New tweeter location

MacLeod

OK, normally I wouldnt start a brand new thread for something simple like this but this place has been dead as a doornail the last couple days so I figured what the hell.

Today on a whim, I took my tweeters out of the dash where they were firing up into the windshield and laid them in the far forward corners of the dash firing into the middle of the car.

Holy cow what a difference!!! The imaging focused up a TON! On Rebecca Pidgeon's Spanish Harlem she sometimes moved noticeably to the left on some notes. Not anymore! This other track with a trumpet on the far right side could be heard on the left side as well due to the reflection and echo. Thats gone too! Plus the trumpet sound a lot better. Even better, my upper midrange had a brassy sound to it that I couldnt get rid of - its gone now!

Ive still got some tuning to do to get the levels right again but this made a huge improvement.

My only problem is that I dont know how to mount them there in any way that doesnt look really ghetto. Theyre in compaxial pods that come with the SR's but theyre just lying there.

Ill worry about it later tho. For right now Im just stoked I FINALLY got some of my major problems fixed and Im gonna start working on getting it smoothed out the rest of the way. So for now Ill just be the ghetto guy.

So let this be a lesson boys and girls - Tweeters + windshield = bad

Tim B.

mold them in the A-Piller.

MacLeod

Youve obviously never seen my attempts at "custom" installation.

ilikesound

do it this way.

by the way, this was my first actual fiberglass job. let me know what you think! once i get my EQ problems all straightened out i will post some pics of the entire thing for you guys to look at.

exalted512

get gauge pods
-Cody

Jstas

exalted512 wrote: »

get gauge pods
-Cody

DING DING DING!

Although, you'd have to do some mods to the passenger side because alot of them are angled towards the driver from the driver's side A-pillar.

vawakemonster

how do you glass an A pillar? I was under the impression that fiberglass and plastic don't bond?! do you mold the entire panel? I would love to try my hand at this!

exalted512

vawakemonster wrote: »

how do you glass an A pillar? I was under the impression that fiberglass and plastic don't bond?! do you mold the entire panel? I would love to try my hand at this!

When I do them at work, I bust out the grinder to the edges of the apillar where the fleece will be layed and take it down about .5". Then drill multiple holes where the fleece will be directly pressed on the plastic, then wrap the fleece around the MDF ring for the tweeter, then wrap the fleece all the way around, use dynaglass as needed and wrap em in vinyl.
-Cody

vawakemonster

so how do you fasten the fleice to the a pilar? and do you only apply fleice to the area where your mounting the tweeter or do you wrap the entire thing?

MacLeod

ilikesound wrote: »

do it this way.

by the way, this was my first actual fiberglass job. let me know what you think! once i get my EQ problems all straightened out i will post some pics of the entire thing for you guys to look at.

Thats actually how Id like to do it. But fiberglassing really aint something Im wanting to tackle.

1- I dont have the first clue how to do it.

2- I have no place to work since I live in an apartment.

3- Its still a new car so I dont really want to be cutting and hacking on it without knowing what Im doing.

4- I have zero skill as a craftsman and even less patience. Not a good mix.

Maybe after world finals in November, I can save up enough loot to have one of my local shops glass me up some like that.

Very nice work by the way.

exalted512

vawakemonster wrote: »

so how do you fasten the fleice to the a pilar? and do you only apply fleice to the area where your mounting the tweeter or do you wrap the entire thing?

Well, resin will seep into those holes that you drilled, as well as the fleece is more or less wrapped around the panel, so its not going any where. I like to stay away from putting fleece over the whole thing because a lot of the time, to reinstall, you need to be able to flex the panel, if its solid resin, it might crack when you try and put it back in.
-Cody

MacLeod

Ya know, looking at these pictures of the install Josh and Thom did on this Silverado - they didnt glass pods into the a pillars, they just fab'd up a mounting pod that would attatch to the a pillar.





That might be easier and I could work on it without having to hack up my new car til I got it right.

Tim B.

If you remember my install. Chris did a nice job on them. I think it's clean and looks like it should be there.

Greg Peters

ilikesound wrote: »

do it this way.

by the way, this was my first actual fiberglass job. let me know what you think! once i get my EQ problems all straightened out i will post some pics of the entire thing for you guys to look at.

Nice job- very professional looking.

Greg Peters

Jstas wrote: »

DING DING DING!

Although, you'd have to do some mods to the passenger side because alot of them are angled towards the driver from the driver's side A-pillar.

I suppose (given the vehicle's origin) you could find some JDM pods for the passenger's side with some dedicated web surfing...and maybe some translation . A company that does aftermarket parts for both JDM and the North American market may well have appropriately angled pods for both sides- a plus for going with a popular model Japanese car that has tuner support overseas and here.

