Rear Fill or No?

[UnderFire 10+ year member]

I got a new truck recently, and it is my first system build for a 4 door. Crew cab 2003 Dodge Dakota.

I have never had to mess with rear fill in my regular cabs, but now I have no clue what to do in this one.

I have an Elemental Designs Nine.4 for my full-range, Pioneer 9800BT Headunit, and it is activelly x-overed at 80hz. A very SQL capable set-up

I have picked up a set of Digital Designs 6.5cs components for my front stage. I know they can take the 160W from the nine.4, but I do not know if I would be better off putting speakers in the rear, I would probably go with Morel Maximo or Massive VX6 coaxials in the back, getting 70W per side.

Substage will be an SQL sub in the bed, 15" or 18" on somewhere between 12-1600 Watts.

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[TheUnderFighter 10+ year member]

I've got a 9.4 as well, and I just bridged it to my front stage. I couldn't hear my rears either way. So, that's how I have it now. I have my rears running off my head unit, and I just turn on the internal amplifier if I have people sitting in the back.

Nice snag on that comp set though!

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

Personal preference. More speakers displace more air, is louder, in theory anyway. Some ppl like rear fill, some don't, some are too cheap to run it, some don't run it because they think that means automatic better SQ.

Personally, I like rear fill, and will be adding it soon. Try it with your stock speakers before buying new ones.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

Rear fill is best implemented in an L-R and R-L mix. You also want sufficient delay and some filtering ability.

The goal with rear fill, to me, is to enhance the illusion that the listening space is much larger - i.e. a room.

the reason for subtracing the channels is to delete center channel information from the rears - which can push the sound stage beyond the limits of the cabin and enhances the center image while adding depth and width.

 

[AVX Mike 10+ year member]

The most winning and best sounding SQ cars in the world rarely run rear speakers. There are plenty of ways to get rear fill without actually having rear speakers. You just have to know what you are doing.

 

[audiobaun 5,000+ posts]

I have a set of Massive 6.5 components fir my rear fill in an Xcab, and makes a big difference in sound .Its that so called missing surround sound affect.Once you run rear fill, with a little bit of clean power, you will never go back to front alone again.I have them on a Hifonics Vulcan VII running at 4ohms, and my front speakers running @2ohms(100 rms Polk MM 5.25 woofers, with an Infinity 1inch 50 rms tweeter on an xover, and a Polk DB6.5 2way(temp)and an Old school Infinity 1in Tweet 100rms on anither xover,in each door running on a Hifonics Odin VII @2ohms.I did not have the rear fill hooked up for a couple days, and did not like the emptiness of the missed rearfill,Hooked them back up, and was just what I needed.As Stated..Its preference , but I can say that those Massive components sound Fantastic on a clean TDH amplifier.

 

[wenn_du_weinst 10+ year member]

I say do rear fill but it has to be done correctly, it's much easier to destroy the sound then improve it with rear speakers.

 

[AVX Mike 10+ year member]

A well built set of kick panels with the proper angles and tweeter placement will give you all the rear fill you need. Want, that's another story and personal preference. I always run active with at least 150 watts a channel. Haven't had rear speakers since I worked at my first real shop which was owned and operated by a usaci USA and Thailand sound quality judge and trainer.

 

[wenn_du_weinst 10+ year member]

A well built set of kick panels with the proper angles and tweeter placement will give you all the rear fill you need. Want, that's another story and personal preference. I always run active with at least 150 watts a channel. Haven't had rear speakers since I worked at my first real shop which was owned and operated by a usaci USA and Thailand sound quality judge and trainer.

that depends on the car, It won't in my durango with out my tweeters in the pillars. I have done both I just like rear fill better. That being said, I also run time alignment and have my rears turned way down and I also never sit in back.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

I have ran rear fill fully processed with an H701. Despite much effort, still distracted from the soundstage. I liked some aspects of it, general spaciousness being one, envelopment is another. But I don't run rears now and am happy with a wide and deep sound stage with everything well placed in it.

We'll see what moving the midbass back to the doors does. Best thing to do is test, test, test.