SDG1990

picked up my 2011 scion xb last monday, installed a sub in sounds amazing, was wondering where i can get info on installing 4 additional speakers and 4 additional tweeter to the stock system already in the car, plz get back to me thanks

Greg S

iTrader: (1)

You'll need at least a single 4-channel amp to do it properly. More important question would be why? You're going to end up with imaging problems and having to cut and fabricate all the mounts for the additional speakers. If you are doing it for the WOW factor then by all means do it, but if you are just wanting to get louder or add some more sound you would be better off changing out the stock speakers for better ones and running and amp to them.

buickid

The internet is your friend. I would check out SoundSolutionsAudio's forum, they're an intelligent and helpful bunch. Most of the other car audio forums are well... yeah.

But +1 to why? I would just replace the front speakers with a quality pair of 6.5"s, and run a quality amp to them. I have a pair of DLS X-Program components in the front doors off a TruTechnology S44, 200W x 2, and its plenty loud, keeps up with the bass unless I'm straight slamming it.

xseveredveganx

I'm pretty meh about SSA. :D But they do know what they're doing. Some are very knowledgeable people, others not so much. Like every forum.


I'm with everyone else. Just replace and power new speakers properly. Deadening the doors will also help.

KaneoheKoa

This may be totally off the wall, but even with all the experience in live sound production and car audio, I got these nagging thoughts.
1. Component speakers are generally considered to give better sound thanks to better woofers, tweeters and most importantly, better crossovers. They are built like good home speakers. BUT, in a car situation, the woofer and tweeter are spaced far apart, not close together like in home speakers. This results in a skewed image space, two sound sources resulting in a non-coherent sound. My professional experience tells me this is not optimal for good sound.
2. Coaxial speakers are considered "beginners" speakers, thanks to a very simple design, generally lower quality components and simple capacitor for a tweeter crossover. YET, they give the most coherent sound, thanks to the woofer and tweeter taking the same space, with the sound emerging from a single point (like the KEF home speakers I used to sell).

Do we "push" components as an upgrade because they are technically more advanced and look it, when a good coaxial may actually sound better? Or is there something in between (speaker design, placement, etc.) that may be better?

Anyone's thoughts on the matter?

randomsuper

like pretty much anything, it's all in the install. coax speakers are easy to hook up and sound decent, but a properly installed set of components (at least in my experience) give much better sound quality. better mid bass for sure.

i will agree with your thoughts on components imaging capabilities, but again, that's more of a problem with the install than the components themselves. it's actually the reason i want to upgrade to 3 way components now and get rid of the active set up i currently have. the imaging is a little screwy with the mid so far away from the tweet. though technically i don't have components since i'm not using the supplied crossover right?

xseveredveganx

You still have components, you're just running them active. Play with time alignment on a processor or your headunit. I've played with mine a bit, and I feel I brought my soundstage up more.

Also, could even possibly cross your tweets a little lower. Having an RTA is a good thing.

Greg S

iTrader: (1)

Yes we do push components because generally they are more advanced for the standard mounting locations in a vehicle. That little bit is the big reason. With standard door mount locations in a vehicle a coaxial speaker is was off axis to the listener, and not symmetrically, and the upper mids to highs get totally killed by being so low and firing directly in to the pant legs of the listener. With components we at least have to oppotunatityto bring the tweeter up for a higher sound stage and imaging. It's not ideal but it is a much better situation.

If you start moving the mounting location then you open up a completely different situation and point source speakers can perform extremely well, as long as they are designed to handle the broader spectrum of sound that would be sent to them. More often you still end up with components but much different than the usual 2-way set up.

I'll use two of my systems for examples. First the one I have in my Odyssey. It is a 2-channel only system with a pair of 8" subwoofers mounted between the front seats crossed over at 55 Hz. I then have three 5 1/4" midbass in each door in a horizontal array, front to rear along the door, crossed over from 80-4000 Hz. Finally I have 1" tweeter in each sail panel playing from 4000 Hz. up. This actually works great for imaging by using a little trick about speaker arrays. With an array you get a very broad listen center that is perpendicular to the long direction of the array. Since mine is horizontal that means my array have a very even sound spread going up and down and this helps compensate for them firing at the legs of the driver and passenger. I have almost no change in tonality when I move my leg towards or away from the door, unlike I had when there was just one 6 1/2" in there. Also it is crossed low enough that I don't have to deal with the higher frequencies being messed with. The tweeter location was actually moved from the stock location of far up on the dash back to the sail panels due to path lengths. It worked out that the sail panels and the door speaker location are within 2" of each other in terms of distance from the driver's head. This let me have both spekaers sound arrive at my ears at the same time. The other advantage I get from this is that when I use the balance setting to adjust the sound I don't end up with the mids being evenly balance but the highs not, or vice versa, it balances evenly. With this system my sound stage is a little low, it hovers just below the top of the dash, but the imaging is very good. And since it's my work vehicle I deem it good enough.

The second system is the one I'm building in the xB. I've got a 12" subwoofer in the rear that will run from 60 Hz. down. 8" woofers in each door playing from 60-400 Hz. in the stock locations, which obviously have been modified to accept them but amazingly enough not too much. And them up at the stock tweeter location I am doing an array of three 2" full range drivers in a triangular pattern and aimed at the opposite seats headrests. These will be playing from 400 Hz. up. This will allow me to have the majority of the vocal and imaging section of the music up above the dash and the people and should lend itself to a very broad sound stage with very clear imaging. With this I had to deal with the speaker limitations because the majority of full range speakers do not have very good power handling or excursions. To compensate for these limitations I ran the three drivers to up the power handling of the set up and lower the excursion needed for each individual driver.

In the first I used different mounting locations to work with the vehicles limitations. While in the second I modified to existing locations to accept different speakers. For the majority of people neither of these would have been options though. Most people do not want to take the time and/or money needed to do this. They would like to have something easier to work with and this is where regular comonent speakers come in to play. They aren't the best solution but they are a good solution.

KaneoheKoa

Sounds like a great system you're building Greg. Don't forget to take plenty of pics! I agree that it's rather easy getting 8s into the doors (lots of room there!). The hard part is making the grill. Another matter is the volume of the door, although finding a speaker who's Theill-Small parameters will fit the door shouldn't be too hard.

One thing that escapes most car electronics providers and installers, in regard to woofer/tweeter placement is phasing. While a time shift circuit can compensate for left/right variations (for one person only), they can't compensate for phase between woofer and tweeter (too expensive). I had the opportunity a long while back to hear two speaker models from the same manufacturer (home stuff, not car). Same drivers and enclosures, but different crossovers. The cheaper system used a standard 12dB two way xover (about 7 parts in it) and cost $300pr. The better one used a 12dB two way xover with phase compensation (about 24 parts in it) and went for $600pr. The sound difference was night and day: the lower price one sounded very good, but the better one placed instruments and performers in the room. Worth the extra bucks.

Alas, we'll never ever get that for car audio. Sigh. I'll just have to leave my good listening for home.

Greg S

iTrader: (1)

I agree, that's why a lot of people go full active so they can do all the phase and alignment processing electronically before the amp stage.