MacLeod wrote: »

Thats actually how Id like to do it. But fiberglassing really aint something Im wanting to tackle.

1- I dont have the first clue how to do it.

2- I have no place to work since I live in an apartment.

3- Its still a new car so I dont really want to be cutting and hacking on it without knowing what Im doing.

4- I have zero skill as a craftsman and even less patience. Not a good mix.

Maybe after world finals in November, I can save up enough loot to have one of my local shops glass me up some like that.

Very nice work by the way.

As for cutting/hacking on a new car, you could probably build a mold off the factory A-pillers and do up an entire replacement trim piece to mount your tweeters in fiberglass for each side, thus saving the OEM pieces to re-install upon selling the car. You may even get better tweeter positioning this way over trying to aim a mounting ring on top of the factory piece.

I suspect you've made some connections in the competition circuit, Mac- maybe one of your teammates might be able to fab some A-pillers, or at least know of a reputable installer that could do some for you (at a discount, of course)??

[Deleted User]

Or just kill the a-pillars. What are they new...$25 each? If you mess them up, just break it off and try again. It's not big so you won't wastes much material. Use C/A glue or hot melt to attach the fleece/grill cloth. I've even used staples through the plastic before. You can cut up some dowel rod to hold the tweeter ring in place before you glass it. If you mold the ring close enough to the plastic, you can just use filler. I've also used this stuff called Duramix (google). It's a 2 part epoxy but dries rock hard in like 5 minutes and is very strong.

Thom

MacLeod wrote: »

Ya know, looking at these pictures of the install Josh and Thom did on this Silverado - they didnt glass pods into the a pillars, they just fab'd up a mounting pod that would attatch to the a pillar.





That might be easier and I could work on it without having to hack up my new car til I got it right.

On that truck I went a little overboard- the tweets are mounted to steel brackets that are attached to the steel a- pillar. I welded two inserts to the steel and two machine screws hold the tweeter bracket to that. Then the little painted pod has three threaded inserts in it, and three machine screws go through the plastic a- pillar into the painted pod. The painted pod when attached to the plastic then fits over the tweeter which is secured to the steel. Then the pretty aluminum ring pushes in to hold it all together.

Something very similar could be done without the welding inserts to the steel, though. I like the other a- pillar pods pictured above, too. With worries about body filler cracking off plastic (sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't) a little pod on the pillar is a good way to make sure that doesn't happen. You could paint the pods a darker grey color, I would imagine the Accord has a few shades of grey throughout the interior...

MacLeod

Several of my teammates are accomplished installers but glassing up a set of pillars would take a day or 2 right (doesnt it take like 8 hours for the stuff to dry?). I couldnt ask one of them to take out 2 days for that. Plus I live 2 hours away from them all.

As for buying new ones, I figure theyd be like $100 each. You know how the OEM marks things up. I could maybe find some in the junkyard.

The thing that kills me is the mounting cups that come with the SR's ALMOST fit. I may be able to make them fit with just a little grinding around the edges. (Let me once again put my objection on the record for the SR's NOT having a surface mount cup! :mad: )

Im going to play around with some other spots before I decide for sure. While the imaging has improved quite a bit like this, the stage height is not at the dash level when it was about 6" above before. Plus, there is a little bit of localization with them being so on axis. Im going to try them up a little further on the pillars firing across at each other and see how that works. Once I decide on the best spot, Ill try to figure something out.

vawakemonster

so the part you class would only be a 5-6 inch length of the A pillar and you would just taper it down to the pillar itself and then wrap the entire thing in vinyl? is the vinyl wrap hard to secure tightly? does body filler bond to the panel? could I just use body filler and my current tweeter mounts to fab a pod and then wrap that?

ilikesound

what i did was take the apillar off, then superglue the cup to the apillar in a good position, (gotten by going behind the car and making sure they looked like they were firing in the right direction) then put some fleece stuff all around it, and stapled them to the back of the pillar. bondo the crap outta it, sand bondo again, sand, fiberglass it a couple times, sand, paint them with spraypaint and viola. CAREFULLY drill a hole in the back, route wires, and bingo, you are done. thanks for the responses to those that did, everyone that gets in there assumes it came stock like that.i probably did mine the wrong way, but they've held up to abuse, and they work nicely.

MacLeod

I dunno. I may get brave one day (if it ever freaking cools off outside) and try to 'glass something up. For now tho, Ill just be a velcro'ing fool!

eloplayspolo

Mac im in the same situation as u except i just dont have time time, my 07 civic has pretty much the same stock spots as your accord and i just dont like the way it sounds there. I have the flush mount cups, but i just dont know where to put them.