3-way....

Vital

So my wife told me i'm out of my freaking mind with this car and audio but i really can't help it LOL.
Ever since i thought i need to replace my momo comps and planned that 3-way idea in my mind everytime i look at my front doors i can't help but think to myself "look at all this space just doing nothing there" lol. I'm refferring to space under the armrest/above 6.5'' speaker that is meant for cups/bottles/whaever.
Looks like my recently purchased SR5250's will fit in there just fine with some wood and fiberglass.

Someone please tell me i'm out of my mind before i start cutting my door panel to the point of no return.

Here's what i'm thinking:

MMC (momo) 6.5'' woofer in stock location (if i ever get my hands on SR6500 then i'll replace it with SR 6.5'')
SR5250 woofer as pictured
SR5250 tweeter where my momo tweeter is now.

All this will be powered by my current PA500.4 - front channels will go to SR5250 woofer and tweets via sr x-over
and rear channels will go to momo 6.5

As far as frequencies since i only have 4-channel amp and no external active x-over all these speakers will receve signal from my headunit LFCut at 50-60Hz.
From there front amp's front channels feeding SR comps will be set to HP at 250Hz and up
and rear channels feeding momo's 6.5'' will be set up to 250Hz (and down to headunit's 50-60Hz)

Any thoughts/feedback/recomendations/mood stabilizers are welcomed.

and here's the same thing i wrote above but simplified:

MMC6500 woofer - 50-60Hz from headunit to 250Hzfrom amp's x-over
SR5250 woofer - 250Hzfrom amp's x-over to 4,600 from SR passive x-over
SR5250 tweeter - 4,600 and upfrom SR passive x-over

Not sure about the whole backwave/front wave interfierance, hopefully someone can shed some light here for me. MMC is in stock location inbetween door's innner and outter skins while SR woofer will be between door's inner skin and plastic door panel.

MacLeod

Kick panels would be better.

The reason for using a dedicated midrange is so you can place it in a spot thatll help imaging like in the dash or something. Putting right above the 6 in the door like isn't going to help imaging and will likely hurt it.

So in short, your wife is right. :biggrin:

Vital

No way i can fit anything short of maybe tweeters in those kick panels, there's 0 space behind them.

While i do understand what you're saying about imaging i just can't help but ask - so what about if you run those 5250's as full range comps the way they were meant to be run?? In stock location that is. Do midbass/lower midrange frequencies somehow make those midrange ones sound better??

Cayuga

My mistake I thought this was something else

MacLeod

Vital wrote: »

While i do understand what you're saying about imaging i just can't help but ask - so what about if you run those 5250's as full range comps the way they were meant to be run?? In stock location that is. Do midbass/lower midrange frequencies somehow make those midrange ones sound better??

Not sure what youre asking.

You can run those 6's as midbass only and due to their size, they'll be a little better at output than the 5's. But not only are you moving the mid closer to your ears on only one side which will really screw with imaging but having it so close to the mid could cause problems with the back waves of one driver interfering with the other. And unless youve got a pretty extensive 3 way crossover you're never gonna get all 3 of those speakers to work well together.

Basically what I'm saying is that the ONLY reason to mount them like that would be because it'll look cool. The only affect it will have on your sound quality will be negative.

Vital

MacLeod wrote: »

Basically what I'm saying is that the ONLY reason to mount them like that would be because it'll look cool. The only affect it will have on your sound quality will be negative.

I guess i need to tell my wife "honey, you were right, i'll take those stupid thoughts out of my head" lol

MacLeod

Vital wrote: »

I guess i need to tell my wife "honey, you were right, i'll take those stupid thoughts out of my head" lol

Well no need for anything like that. Just tell her you decided not to do cause you were considering her feelings. That way she owes you one.

ken brydson

Cayuga wrote: »

My mistake I thought this was something else

Me too :biggrin:

Vital

DSkip wrote: »

Have you installed the SR's yet? The low end really improves over about 80 hours of play time. If you can get the sub to blend right with them, you might not even worry about the 3-way front stage. I say just get 'em installed, give them 3-4 months play-time, and go from there.

