What to do. Please help a mate

[Jowi77]

Okay guys, I need some help.
I live in aus (this makes no difference to what I’m about to say but just thought I’d share) and I am very very new to car audio etc... but I want to get into it by getting a mid tier set of speakers and sub. I also understand that there is a consensus that Sony make horrid subs? But I mean In the end I bought for value as it was on special
Basically for Christmas I got a head unit (Sony XAV-AX5000) which I was obviously stoked about. I really wanted to make the most of my new head unit by getting a good audio system. In the end for Boxing Day I ended up buying a 4 channel amp (Sony - 4 Channel, XMN1004) I then bought a subwoofer (Sony BOXGSW121D 12" DVC) and mono amp (Sony XM-GS100) combo.
My main question is what speakers I should get. I want it to be something that would obviously match my 4 channel amp. I just don’t want to be paying for speakers and not being about to use them as they should be because of my amp (if that makes sense). I was looking at these pioneer TS-D65F but yeah I’m just not sure. I also bout a wiring kit so it will be good to be installed once I get the speakers
Feel free to flame me for what I have done as I proabably deserve it. I just need some guidance friends.
Thanks heaps.

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[Gunk]

What size are the factory speakers in your front doors?

 

[Jowi77]

it’s Ford Focus 2007 Zetec sedan I’m not sure if you guys have that series in America. I believe it’s 6”. Both the front and back speaks have a circle grill but I haven’t opened the panels yet. That’s another question I have. Can you put a 6.5” in a car which factory was 6”?

 

[Gunk]

Are you planning on replacing the speakers in the rear? People often just have the sub in the rear and setup the front of their car to produce the full sound spectrum minus subbass.

So that route would have you remove the rear speakers and put some good 6s in the front doors along with some tweeters up front as well. A good component set would probably be the easiest way to go.

 

[Jowi77]

Ohhh so it’s common/advisable that you just removed the rear speakers and get the component setup in the front?

These are the stats for my 4 channel amp

• 1000 Watt peak power output
• 70 Watt RMS x 4 @ 4 Ohm
• 85 Watt RMS x 4 @ 2 Ohm
• 175 Watt RMS x 2 @ 4 Ohm bridged

With this kind of amp what would be an optimal component speaker to purchase?

 

[20 hz bass machine Premium Member]

Hate to be broad in my response but any component set that has a speaker to match your current size (6") will work. I've hooked up $8 tweeters in my friends car that were most likely getting over powered and was able to get things tuned in and sounding good. On the other hand I have a $500 set of focals in my car on a 4x100 watt amp. The speaker is only rated for 70 watts rms and the tweeter 15. I used an AMM1 from smd to make sure I wasnt clipping and that I wasnt giving them too much power. All in all, look for a component set from a reputable company and then hook it up so that both the tweeters and the speakers are on different channels. In other words dont use the crossovers that come with the set. Instead use the head unit to digitally cross everything over. I know how it feels to not know much (I'm not a genius by any means) and some of what I've said might not make any sense. If you want me to go into further detail let me know. I will help as best I can.

 

[20 hz bass machine Premium Member]

Also for the record I totally agree that you should remove the rear speakers and just have a front stage setup with a component set. Also to potentially help you better understand. Once your done everything that came factory will be no more. Your head unit will send a signal to your amplifiers that will then be sent to the speakers. The head unit (in my opinion) should be doing all of the processing.

 

[Jowi77]

So if I get these alpine speakers (https://automotivesuperstore.com.au...PMajZXM0xy8W9PMwVDpVQB4gnS2Ln5lhoCyj4QAvD_BwE) rated at 100wRMS , and put them on my Sony amp with stats of

• 1000 Watt peak power output
• 70 Watt RMS x 4 @ 4 Ohm
• 85 Watt RMS x 4 @ 2 Ohm
• 175 Watt RMS x 2 @ 4 Ohm bridged

Will that be okay?

I’m also wondering wether the tweeters will be put on this amp or just straight to the head unit.

thanks guys

 

[Gunk]

You should confirm what size speakers will definitely fit in your car door.

This site may help. Crutchfield

 

[Jowi77]

Yeah it will fit apart from that do you reckon these speakers will work well?

 

[Gunk]

Yeah it will fit apart from that do you reckon these speakers will work well?

Theyre nice speakers, nothing wrong with em that I know of. I never personally heard em so can't say that much really.

 

[20 hz bass machine Premium Member]

I have done a ton of research for you to better help you with this project. One thing I found is that your head unit only has front, rear, and sub. I'm also not sure what type of crossover control you have with this head unit. That being said, and I don't know how others on this forum will feel about this, I think the best plan may be to replace the rear speakers as well, because you already have the amp. It breaks down like this, if you get a component set and hook up the tweeters to the front channel and the door speakers to the rear, as far as I can tell, you won't have much control of what frequencies are going where. This is a big problem because tweeters are sensitive to low frequencies. In my opinion the better plan is get the component set and use the supplied crossover. This will put both the tweeter and speaker on 1 channel (left and right front so really 2 channels but you get what I mean) leaving you with another channel, in this case the rear channel, to work with. If I were you I'd find a set of decent coaxial speakers to put in the rear. Putting speakers in the front and rear isnt technically the ideal way to get the best sound quality but it will still sound good and there is a chance you will like it more than if you only went with front stage despite the fact that front stage is better for sound quality. I did this on accident (dont ask) once back in one of my first builds and loved how it sounded. With all that said I'm going to attach a picture of a rough diagram that I drew to help you further visualize what I'm talking about.

 

[SteelKiller 10+ year member]

Depends on if you want to run "active" on the front stage or use the passive crossover supplied with the component set. If you want to go active its going to take a little more work getting it dialed in (IMHO) but will be worth the extra work. If you use the passive crossover you are going to only be using 2 channels of your 4 channel amp unless those passive crossovers allow a bi-amp configuration? It looks like those coaxial pioneers you have picked out are decent but again you will be only using the front 2 channels of your 4 channel amp. Whats your budget?

 

[20 hz bass machine Premium Member]

I have just thought of a new plan and it's simple. Hook up the component set with the supplied crossover, and then hook that up to the amp in a bridged configuration. You will have to be careful setting your gain to not over power the set but you will eliminate the need to rely on the head unit to cross things over. A simple low pass on the sub and a high pass on the components and boom your done.

 

[20 hz bass machine Premium Member]

Hate to keep bringing new ideas to the table potentially being more confusing than helpful.
I was thinking more and missed an obvious angle of attack. Instead of bridging and pushing 175 watts to a component set. Just wire the component set (with supplied crossover) to 2 of the 4 channels. Then leave the other 2 channels unloaded. There is no need to load all 4 channels if you don't need to. Wiring is still simple. An rca from (well say A) to the front channel of the head unit and an rca from your sub amp to the sub channel on the head unit. Leave the crossovers off on the head unit and use the high pass on the 4 channel for the speakers and the low pass on the subwoofer amp. Boom done