Please help me plan a nice front stage.

[BnGRacing 10+ year member]

You're entirely wrong on this subject, so please stop giving bad advice. Peel'n'Seal is for roofs, not vehicles. Compare it to real sound deadener tiles and notice the two main differences: 1) it's asphalt based, not butyl based 2) it has no metal bonded to it. The metal isn't there just to look shiny.

As for sound deadening not improving the sound of your door's speakers, all you need to do is perform a search and you'll find countless evidence to the contrary.

Sound Deadener Showdown - Your Source for Sound Deadening Products and Information

Here's some advice; there's a 75% mark-up on sound dampening material (by Dynamic Control at least). Remember that next time you tell yourself that sound deadener Brand X is worth the trouble. In addition, go listen to the difference yourself. Deaden your door with the really expensive stuff and then use the cheap stuff from a home improvement store. You'll probably need a microphone & test equipment to 'hear' the difference.

I don't need to read the hype and marketing from a sound deadening website. The simple fact is a HU can go from one car to another as will an amp, component speakers, subwoofers, etc. You cannot take sound deadening with you and unless you have money to burn I wouldn't waste $100 or so to only do the doors when $15 from a Home Depot product will be 'good enough' to seal openings.

If you want to buy expensive sound deadening, that's fine. The OP seems to be on a budget and spending money on 'the good stuff' will not be money well spent.

Sound deadening has its purpose, that I will not argue, but I wouldn't include that in the OP's budget, especially if that money can be allocated to better speakers/amps.

 

[whitedragon551 5,000+ posts]

Here's some advice; there's a 75% mark-up on sound dampening material (by Dynamic Control at least). Remember that next time you tell yourself that sound deadener Brand X is worth the trouble. In addition, go listen to the difference yourself. Deaden your door with the really expensive stuff and then use the cheap stuff from a home improvement store. You'll probably need a microphone & test equipment to 'hear' the difference.
I don't need to read the hype and marketing from a sound deadening website. The simple fact is a HU can go from one car to another as will an amp, component speakers, subwoofers, etc. You cannot take sound deadening with you and unless you have money to burn I wouldn't waste $100 or so to only do the doors when $15 from a Home Depot product will be 'good enough' to seal openings.

If you want to buy expensive sound deadening, that's fine. The OP seems to be on a budget and spending money on 'the good stuff' will not be money well spent.

Sound deadening has its purpose, that I will not argue, but I wouldn't include that in the OP's budget, especially if that money can be allocated to better speakers/amps.

THe science behind it alone makes the asphalt based junk just that. The intention of deadener is to allow the butyl layer to contract and expand turning sound waves into heat through the alluminum layer. An asphalt based adhesive doesnt do that. The ONLY way an asphalt based deadener works is because it adds mass which is the second reason for using deadener.

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

Hey man, come stop by and i will let you hear my front stage. hybrid audio imagine.

For sure man! I'm off work next week, so I won't be in town, but the week after I'll cruise up there on lunch. I've read about the HAT Imagines. Where do you get those from?

BTW, what kind of sub stage you running these days?

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

Here's some advice; there's a 75% mark-up on sound dampening material (by Dynamic Control at least). Remember that next time you tell yourself that sound deadener Brand X is worth the trouble. In addition, go listen to the difference yourself. Deaden your door with the really expensive stuff and then use the cheap stuff from a home improvement store. You'll probably need a microphone & test equipment to 'hear' the difference.
I don't need to read the hype and marketing from a sound deadening website. The simple fact is a HU can go from one car to another as will an amp, component speakers, subwoofers, etc. You cannot take sound deadening with you and unless you have money to burn I wouldn't waste $100 or so to only do the doors when $15 from a Home Depot product will be 'good enough' to seal openings.

If you want to buy expensive sound deadening, that's fine. The OP seems to be on a budget and spending money on 'the good stuff' will not be money well spent.

Sound deadening has its purpose, that I will not argue, but I wouldn't include that in the OP's budget, especially if that money can be allocated to better speakers/amps.

I've thought about this. This is the exact reason I haven't spent $400 on a HO alternator for my car with 153K miles. I plan to leave all the HU to speakers wiring intact even with running new wires, and I plan to leave the factory tweeters intact, but disconnected, and mount the new tweeters probably like this:

Cheap, adjustable, easily replaceable tweeter pods - DIYMA.com - Scientific Car Audio - Truth in Sound Quality

--- just in case I get rid of the car at some point (probably not though, saves $$ having no car payment). Nontheless, I don't wanna dump too much money in the car itself. Like you said, the equipment can be moved over to any other car (as long as it fits).

