001 as I recall that was the add that prompted me to get them. Lots of innovation back then, it was the golden years of car audio. Thanks for posting the photos, I've been looking for them for a few years now.

twochannel

Polks first attempt at car audio speakers was a complete success in my opinion. My own personal audio demo car had 2 pair of mm6510/mm2200 components and a pair of mm6901subs connected to the SDA-ACM with three Alpine amps. At that time no round subs were available from Polk, so I also had a pair of Alpine 10 inchers firing thru the rear seat, powered by another Alpine amp to reproduce what the 6 x 9 subs were not capable of. My SDA-SRS's were in storage at the time, so I had SDA in the car. I spent alot of time in the car! Impressive effect that took some time to perfect with correct placement of the speakers. I really miss that system!

twochannel

Vette C6.r wrote: »

Never new 6510's were ever in car speakers. Maybe I need to look in the car audio section to get one.

If my memory is correct, the MM6510's were not the same as the 6510's in the home speakers.

Jstas

skrol wrote: »

The C4

This one is still grabs me.

I got one. Powering it with a NAD 902 amp and using it as a subwoofer on a gaming rig. Fits under a couch, unseen and has a crazy range with impressive output. Totally worth the time to find one. One of the better pre-package subs ever made, of all time.

Hear one, in a car or a house, and it'll rock your world on what you think a sub needs to perform like that.




As far as the Mobile Monitors, the MM "teardrops" tore up the SQ scene before there even was an SQ scene. Imaging was incredible and they were very forgiving installation wise because of the packaged and matched mid-range/tweeter configuration. The best imaging I have ever heard in car, even to this day, was in a 92 Ford Taurus running that MM component set mounted in custom pods under the dash with a pair of midbass driver in custom pods on the front doors. Used Alpine electronics and amps. Any where you sat in that car, the soundstage was dead center in the middle of the dashboard.

That guy was unbeatable. The best you could hope for in competition against him was 2nd place.

I've seen incomplete sets pop up on ebay from time to time. The few that are complete usually have blown drivers in the teardrop from some idiot throwing hundreds of watts at them. They did spectacular on as little as 22 watts. Never understood why people had this fetish for big power with them.

I would love to see Polk Audio come out with another set similar to that but it'll never happen.

I tell you though, back in their day, they were coveted, holy grail level speakers. Some of the super high end car audio companies out there with 3-way and 4-way speakers used the MM "teardrops" as inspiration because of how forgiving they are.

Jstas

twochannel wrote: »

Vette C6.r wrote: »

Never new 6510's were ever in car speakers. Maybe I need to look in the car audio section to get one.

If my memory is correct, the MM6510's were not the same as the 6510's in the home speakers.

I don't think it was a MW6510. I do believe the model number was an MM6501 but even then I think that's wrong. The "old stuff" part of teh Polk site on lists the MM6502 and that's what I remember the model number being.

http://www.polkaudio.com/caraudio/products/recent/mm6502/

They were based on the same technology but even like the current SR's, the ring radiator tweeter is similar but not interchangeable. Even the woofers are different with beefier baskets, formers, VC's and spiders and that all changes voicing from the home application woofers.

Jstas

I guess I should look at the pictures, huh?

I still don't think it was the same driver.

Even my older dB's based on the RT speakers have a vastly different drive with similar looks and model numbers.

twochannel

The MM6510 had two positive and two negative terminals. One pair was used as the input from the amplifier and the second pair was used to hook up the 2200 tweeter/mid egg. The 6510's lacked a crossover, so they went full range.

Jstas

twochannel wrote: »

The MM6510 had two positive and two negative terminals. One pair was used as the input from the amplifier and the second pair was used to hook up the 2200 tweeter/mid egg. The 6510's lacked a crossover, so they went full range.

Yeah, I remember that. I don't think they came with an external passive crossover like many components do now. All the crossover components were in the tear drop except for a couple components on the midbass driver itself. I might be wrong though. People experimented a good deal back them. Pretty much why "pretty package" companies like JL Audio couldn't get any respect when they first came out.

Alot of people used external, active crossovers and multiple amps. Then again, that's when stereo amps had nominal output levels of 25W x 2 so you could easily power highly sensitive tweeters on low power without blowing them up and then jack the heavier duty mid-range up with 50+ watts of power.

skrol

Don't confuse these with the more recent MM series. These looked very similar to the MW65xx used in the Monitors, SDA and RTA speakers. I do believe that the MM6510 is a different animal than the MW6510.

