Fiberglassing the A-pillars for three 4" mids

[CousinVin 10+ year member]

I've bought all the materials i needed for it. The plan is to put three 4" Tang band mid ranges in each A-pillar. I have the baffle cut and i mounted it on the pillar, but after thinking about it, would it make more sense to make myself a whole new pillar out of fiberglass? or does it make more sense to just use the original as the back of it, and just stretch the fabric over that?

Also, It is a very odd shape to stretch material over. I have already fucked it up once and ended up just pulling the half hardened cloth off and throwing it out. Is there a specific fabric that works best for this?

And finally, all i could find around here is bondo brand resin/ hardener, and I'm in upstate NY. Recently the average temperature rarely gets above 45. The resin wasn't hardening correctly. How much hardener should i use to get it to harden right in less than ideal temperatures? This is my first experience with fiberglass.

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[SpeedEuphoria 10+ year member]

people use fleece as material or T shirts or nylon/spandex

from a SQ standpoint putting the mids in a verticle plane is best, as in not going back towards the windshield

 

[CousinVin 10+ year member]

not sure exactly what you mean. which way should they be facing? I'm pretty sure i will just leave them facing the passengers. Although they will be more towards eachother.

Also, I was going to go with nylon/spandex, but im not sure. i bought some cheap, not so stretch fabric and it ******. how should i adhear it too? I used 3m 90 spray glue, but the resin released it.

 

[SpeedEuphoria 10+ year member]

what I mean is they should all be on the same verticle plane ideally so they are all basically the same distance from you. like this

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not like this(disregard the "_" its just for spacing

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so not following the stock A pillar as it gets farther away from you at the bottom

 

[helotaxi 5,000+ posts]

For small intricate shapes you want a thin stretchy material. I usually use T-shirt material or spandex. Fleece is just too thick to get all the wrinkles out. Some people use pantyhose as well.

 

[CousinVin 10+ year member]

what I mean is they should all be on the same verticle plane ideally so they are all basically the same distance from you. like this
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not like this(disregard the "_" its just for spacing

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so not following the stock A pillar as it gets farther away from you at the bottom

so you're saying since the distance at the bottom of the windshield is further away, I will lose something because the one on the top of the row is more in your face. That's understandable, but by now its too late to change any of that. I don't think It will bother me too much anyway.

 

[helotaxi 5,000+ posts]

The problem that you're going to run into is that the response is going to be ragged as all hell because of the phase differences caused by the multitude of drivers. If you had an amp channel for each mid and a massive DSP that could time align them all, it might sound OK but that's a lot of work for no real gain over a single driver per side.

 

[James Bang 5,000+ posts]

An array of three 4"s seems a bit much for A-pillars. I'm not sure how you'll get the air-space they'll want and need.

 

[SpeedEuphoria 10+ year member]

so you're saying since the distance at the bottom of the windshield is further away, I will lose something because the one on the top of the row is more in your face. That's understandable, but by now its too late to change any of that. I don't think It will bother me too much anyway.

basically and read what helotaxi wrote as he surely knows more than me. I have just come across the subject and there seems to be issues getting an "array"(setup like you propose) to work and sound properly.

Like anything KISS is normally one of the better solutions

I'm not saying it wont sound good to you as I've never heard a setup like that, I just know most of the SQ guru's will advise against it

 

[ramos 5,000+ posts]

The problem that you're going to run into is that the response is going to be ragged as all hell because of the phase differences caused by the multitude of drivers. If you had an amp channel for each mid and a massive DSP that could time align them all, it might sound OK but that's a lot of work for no real gain over a single driver per side.

Yeah buddy. Tuning that would be fun //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

An array of three 4"s seems a bit much for A-pillars. I'm not sure how you'll get the air-space they'll want and need.

I was thinking about that, then thought about the driving side of things. Three 4" mids in each pillar gotta make for one farking huge arse blindspot. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

 

[CousinVin 10+ year member]

Yeah buddy. Tuning that would be fun //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

I was thinking about that, then thought about the driving side of things. Three 4" mids in each pillar gotta make for one farking huge arse blindspot. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

not as much as you would think. I moched it all up and i tried to align it as much as i could so it still generally runs along the same line of site from where my head normally is.