Loud Sound System

[vmail]

Hi, I currently have a Kenwood 600W Sub and a 220W Stelth Amp(running at 100W). this isnt load enough for me. I want ppl to hear the car from outside, I have to currently put the fader on so I can hear the sub, should I just get a 600W amp, or get a higher sub and amp(I dont want to spend too much)

Oh the headunit is Kenwood(4*47W) and Ive got 4 std front Speakers, will upgrade these later, is there anywhere where I can put rear Speakers in the car or will I have to make a shelf and put some 6x9 on them, Ive got 18mm thick MDF is that too thick? not done CDT for a long time now

[GSB]

Why oh why do you want people to hear it from outside? Have you any idea how daft it looks to see a motorised four wheel shopping cart careering out of control down the high street beacuse the drivers ears are bleeding?

Does he look cool? No...

Atractive to the opposite s*x? Definitley not.

As irritiating as itching powder in your boxer shorts? Definitely...

Theoretical scenario:...

Which of the following statements do you think more likely from the schoolgirls you've driven past 14 times in the last 20 minutes trying to impress them with your distorted bass heavy audio?

1/ "Oh my god, look at the guy in the Yaris, hes so lush...And listen to that bass! Take me home, I'm wetter than an Otter's pocket!"

2/ "What a pillock"

Trust me, its not #1, that only happens in porno films and in your dreams...

What you need to do is improve the system in order that it recreates the music in a way that sounds good to your ears, not !Removed! awful to everyone else's...

Upgrade the front Speakers, as thats where the accurate stereo image will be developed, and the increased control of mid to high frequencies will make it far more pleasureable to listen to.

[Yarisboy]

LOL GSB, that has been ... certainly the funniest post i've read here in a long time, and it's so true.

vmail, people with distrorted bass leaking out of the car... they get looks for a bad reason :P

You only need a small sub, a nice amplifier, upgrade all 4 front Speakers. And if that's not enough you can put 6x9's in the shelf.

you can fit 6.25inch Speakers in the doors with a struggle, they're 5.25 as standard, and i'm pretty certain the dash Speakers are 4 inch... they have to be a direct 4 inch replacement.

The art of achieving GOOD sound is to split the frequencies into the bass, midrange and high's. In this case your sub should deal with LFE (Low frequency effects) bass, your door speakers should deal with midrange, and the dash should recreate the highs.

If you've got a nice set of good quality speakers (can't go wrong with JBL)... a nice amplifier (doesn't have to be mega powerful.) and a sub that delivers smooth bass rather than rattle the windows... you will have a pretty decent setup there. B)

Personally I'd get a pioneer or an alpine headunit... kenwood is just sooooo saxo ;) :P

And anyway, if it's the 15/16 year old schoolgirls you're after just trade in the yaris for an old clio, put a bonnet vent on it and put on about 8 stone... and add a loud exhaust.... seemed to work for most of the brainless girls at school/sixthform when I was there!!

These boyracer idiots drill some ridiculous ideas into these young ladies heads... one was telling me that the 'clio' she went in was the fastest thing on the road, so after informing her about some cars that would make the clio look ridiculous she didn't believe me, frowned and walked away.

Ended up making her go for a ride in a kit car we had (which was a crazy car:D), she never did talk about that clio again much after that...

But anyway back to the story, when I see 2-4 young lads in a car with the bass intruding my personal airspace... and to see them looking at me in a way that suggests 'we're harder than you'.... all that comes to mind is 'TW*T!'

Concentrate on good reproduction of sound m8, you'll be better off for it

[vmail]

are you old?

[Yarisboy]

19

[dave5282]

19

I wonder why he said that? :P

Only joking yaris'boy' you know you to want a big Kenwood sticker for your back window

LOL :D

[Yarisboy]

I might go get one today Dave, cos they look so cool ;) :D

please don't call me yarisboy... my name's Sam

[Fidgits]

I have to agree, concentrate on sound quality... besides, if you want people outside the car to hear, then roll the windows down... they'll be more impressed if they can hear perfectly reproduced music than some distorted 'boom boom'...

[dave5282]

I might go get one today Dave, cos they look so cool  ;)  :D

please don't call me yarisboy... my name's Sam 

Sorry fella, I was actually gonna call you sam.

But having never met you I thought it was a tad presumptious( ;) )

Dont bother with a kenwood one, just get to Halfords and buy a big 'on a mission one'

I joke!

[vmail]

no i ment how old is that other boring guy. the sub is only producing LFE. the 4 Speakers are produducing mid and high, I want ppl not only to hear the b-line, but to feel it aswell, has a JBL, it blew up, wont be getting one of those again

[dave5282]

I thinx its a differing opinion, you like bass, I like crisp clear quality.

Horses for courses and all that.

Depends what your into and what you like!

Its the thing that modding your car is a very personal form of expression, you cant please evryone with the same thing.

It probably wasnt a personal dig at you, were just having a laugh just a friendly muck about (dont be offended by it )?

[GSB]

no i ment how old is that other boring guy. the sub is only producing LFE. the 4 speakers are produducing mid and high, I want ppl not only to hear the b-line, but to feel it aswell, has a JBL, it blew up, wont be getting one of those again

Ahhh that'll be me then...

No I'm not old, although I'm undoubtedly a little older than you, its not enough of a gap for you to claim that "Old farts" (like me supposedly) "just cant understand these things..." If I sounded a little like your parents earlier on its not becasue of my advancing years, but because I'm right.