I actually have a brochure with the small parameters for the MM speakers.

Jstas

skrol wrote: »

Don't confuse these with the more recent MM series. These looked very similar to the MW65xx used in the Monitors, SDA and RTA speakers. I do believe that the MM6510 is a different animal than the MW6510.

I actually have a brochure with the small parameters for the MM speakers.

Trust me, I'm not confused in the least.

There have been multiple discussions in the Car Audio forums in the past 10 years about these stellar little gems. I guess it's "new" here because nobody gives any credence to the car audio world. Like it's a bunch of shenanigans or something.

skrol

Truth be told, I get to enjoy music in my car more than any place else. If I get the time, not likely with 4 young kids, I want to do my Volvo V50 up nice.

My old MM's have been installed in 3 cars previously ('90 Daytona, '94 Integra and '02 Volvo S40), that is how much I liked them. They were driven by Alpine HU and amps. They were the best in the S40. One was starting to make nasty noises so I replaced the fronts with some MB Quart components. The Quarts were very nice but hard to tame the highs and you heard every defect in the recording and reproduction. If I do up the V50, I'll look at Polk's latest offerings or maybe Focals.

Jstas

skrol wrote: »

Truth be told, I get to enjoy music in my car more than any place else. If I get the time, not likely with 4 young kids, I want to do my Volvo V50 up nice.

My old MM's have been installed in 3 cars previously ('90 Daytona, '94 Integra and '02 Volvo S40), that is how much I liked them. They were driven by Alpine HU and amps. They were the best in the S40. One was starting to make nasty noises so I replaced the fronts with some MB Quart components. The Quarts were very nice but hard to tame the highs and you heard every defect in the recording and reproduction. If I do up the V50, I'll look at Polk's latest offerings or maybe Focals.

The new MM series is quite nice and honestly a bargain at it's price point. I heard the DXi line as well and it's very similar to the old dB line that replaced the original MM line. The original DX line replaced the dB line and I never thought much of them. Polk said they were an improvement but I think they lied. Lotsa other folks though so too. The new DXi line looks and sounds very much like the old dB line and that's, honestly, a very good thing.

Then again, that old dB line was alot like the SR line now and the original MM line. Ferrari performance at Ford prices, you know? Lotsa value there. I have the old dB3065's in my Lightning with a dB124 sub. Those silk domes, I just love them! One of the most even keeled tweeters I've ever heard in my life!

But yeah, those MBQuarts, they got screechy. Never liked the tweeters. A guy I used to work with, he was an MB Quart snob, raved about them. But he had the tweeters attenuated at like a -12dB level just to get rid of the screaming top end. All I could ever think was why get them if you have to make such a drastic change to tame them?

There's lotsa stuff out there now. Read through the Car Audio forums, there's lots of interesting discussion on drivers and setups in there and active right now.

Vette C6.r

twochannel wrote: »

Vette C6.r wrote: »

Never new 6510's were ever in car speakers. Maybe I need to look in the car audio section to get one.

If my memory is correct, the MM6510's were not the same as the 6510's in the home speakers.

You are correct. Looks like I need glasses. Mis-read it.

Jstas

DSkip wrote: »

Jstas, did you ever toy with or listen to an SDA system in a car? That really piqued my interest.

Nope. I haven't. I've seen installs with them but never really heard them.

I'm told they don't operate the same way as the home SDA does. It goes more front to rear than left and right. It does the same thing as the home SDA does but positioning of drivers matters and the effect isn't as pronounced in the car as it is in the home.

Then again, it's not really imaging that suffers in a car as much as it is outside interference. Whether it's electrical or audible. I mean, imaging suffers but you can compensate with installs and there are ways to use reflective surface like a windshield to your advantage.

I think it would be neat to get one of the modules and mess around with it but it is an expensive proposition because it does require multiple amps IIRC. They pop up on eBay every so often and around the internet sites but they are rare and usually when one comes up, they do draw some attention and interest.

Jstas

There are lotsa people on the forum in your area with SDA's. Just ask, someone will let you have a listen.

skrol

I know it isn't quite the same as the SDA but my Volvo has Dolby ProLogic II and it actually works pretty well. It isn't over done and, with some tweaking, you can get a pretty good sound stage. It doesn't work too well for folks in back though.

Jstas

Talk to RuSsMaN about the audio meets they got going on. There's a few of them. You'll meet lots of cool people and probably meet someone with SDAs who will let you have an audition.