My first "Active" "SQ'ish" build attempt.

[ThxOne Premium Member]

1) why are your crossover points so high? unecessary. do sub up to 65hz. midbass from 80 to 350, midrange/tweeter 350 on up. you also shouldnt be using generic passive crossovers while mixing/matching drivers, but thats not a huge issue right now if nothing is blowing

2) he means half octave, but this is for a more common crossover, like around 80hz.midbass at 80hz, sub at 65. this helps keep them in phase at the actual intended crossover point while allowing the sub to play at a higher amplitude. This is also ONLY for the sub to midbass crossover. NOT all of them. Set

3) i would probably set signal delay based on the midrange drivers location, not an average of them and the tweeters. Phase isnt as important at high frequencies but will greatly effect the midrange placement if the differences in distance between mid and tweeter arent subtle

If I set the sub to to 65hz and the midbass to 80 it's gonna sound real shitty real quick. The midbass doesn't come close to having enough output to blend where the sub would drop off. If I could get my door speakers to respond like my near field monitors on my desk I could see using those crossover points. There is NO bass from the kick drum in those 6.5" midbass, just the snap of the beater on the head of the drum... the sub fills in the bass. I wish my midbass would have bass output like that. It would change the ball game for me for sure. That is why I have things set the way I do.

The midbass has no issues playing up to 1Khz and the last time I played my DD 2.75" mids lower than 700hz the cone came free from the dust cap/coil. If you know of some magic that will get me bass I can feel from the midbass that would be awesome and I could lower the subs x-over.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

I should say that the DD 2.75" is covering 1.5Khz to what I assume is 4Khz in the passive crossover then the ARC Audio tweeters take it from "4Khz" and up.

0 - 100 | 150 - 1Khz | 1.5Khz - 4Khz - 20Khz
Is what I have.
You say I should try?
0 - 65 | 80 - 350 | 350 - 4Khz - 20Khz

 

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

If I set the sub to to 65hz and the midbass to 80 it's gonna sound real shitty real quick. The midbass doesn't come close to having enough output to blend where the sub would drop off. If I could get my door speakers to respond like my near field monitors on my desk I could see using those crossover points. There is NO bass from the kick drum in those 6.5" midbass, just the snap of the beater on the head of the drum... the sub fills in the bass. I wish my midbass would have bass output like that. It would change the ball game for me for sure. That is why I have things set the way I do.

The midbass has no issues playing up to 1Khz and the last time I played my DD 2.75" mids lower than 700hz the cone came free from the dust cap/coil. If you know of some magic that will get me bass I can feel from the midbass that would be awesome and I could lower the subs x-over.

I think your misunderstanding what midbass drivers are supposed to do.. play midbass lol. Let your sub do its job, and let your midbass do their job. Midbass drivers are not supposed to be able to play super low like a lot of people seem to think. That said, if they cant handle 80hz, sounds like an install issue. Sorry, but i haven't looked through your whole log but if they cant do this, I'm sure it has to do with the install. I also know that these have no issue playing up to 1k. These are midwoofers after all (honestly, not the best choice for a midbass application, but that's for a different discussion), but by crossing a 3 way set at 1.5k, it almost completely defeats the purpose of a 3 way. If your DD 2.75" driver has trouble playing below 700hz, that sounds like you have either a defective unit, they ****, or you have insane and unrealistic output expectations of your system. Frankly, the whole midbass thing also points to you wanting unrealistic output unless again, its just your install but I'm still betting on a defective speaker. They unfortunately don't list any useful specs (one reason why I'm not a fan of DD), but they do list frequency range of 160 and up. This most likely means FS is about 160. If this is true, you should have no issues crossing them at 350, maybe 300 with a 24db slope or steeper. As far as getting "bass you can feel from the midbass"... that actually doesnt have much to do with the midbass itself as you would think. again, you are going about this wrong. That all comes from an optimized system, that has a proper and solid install, and has good phase cohesion between the subwoofer and midbass.

I should say that the DD 2.75" is covering 1.5Khz to what I assume is 4Khz in the passive crossover then the ARC Audio tweeters take it from "4Khz" and up.