Heres a few other things I'm right about:

1/ Your JBL sub didnt blow up because of the speaker. These things nearly always die due to the quality of the signal being fed to them. check for signal distortion in your amps output stages, and never run it so loud its actually distorting the sound, at that stage your amp is clipping and effectively feeding the speaker wth pure DC, which, you guessed it, cooks the voicecoil...

2/You shouldn't concentrate purely on bass. Its one dimensional and effectively masks the rest of the music. Let me put it this way, if you were after some performance tyres, you wouldn't just buy one and stick ****ty re-moulds on the other 3 wheels would you? No. Similarly if your upgrading to serious audio, you upgrade all the parts to get the best out of the system, or the benefits of just doing part of it are wasted. By upgrading and improving the mid and high end Speakers as well, you gain a balanced sound. Thats never going to happen with 600 watts of bass bin in the boot competing against the 5w paper cone pieces of crap in your dashboard.

3/ These "other people" you so desperately want to entertain with bass heavy renditions of Girls Aloud, are also likely to contain some criminal elements, who will probably like your system, for all the wrong reasons...

[ae111sr]

Took the words right out of my mouth GSB and age has nothing to do with it. In my previous Corolla the boot housed two 12" JBL subs and four Alpine stereo amps - there were JBL 6" x 9"s in the parcel shelf, 6.5" in the doors and JBL component mids and tweeters up front. Not bad for a guy pushing 45+ and I'm even older now :P :P

[dave5282]

Took the words right out of my mouth GSB and age has nothing to do with it. In my previous Corolla the boot housed two 12" JBL subs and four Alpine stereo amps - there were JBL 6" x 9"s in the parcel shelf, 6.5" in the doors and JBL component mids and tweeters up front. Not bad for a guy pushing 45+ and I'm even older now :P :P

What did the kids think

B) cool dad?

[knightrider]

in reply to the post with puttin a sticker on your window most pppl who do it have a kenwood sticker and the cheapest goodmans head unit possible, no kenwood gear at all!

GSB is rite if u just load ur car with bass as soon as u turn it up a bit ur standard Speakers will distort and that is wot sounds sooooo bad like at the leicester yaris meet wit the bloke in the vectra! lol!

i have ditched the dash Speakers and opted for some tweeters in there place and some sony door Speakers and pioneer 6x9's on an MDF shelf the MDF improves bass,

dont skimmp on cabling and stuff too cuz u get some £200 dorr speakers and run B&Q bell wire to them and ur gonna b in trouble! Also try 2 stick wit one brand im in the process of full vibe rewired and soundproofed so people CANT hear it outside and i can i paid for the system y shud they hear it?

[Yarisboy]

1/ "Oh my god, look at the guy in the Yaris, hes so lush...And listen to that bass! Take me home, I'm wetter than an Otter's pocket!"

I'm wetter than an Otter's pocket!

LOL, loving that one GSB :D

if you want people to feel the bass ur gonna have to spend major dollars on a sub that's designed to beat your heart for you.

Personally I like music that's clear, with a healthy injection of bass.... not too much to ask for then!

Having a small sub to handle the bass while the door and dash Speakers take care of the mids and highs is the most cost effective way of getting brilliant sound from your car

[vmail]

some ppl have 1200W+ ive only got 600W, if i upgrade to a 600W amp will i have less distored louder bass?

[RFvitz]

yeah definately...subs sound sh*t if they aint bein powered right.

distortion comes most of the time from the head unit...so the lower u can keep the vol on the head unit the less distortion u'll get....try get the volume out of proper amps.

and soon as it starts distortin put it down... good clear sound is wot u want.

[T BALL]

it all depends what sort of music you listen to. if you listen to hip hop/d+b/r+b you need subs to even drop low enough to play some frequencies. if your looking for cost effective bass go for a dual voice coil 15 and a powerful ok amp that can be set up to run at 1 ohm.

[jaxx]

agree with every1 on this

i hear so many cars that seem to succeed on playing more bass with the three qtr panels than they do the subs

with my own personal system which includes 4 amps and two 12's im by no means a person of fore mention caliber. the system is set for the sound quality properties but does have the option of a quick flick of a switch for a full SPL onslaught!!

and its rammed full of dynamat and other deadenin stuff!

[VTRick]

ill second you to that jaxx.

ive got a very loud car if need be. ive got well over a 1000 RMS come to think of it.

but i HATE those ******s that listen to jungle music tearing the roads up. i listen to the music i like (which most of those little ****s dont, as its not garage/jungle). my stereo can go way, way louder that im willing to listen. but ive got it set up so it sounds good. not so it sets car alarms off and scares children...

some people need to grow up methinks...

[jaxx]

nice one rick

look forward to seein your system one day

[VTRick]

probably wont mate :(

ive been playing about with it and i think im gunna loose the 15". i just dont listen to enough bassy stuff to vouch for it anymore. hardly being used. and its sapping up ALOT of power.

400 rms amp at 4 ohms drinks it i tell ya.

[Yarisboy]

Rick I thought you were getting a starlet turbo?

[VTRick]

yes i am, but not till august probably. years NCB then. the insurance should only give me a mild stroke instead of a full on heart attack then.

so ill be in the yaris at the next JAE unless i find an old iraqi on a hole with $750,000 to buy it with.

oh ****, they've already done it...