General Upgrade to ICE - Marea Weekend

[cpt_spalding]

First of all, I'm over forty so I don't want to blow you young whippersnappers off the road with my ICE. I want to listen to guitar based rock'n'roll at a decent volume & have just installed my old Panasonic head unit & JBL 5x7's in the front doors.

I reckon I'll have to install a sub-woofer & amp if I'm to get near the sounds I'm used to in the home (my home system rocks ). Do you agree? What do I need to do for this? Do I need to rewire the ex speakers back to the new amp? Have I just wasted money on the 5x7's? How easy is it to DIY fit sub & amp? Do I need to get behind dash etc? My head unit has RCA connectors.

Also I had another suggestion to fit dampening mats in the doors. Will this really make such a difference to the sound?

 

[jug]

a sub and amp is used to allow you to cut the bass going to the other speakers, and this allows the other speakers to play a much higher volume without distorting. if you currently find the speakers distort at the volume levels you want to use, then you need a sub and amp to take the volume higher without distortion.

to fit a sub and amp you will need:
sub&box
amp (capable of bridging 2 channels into 1)
RCA lead (3m+)
power lead (6m+)
inline fuse for power lead
earth lead (2m+)
remote lead (3m+)
speaker cable (1m+)

the power lead needs to go from the positive terminal of the car battery right back inot the boot. route the lead through the rubber gromit to get it from the engine bay inot the foot wells. this is usually hard to find, but its better than drilling a hole through the firewall. add the inline fuse in the power lead near the battery.

the remote and RCA cables need to be connected to the back of the head unit (stereo) and then routed into the boot.

the earth cable needs to be fixed to a good earth point (chassis). existing earth points can be used.

the remote, earth, live and RCa will all plug into the amp. on the amp's outputs you want to bridge channel 1 and channel 2 into a single channel which you will use for the sub.

with subs you basically have 2 considerations, size and ported or sealed enclosure. a smaller sub gives more accurate bass but generally less volume. a sealed enclosure givem more accurate bass but a ported box (if build correctly) will give more output. i recommend a 12" sub in a 1cu.ft. sealed enclosure.

i would not recommend running any of the other speakers off the head unit. it is always better to amp them. if you want to run all speakers off the amp you will need a 6 channel amp (running in 5 channel mode). the front and rear speakers will need to be directly wired up to the amp. you will also need to run seperate RCA's for the speakers, depending on how many RCA outputs you have on the head unit you may be able to use a seperate RCA for front and rear, or you may need to share one. i recommend having seperate outputs if possible so you can set gain and filter levels on the headunit seperately, as well as at the amp (if your headunit and amp had these features)

however since you only want a 'decent volume', (i assume you also want a balanced sound with good imaging) i wouldnt bother with a sub and amp or amping all your speakers. save yourself the hassle and go for a set of good component speakers front and rear. you want seperate mids and tweeters connected to passive crossovers. this will seperate the frequencies out for you, and allow a decent volume level, without the cost and complications of amping.

you can use something like these in the front, and another set the same in the rear, to good effect running them off your head unit.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Brand-New-JBL...ryZ18800QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

if you then decide you want more volume, you can get a 4 channel amp and run these speakers off the amp, giving a big increase in output. if you find the bass is lacking you can add a sub and buy a 6 channel amp instead of a 4 channel one. then you'll have a beast of a setup.

sound deadening (dampening mats in the doors) makes no difference at all in my opinion. i cant see the point. i've fitted it for several people buy i dont use it in my own cars. i cant see the point since it has no noticable benefit.

 

[cpt_spalding]

The speakers I have just installed are JBL-GTO8626e-5x7 2way, multi-element speakers with the tweeter in the centre of the mid. Have I just wasted money on these as you seem to be recommending separate mid / tweeter with passive crossover?

Next Q is if I then go for this, where do I put the tweeters? Will they go in the dash where I believe there are currently the Fiat originals? How then do I wire to the crossover? I'm ok at the wiring side of things but not so great at taking car interiors apart (to get to the wiring) & reassembling them.

 

[jug]

the problem with fitting the JBL-GTO8626e speakers is that they are positioned in the doors. higher frequencies (such as those produced by a tweeter) are very directional. if you dont have a straight clear line between your ear and the tweter it will not work very well at all. by having the JBL-GTO8626e speakers in your doors you are seriously limiting the imaging of your sound, the higher frequencies will suffer and you will get a more dull sound. you really must have tweeters placed on the dash or on the a pillars for them to work effectively.

all is not lost, the JBL-GTO8626e speakers will work better on the rear shelf (they are just small 6x9s afterall), so maybe you could stick them on the sheft and buy a set of components for the front. the rear speakers are no where near as important to the overall sound as the front speakers, and the JBL-GTO8626e speakers will be fine for providing a bit of depth. but up front you need a set of components if you want good volume balance of the frequencies.

 

[cpt_spalding]

Thanks for that. I have the Marea Weekend estate model so it looks like i spent money on the wrong things after all (no parcel shelf).

Back to the wiring. I assume I can replace the dash tweeters directly but I've no idea how to put the passive crossovers together with the tweeters & mids. Where do I put the crossovers to minimise rewiring to speakers?

 

[jug]

in my car the crossovers are fitted out of sight next to the fuse box. space is limited but its handy for the wiring. a 2 core speaker wire is connected to a crossover, then you run one wire from the crossover to a tweeter and one from the crossover to a the mid. routing a wire up to the tweeter is easy enough, but i suggest you use the original door wiring because it is not possible to route new wires through the connector on the door because the connector has pins and no space to route a new wire. you can chop the original wiring before it enters the doorway connector and add some bullet connectors to the wires so they are easy to use. then you can easily put the wiring back to normal at a later date if you remove your ICE.