0 - 100 | 150 - 1Khz | 1.5Khz - 4Khz - 20Khz
Is what I have.
You say I should try?
0 - 65 | 80 - 350 | 350 - 4Khz - 20Khz

Yes, with 24db Linkwitz Riley slopes. Follow that guide. Read every single bit of it. I can tell there's a good chance you didn't read the whole thing because i wouldn't have needed to write everything above

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

The shop I bought the DD's from said I should have no problem crossing them over at 250hz actually. The other set was defective in the glue at the cone/voice coil.

The SilverFlutes are mounted in the factory speaker pods and they are sealed to the pods nicely with speaker gasket foam tape and the screws of course. There is a foam plug from the fast rings set behind each midbass. There is no sound deadening at all in or on either door.

When I ran my JBL 12's in my Jeep Grand Cherokee I also ran a component set of JBL's in the doors and JBL coaxials in the back doors, though they were literally barely audible as I set the amps gain for them very low. However that system was WAY louder than this "active" system when it comes to mids and highs. It confuses me because this should be easily as loud as that system or louder... but it is not. It is loud but not like the Jeep with two less speakers up front. Unless my Alpine amps are just that much better than the US Acoustics Barbara Ann and the Punch 1200D.

I have read the article 4 full times now.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

Also...

 

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

There is no sound deadening at all in or on either door.

Big yikes. Do that asap. seriously. If you need help understanding how to do it properly.. www.resonixsoundsolutions.com/reference-information

It confuses me because this should be easily as loud as that system or louder... but it is not. It is loud but not like the Jeep with two less speakers up front. Unless my Alpine amps are just that much better than the US Acoustics Barbara Ann and the Punch 1200D.

Sounds like you need to start fresh on your gain structure. unfortunately i am not 100% familiar with how to set input and output gains of the 360.3. Setting amp gains alone in a system with a dsp is not the whole process

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

Big yikes. Do that asap. seriously. If you need help understanding how to do it properly.. www.resonixsoundsolutions.com/reference-information




Sounds like you need to start fresh on your gain structure. unfortunately i am not 100% familiar with how to set input and output gains of the 360.3. Setting amp gains alone in a system with a dsp is not the whole process

Five Star Car Stereo says the Kenwood eXcelon I have is clean to full volume but the 3Sixty.3 says different. It says 36 out of 40.

I have been really really thinking about the sound deadening. I don't mind messing with the setting in the DSP as I am getting pretty good/quick at it. So I appreciate the suggestions and I WILL try the x-over settings you suggested before work tomorrow. I wish I could test the head unit output myself. If all else fails... there is always pro audio mids and highs

 

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

Five Star Car Stereo says the Kenwood eXcelon I have is clean to full volume but the 3Sixty.3 says different. It says 36 out of 40.

I have been really really thinking about the sound deadening. I don't mind messing with the setting in the DSP as I am getting pretty good/quick at it. So I appreciate the suggestions and I WILL try the x-over settings you suggested before work tomorrow. I wish I could test the head unit output myself. If all else fails... there is always pro audio mids and highs

sound deadening is nothing you need to really think about. Its kind of a requirement when doing a build that is focusing on sound quality. as far as the gains. there should be input and output gains on the dsp. but again, I'm not familiar with the 360.3

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

sound deadening is nothing you need to really think about. Its kind of a requirement when doing a build that is focusing on sound quality. as far as the gains. there should be input and output gains on the dsp. but again, I'm not familiar with the 360.3

The 3Sixty.3 has an auto thing to it... It said to turn it to max volume, play a track then it did its thing and told me to turn it down until I saw green so I did. At that point it said I was done with setting the input. With everything flat at that point I set the amplifiers gains with the O-scope so there was no clipping and called it a day pretty much.

That ResoNix is a great read.

 

[blazian87 10+ year member]

I completely agree that the doors should've been sound treated in the first place when you installed the silverflutes. Once you go aftermarket, it is pretty much a requirement or you'll be getting minimal results that is far from optimal. Even stock speakers will sound better and have more midbass than that. I think running different tweets/midrange in a generic passive x/o is also a bad idea, especially when you have the ability to go fully active. I don't see how there is going to be any time alignment involved with a passive x/o unless the tweets and mids are right next to each other. Also, from my experience with auto tuning, it creates more problems than it solves and never goes well. I feel it's not worth touching IMO.