 

[Brandon Grubbs 10+ year member]

For sure man! I'm off work next week, so I won't be in town, but the week after I'll cruise up there on lunch. I've read about the HAT Imagines. Where do you get those from?
BTW, what kind of sub stage you running these days?

DD 2channel for the hybrid's and audiopipe 1800 on two 12in audiopipes subs. It sounds good but will be pulling it out soon for a better sub stage. Im going more sq. You still rocking that same box that was tuned low??

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

DD 2channel for the hybrid's and audiopipe 1800 on two 12in audiopipes subs. It sounds good but will be pulling it out soon for a better sub stage. Im going more sq. You still rocking that same box that was tuned low??

Yea, the one in my sig ^

I yanked the other box you looked at, where the sub was mounted off in the corner in a low profile box, magnet up, port loaded into the fenderwell. It hammered real hard and low, but lacked any high end. New box is much much more balanced sounding. Half of it is port though. The port takes a 90 degree turn like normal, and then a 180 degree turn at the other side, all with 45s and rounded off edges except the outer port opening edges. The 45s were a nightmare with just a skill saw out in my gravel driveway. I envy the tablesaw in your shop. I'm not building another box anytime soon unless there's $$ in it. I will stick with ported, tuned low, with 45s and rounded corners from here out in my builds, but never again with that dang skill saw.

I'm looking forward to a new amp rack build when I get some comps and such.

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

OK, I found an authorized HAT dealer on the webz:

Imagine I61-2 6.5" Component / Coaxial Speaker Set - 12v Electronics

Smexy.

Edit: Wait a minute!! Where's the Xovers?? I need those.

 

[zako 10+ year member]

OK, I found an authorized HAT dealer on the webz:
Imagine I61-2 6.5" Component / Coaxial Speaker Set - 12v Electronics

Smexy.

Edit: Wait a minute!! Where's the Xovers?? I need those.

These speakers are designed so that the woofer does not need a low pass crossover. According to HAT owner, the woofer plays up to 5000KHz, then starts rolling off. The tweeter uses a capacitor as a high pass filter. The capacitor is on the back of woofer. The tweeter plugs into a connector on the back of woofer.

I have these speakers and they really shine when running active. Running them active is very simple. Your head unit's "front" channels run full range and connect to the amplifier pre-amp. The amplifier outs connect to Imagine tweeters directly with a 2.2uF capacitor inserted inline on the positive wire. I didn't want to detach the factory cap from the woofer, so I bought a couple dayton capacitors from PE for $4. The head unit's "rear" channels connect to amplifier and then to the imagines woofer without any crossovers between them. Why would you want to do this? This gives you an ability to tune speakers beyond what's allowed by even the best of passive component sets. You can time align woofers with each other and tweeters with each other (separately from woofers), resulting in very solid imaging and sound staging if you do it right. Another benefit is that you can match the level of tweeters with the woofers a lot better than what's typically allowed by passive crossover boxes.This is what I am running right now, and both imaging and tonality is very good. There are several tutorials on DIYMA about how to tune an active front stage, but even without those, after spending a few minutes to enter some rough parameters, I still like the sound a lot. Very clear midrange. Bass is kind of dry and tight, and there is a good amount of it. The disadvantage of this approach is that you lose two amplifier channels, so if 4 speaker channels is all you have, then you can't run rear speakers AT ALL.. Of course, you can run these speakers in passive crossover mode, but you lose all that ability to tune.

HAT web site has some papers on these topics:

http://www.hybrid-audio.com/ARCHIVE_OLD_SITE/White%20Paper%20-%202%20Way%20Quasi-Active%20Crossover%20System.pdf

http://www.hybrid-audio.com/ARCHIVE_OLD_SITE/White%20Paper%20-Imagine-Series%20Crossovers.pdf

In fact, this is why I like HAT speakers. I can run them "quasi-active" without owning any equipment with active crossovers. There could be speaker that in passive mode may sound better than these also running passive for the same money. But these speakers are so easy to bi-amp, and you don't get this with every speaker.

