I think my ARC ACS-265's are too harsh..

[manstretch 10+ year member]

I bought a slightly used set of ACS-265's from a member here. I've had them installed for 2 days now and I think the mids are too harsh... they easily fatigue my ears even when turning down the "midrange" on my HU. Here is my setup:

01 Mazda Protege Sedan

Arc's in stock door locations with tweeters 4" above the mids.

Eclipse 5425

PPI 200.2 (50x2)

Mids are mounted to 1/2" oak mounting brackets, doors are deadended with cascade, door skins have deadening and deflex pads. Tweeters are firing at knee height.

No matter what I seem to try, I can't get the mids to stop killing my ears. I listen to mostly hard rock and it's the guitar (rythem and solo) that seems to bother me the most. Is my install THAT bad or do I just need some more laid back components (which is what I think)?

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[alphakenny1 10+ year member]

are you positive your mids are too harsh? i mean, can't it be the tweeters that are harsh? maybe turn down the gain, and if you have the processing maybe eq it out.

 

[Jdizzle 10+ year member]

yea i've never heard of a mid being harsh....the tweeter is understandable

 

[manstretch 10+ year member]

On my way to work this morning I covered the tweets with packing tape... it's not the tweets, they sound fine. Certain midrange frequencies (that include highe"er" pitched guitars seem to fatigue my ears). System of a Down is incredibly harsh on some songs, while... most of Pearl Jam is a little easier on my ears. Tori Amos sounds pretty smooth, but sometimes the voice still "resonates" and bothers me. I would say that I've been listening somewhat loud, but nothing unreasonable. I guess I'm just not used to having to make ajustments when I change albums.

My 5425 only has "bass", "mid" and "treble" adjustments. I do have room for a half-din EQ if needed (seems like it would be nice at this point).

 

[3.5Max6spd 10+ year member]

you got a pm

 

[manstretch 10+ year member]

I had 2 other people listen to them tonight. They both agreed that the upper range of the mids are simply overpowering every other frequency. There has to be something wrong somewhere. The polk coaxials I had before with the same setup sounded better which I know isn't right. It almost seems like the tweeter is crossed over too high and the mid is playing too much of the upper range. I tried the tweeter adjustment in the crossover at each setting just for the hell of it.. didn't help any. I'm going to the Arc dealer an hour away this weekend to have them listen because I have no idea what else to do.

 

[Nova_ 10+ year member]

Get an EQ and turn the 5k to -1

 

[Dr. Dan 10+ year member]

Most likely this won't help too much, but it can't hurt to try wiring one side out of phase. Just flip the positive and negative speaker cables.

Try both the woofers and the tweets. Bad phase cancellation can sometimes be an ugly, harsh sound.

If that dosen't help, try bypassing the crossover completely and wire directly to the woofer. If you have a crossover on your amp that goes into the 1K-5K range try sweeping that back and forth. If it still sounds bad after doing that, then that set is either just not to your taste or possibly damaged. If it's instantly better and you want to keep them, then maybe consider going active, or upgrade the passive crossovers.