I really feel like you should reconsider going back to full active and reset your gains again and set them all by ear. Just by simply changing between passive and active, you also have to be careful with gains and setting crossover correctly. I believe your gains were set way too high before which is how you blew your tweeters and amp before. Normally on passive setups, your gains need to be much higher to be anywhere decently loud. Fully active is way louder with only a fraction of those gains. Once you find where the drivers are comfortable at, you'll be able to crank your system the way you like it.

 

[fithwheel]

100 % agree ^^^^.
No sound deadening setting gains with test tones running passive crossovers.Op you must not read too many other threads around here?

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

Could be many things...

What I call loud and what everyone else calls loud may not be the same thing.

The passive crossovers are so I can run 6 speakers off a 4 channel amp which shouldn't be a problem with a 100w x 4 rms amp. They are Arc Audio Tweeters and Crossovers.

When I set the gains for my mids and highs I set them with a test tone based on what the manufacturer of the speakers said they could handle power wise rms. I think the Alpine tweeters were counterfeit and Massive Audio lies about how much their tweeters can handle rms and crossover settings. After the DD 2.75" blew I ran 2-way full active and set the MA aluminum tweeters to 60w on a test tone and set the crossover pretty high, one still blew on music. Should have been getting less than 50w on music right??

My expectations are to be able to listen to my music without distortion at high levels when needed without blowing speakers. That being at 70mph with the windows down and overcome wind and road noise. At moderate SPL's at 45mph 75% of the time with the windows down with no distortion. When I say moderate it is still loud as hell like 100 - 110db. Below 90db would quieter listening for me while driving in traffic at 45mph.

I don't know what everyone else considers "loud" when it comes to DB's for an SQ stereo... perhaps someone could clear that up?

I'm gonna work on the sound deadening, I know it is important... just one of those things I have blown off. My bad. I have a roller because I did my Jeeps doors way back when. I will get it done.

Oh, currently all speakers are door mounted and my Arc Tweeters are about 5" north of my DD 2.75" mids.

 

[ThxOne Premium Member]

I redid the crossovers. I had to do a bunch of eq work but ok, yes, it sounds better. I turned off the sub to listen to the midbass, the midbass is handling a kickdrum just fine. I think I would like to see if it improves with sound deadening as well.

SkizeR you were right.

 

[T Reds 19]

Sounds deadening will be a game changer for you I bet. It will give you that kick in the chest feeling from drums etc. Do it!

 

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

Could be many things...

What I call loud and what everyone else calls loud may not be the same thing.

The passive crossovers are so I can run 6 speakers off a 4 channel amp which shouldn't be a problem with a 100w x 4 rms amp. They are Arc Audio Tweeters and Crossovers.

When I set the gains for my mids and highs I set them with a test tone based on what the manufacturer of the speakers said they could handle power wise rms. I think the Alpine tweeters were counterfeit and Massive Audio lies about how much their tweeters can handle rms and crossover settings. After the DD 2.75" blew I ran 2-way full active and set the MA aluminum tweeters to 60w on a test tone and set the crossover pretty high, one still blew on music. Should have been getting less than 50w on music right??

My expectations are to be able to listen to my music without distortion at high levels when needed without blowing speakers. That being at 70mph with the windows down and overcome wind and road noise. At moderate SPL's at 45mph 75% of the time with the windows down with no distortion. When I say moderate it is still loud as hell like 100 - 110db. Below 90db would quieter listening for me while driving in traffic at 45mph.

I don't know what everyone else considers "loud" when it comes to DB's for an SQ stereo... perhaps someone could clear that up?

I'm gonna work on the sound deadening, I know it is important... just one of those things I have blown off. My bad. I have a roller because I did my Jeeps doors way back when. I will get it done.

Oh, currently all speakers are door mounted and my Arc Tweeters are about 5" north of my DD 2.75" mids.

As far as blowing tweeters, thats because, believe it or not... setting them via o-scope is not a good way to go about it. tweeters will see maybe 5 watts if crossed over and level matched appropriately. Another audiofrog article..

Pink Noise, White Noise and Why Your Tweeters Never Get 150 ...

What’s the difference? I’ve always read and been told that “White noise is equal energy at every frequency and pink noise is equal energy in every oct...

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