 

[zako 10+ year member]

In my opinion, if you plan to sound proof more than your front doors, raammat.com products are the best value per square foot. I ordered one box of raammat's bxt2 sound dampening material (36sq ft) and 12 sq ft of ensolite ccf (Just about $120 shipped). This was enough to cover two of my Taurus doors, the trunk, many other areas. I still have some left overs. I kind of got lazy and bored after spending hours on deading my car, and the box still was not running out of material.. They also have a pretty good tutorial online. One good rule to remember is not to waste the bxt2 material. You should cover the middle 50% of the area of flat metal spots only. Bent metal does not resonate. 50% coverage works as well as 100% coverage (some say 25% is enough). The only area of my car that's 100% covered by btx2 is the middle section of the door, because the goal was to seal it, creating the best possible approximation to an infinite baffle for the door speakers, with a layer of Ensolite on top. I think of treating the floor of my car when I get bored enough.. but dftly not the roof.

 

[zako 10+ year member]

1). I need to know what would work best for baffles, as the factory comps' mounting ring is like 3 - 4 inches deep, so whether I use plastic or MDF baffle rings or whatever, I'll need to stack them to make the proper depth for the new speakers. So, I'll need to know what kind of adhesive/fasters/etc. to use with whatever baffle material is ideal.

3-4 inches would be awesome. Most car speakers need less than 3 inches of mounting. If you have 3 inches, you're in fine shape. If you had 4 inches, that would open up possibilities for some relatively exotic midbass drivers.

 

[zako 10+ year member]

Sorry to add another post, but did you really need to buy that amplifier wiring kit? Don't you run some kind of wiring to your trunk already? If you already run 4awg power wire to your trunk, then it must be good for 120-130amps of current, and 120-130 amps of current should be good enough for up to 1355watts of class D RMS power. An oversize 4awg wire, like the one I got in my SteetWires kit from soniceletronix, should be good enough for 150amps of current and well over 1500watts of class D power. Unless you're setting up a massive SPL vehicle, 1 awg is just overkill.. but 8awg seems undersized and also redundant. If you have 4awg power wire running to your trunk, all you need is a power distribution block and a ground distribution block, plus the cables to reach the other amplifier.

BTW, I was pulling these numbers from here:

WIRE

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

Excellent info Zako!!

Yes, I do have 0 AWG ran to the trunk, and I have a direct ground from the trunk to the front in 0 AWG. I was going to go serious SQL with a big alternator and everything, but I ended up heading down the mild SQ road. However, the wire is there, so I'll just leave it. 2 runs of 0 gauge really suucked to run in my car.

BTW, I was planning to bridge my new 4 channel for more power. If I don't, 70 watts RMS is the max I can get out of each channel. I was hoping to bridge it to 250 watts x 2, and turn the gain down to only see a perfectly clean 100 - 150 watts or so. If I do that, I may need to cut some highs with the Alpine's built in PEQ.

Also, will deadener alone seal big holes in the door, or would more rigid material be necessary? I just don't know if flexing soft mater in the door "enclosure" would affect anything.

Much thanks man.

 

[zako 10+ year member]

You don't have to bridge channels. Most 6.5 speakers do not really have mechanical excursion to allow them to handle more than 60-80watts if a reasonable high pass crossover frequency used. The ratings of 100watts RMS or higher are most likely thermal rating, but mechanical excursion/xmax power handling are more limiting. Some speaker manufacturers provide T/S parameters for their woofers (HAT, Infinity, and some others). I have played around with HAT Imagine woofer in WinISD (had to use 2sq ft to approximate IB, but it wasn't really sensitive to box size). 70-80 watts were more than enough to reach and exceed its one way xmax of 6mm with 80Hz crossover. Alpines I had are rated for 110watts but in reality handled even worse in real life power handling.

 

[Danometal 10+ year member]

I wonder how these sound. The price is definitely right:

RE Audio RE6.5C 6-1/2", RE Series 2-Way Component Car Speakers

 

[trumpet 5,000+ posts]

Also, will deadener alone seal big holes in the door, or would more rigid material be necessary? I just don't know if flexing soft mater in the door "enclosure" would affect anything.

The sound deadener you should be using has metal bonded to the butyl adhesive, and what I've seen is deadener applied to the back side of the hole, and then more deadener applied from the front side. This depends on how easily you can get your hand inside the door, or if you can take the outer door skin off.

The way I did it was to use sheet metal, rope caulk to seal it to the door, and CLD material on the sheet metal. 18-20 gauge metal is galvanized metal is good. You'll want to be able to cut it by hand. I documented it with a write-up.