No, didn't instal them yet. All my work is done outside since i don't have a garage. It just started getting warm(er) outside so one of these upcoming weekends SRs will be up. Another thing that's holding me back is that SR's x-overs a huuuge and i can fit them in my current amp rack so i actually need to re-do that before installing SRs.

Actually i'm thinking of building "custom" SR x-over pods out of wood/fiberglass so they will not take any usefull trunk space while still being visible when i want to show them off. After my db x-over failed from being in the front doors i swore to never install any of them there since they are constantly taking a hit everytime you open/close your doors.

MacLeod

Wait a minute, dont you have an Altima?

Im 95% sure those kick panels are BEGGING for some mids. There is no fuse box and theyre relatively flat. Dude if you could cut those SR 5's into the sheet metal, cut out the trim panel and then wrap it in grill cloth, youd have an outstanding platform! Doubt youd even need any time alignment. Then you could use your 6's for midbass.

A friend of mine competed in an 07 I believe and he ran ScanSpeak 4" Revelators mounted that way. Worked great!

Vital

MacLeod wrote: »

Wait a minute, dont you have an Altima?

Im 95% sure those kick panels are BEGGING for some mids. There is no fuse box and theyre relatively flat. Dude if you could cut those SR 5's into the sheet metal, cut out the trim panel and then wrap it in grill cloth, youd have an outstanding platform! Doubt youd even need any time alignment. Then you could use your 6's for midbass.

A friend of mine competed in an 07 I believe and he ran ScanSpeak 4" Revelators mounted that way. Worked great!

You mean something like this?

MacLeod

Kinda. It's better if you can cut a hole in the sheet metal and mount it flush. That way its in free air like it was designed for and you'll get better performance. Even if you glass it in like in the picture, its still best to vent it externally thru the sheet metal.

arun1963

The midbass there would give you good stage depth. The difference between the drivers and your ears goes down, the lower you mount them. Hence, lower phase difference. The frequencies that the midbass will play are more sensitive to phase difference.

Of course the tweets wouldn't go there. Mount the mids and tweets as high up as you can. Get these drivers more on axis too. The frequencies these drivers play are more sensitive to axis differences and less to phase difference.

In a car 'the best sound', will normally be for one seat only. If you dial things in well, you'll have decent tonality even in the passenger seat. Imaging will be messed up, but it will still sound decent. Mac is right, you have the platform for building a killer set-up. I hope you go through with all thats been mentioned. Somewhere down the line, you may want to look at a hu that has tons of tuning options. Then you can really leverage the install.

Btw for me, the frequency of hearing those words is normally a good indicator of how wrapped and messed up I'm getting with this stuff .

Vital

According to info on this altima built most you can flush fit in there, even with cutting sheetmetal is 4'' driver. There's not much space there under the kickpanel.

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/diyma-member-build-logs/93647-my-2008-altima-hat-build.html

arun1963

That's exactly how you should mount them. The guy in the thread cut the metal. Throw in some dynamat in there and you would have a well sealed free air enclosure.

Vital

Don't have SRs or a tape measure with me but just looking at those kicks i find it hard to believe 5250s will fit in there unless i fiberglass some pods that will be stickin out a few inches to the center of the car. No way they will fit flush, noooo waaaayyyyy. even if i cut sheetmetal and all.

MacLeod

OK. I knew Andy had 4's in there but I didnt realize how small that area was. So yeah, no way youre putting the SR's in there.

You can always get something like the DXi 4's or even the 3's and put down there. Their timbre will match with the MM's and if you have a 3 way crossover, you can run them from say 500-3.5 or so. It would help out your imaging and deepen your stage a good bit.

arun1963

I should stay out of install threads :redface: well atleast I got something right.