£150ish Front speakers (sound stage)

[HickRm]

I thought I would leave this to you guys to have a think....the parts of my sound system I want to keeps consists of:

Headunit: Alpine CBA-7876 RB
Amp for front components: JL Audio E2150
Amp Powering sub: DLS CA23
Sub: JL Audio W3v2 subwoofer (which I love cheers stu for the recommendation)

I wanted to pick your brains about new front components to complement everything. Correct my if I am wrong but doesn't good sound stage come a setup using three speakers tweeter, midbass and mids. Is the possible with my set up?

And if so what do you recommend? If just speaker and tweeter is the option open to me I don't mind having different brand speaker and tweeter if they sound good together.

Thanks

 

[volxstu]

Going 3 way as you suggest is very expensive. Knowing your general budget I would say its a difficult task to take on.
You will need a processor capable of doing three way active. I personally use about the cheapest option and use an Alpine H701, controller and Head Unit. The whole set up can be had for around £450 iirc. Then You have optical leads and RCAs add £200ish.

I think a reasonable set of 3 way components new would be about £5-600 but second hand would be less obviously.

This is all a generalisation of average cost. The installation and tuning is paramount. It can be done cheaper than above but if this is a rout you would like to take then I would seriously recommend you get yourself aquanted with a professional installer who is into competition installs. That way you will buy yourself more tuning time in with the job.

 

[HickRm]

will it be possible to achieve good sound stage with components then? and if so what would you recommend? and I assuming tweeters about 1/3 up the A pillar and directed components i.e. fabricate door pods with wood baffles are a must?

If if fabricated door pods what difference does the actual cubic size of the pod space have on the sq and is there a rule for this?

 

[volxstu]

TBH the benefits if aiming the mids towards you are debatable. If you do then the higher frequencies become less invisible. This drags the stage downwards causing the rainbow effect. Also most (not all) mid bass speakers are designed to play into doors. This means they wont respond well to being put into sealed pods.
Staging wise your next step would be as you say in the A pillar. Get some blutac and try different positions. 3/4 is likely to be to be a little high. This will mean the right tweeter will be blasting in your ear, not giving your left tweet to ballance anything out. If you have a play and try to get them playing as central as possible then you will be fine without any processing.

Staging has nothing to do with the speakers in reality. It's all about mounting, tuning and processing. If you want good stage the sound deaden more. Have some steel baffles made up and get a heady unit capable of time alignment and a decent equaliser.

Just to put things in perspective. I have a 3 way active, up front sub system. A friend has 2 way passive rear sub (albeit saloon car to take away the initial punch of the sub). We had been tussling for the win on sound all season this year. He got a great processor for the Euro finals and not only kicked my arse but 19 others coming 5th out of 20.
It just proves KISS (keep it simple stupid) is a great philosophy for a daily system.

 

[HickRm]

what components would you suggest or combination of tweeters and speaker. I dont mind didnt brands if they go together. I have my current speakers mounted on wood baffles.

my system now is clear but i dont really get a sense of where people are its just all one if that makes sense.

 

[volxstu]

Stage is not dependant on the speakers. If you think it sounds nice but unfocused then you need to look else where to rectify the problems.

The biggest thing would be to get a head unit with time alignment. I'm kicking myself ATM because I just let 1 go for a steal and so many people on here are warming to the concept of Sq.

Then you need to go active. I.e having the mids and tweets each on their own channel of amplification.

Then you need to check your phasing. Check that the + and - on each speaker match the corresponding on the amp.

After your phasing is sorted, making sure you have no EQ, Balance and Time alignment and sort your speaker placement. Get some Blue tac on your tweeters and place them roughly where you think they would be. Then try slightly different positions and angles until the mid bass seem to disappear and all becomes as high and central as possible. You can then tweak your time alignment to perfect the stage from there.

I forget where you live. It's difficult to explain all this on the net. It would be good to meet up and discuss this properly.

 

[HickRm]

Sorry for the late reply work has been manic. I now have a Alpine 9855 headunit on the way with time allignment and equaliser built in . So should be fun trying to set that up haha. Although I can't afford a new amp so the two channel amp will have to do for the time being. Do you know good settings to for this headunit. E.g. Treble, bass etc to get the best out of it as I know it is meant to be a good SQ headunit

 

[volxstu]

It all depends on your taste and the speakers you are using. The only thing i can say is that if you put 8khz + 1DB, 10khz +2DB, 12khz +1DB you should be able to raise the stage a little.

Do you have an Iphone? There is an app called RTA. Basically you can use that to get get the frequency curve pretty good and then eq to taste from there. We can go into that more if you have it.

 

[HickRm]

unfortunately I don't have an iPhone im on a windows phone. Now sure what settings you are refering to?

I see what you mean about doing a sound system right first time. Although I did fine the 9855 for the same price as I bought the 7876 headunit so can't complain too much now just have sell that one.

Gonna ask a really stupid question but if I get tweeters and put my four channel amp on them isn't that too much power through them? Now I just need components then I think that's my system sorted. Would love to come to a meet though my car is battered and crap atm haha just the audio that is ok at least got my priorities right haha

 

[volxstu]

Who cares what the car looks like from the outside :devil: where do you live?

As for 2 much power. You can pretty much give a speaker as much power as you can within reason. The more power you have, the less you need to turn the Gain up, the sweeter it sounds. This is called a gain pot.

My mid bass are rated at 200w RMS and i am giving them 400w RMS with no gain pot :devil: Although that is about to change as i am going to change the configuration on the amps and speakers.

 

[HickRm]

Haha yeah true well I don't mind it passed it MOT dents on bout every panel but I refuse to get rid of it till it gives up .

I live in Grantham bout 40 minutes from Nottingham, you in Norwich aren't you?

What were the setting you gave me for? So many settings on my new HU but at least can tune it well and nowhere does decent tuning near me. Still have my coaxials in atm but will get components when I next get paid hopefully though the ones I want can't find anywhere

 

[HickRm]

DLS speakers or something that would go well with my 2 channel JL E2150 amp as not got enough atm to get a new one and speakers atm

 

[volxstu]

They are for the equaliser, but only when you get components. It will help to raise the stage a bit.

As for speakers what budget do you have. I need to phone the distributor tomorrow anyway. I may be able to get a deal as im buying some speakers for myself.

 

[HickRm]

Bout £80-£100 something like that.

 

[volxstu]

Ok ill add it to the list lol.

 

[HickRm]

Cheers