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Wrx Sound System Upgrade


Subru

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I used to be super into the sounds thing. Crazy crazy into it.

 

Now the STI has an aftermarket headunit and stock speakers. Not much point sinking too much $$ into sound quality in them because the exhaust is always going to be loud AF, plus road noise etc etc.

 

If you want to get loud without going large the solution is high quality drivers and lots and lots of power. A (edit: high quality) 8" sub in a good ported box with 1500wrms up it will kill the s*** out of most 12" boxes in a sealed box with 250w pushing it.

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8 hours ago, boon said:

I used to be super into the sounds thing. Crazy crazy into it.

 

Now the STI has an aftermarket headunit and stock speakers. Not much point sinking too much $$ into sound quality in them because the exhaust is always going to be loud AF, plus road noise etc etc.

Performance tyres also make a s*** tonne of noise which drowns out midrange from speakers too

Edited by Omsin
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13 hours ago, Subru said:

Too late now but ill keep it in mind.

I have valved exhaust so that helps a lot 😁

 

Nothing wrong with something a little better than stock. Just no point doing it what I consider "properly" ;)

 

At some stage I will install some of my hoarded gear in the STI, but it will just be a set of nice-ish 2-way components up front and maybe a small ported sub in the boot, plus a couple of nice little class-D amplifiers to run it all tucked in the spare wheel well.

 

Proper bass is too heavy for a performance car, and proper sound quality is unachievable. But better than stock is still a really nice thing to have :)

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7 minutes ago, boon said:

 

Nothing wrong with something a little better than stock. Just no point doing it what I consider "properly" ;)

 

At some stage I will install some of my hoarded gear in the STI, but it will just be a set of nice-ish 2-way components up front and maybe a small ported sub in the boot, plus a couple of nice little class-D amplifiers to run it all tucked in the spare wheel well.

 

Proper bass is too heavy for a performance car, and proper sound quality is unachievable. But better than stock is still a really nice thing to have :)

Definity. On my next car I will get a better setup maybe. Next car will be something more comfortable and quiet.

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I plan on just getting a nice set of components and potentially amp them. As mentioned above between my exhaust that has no mufflers besides the cannon and the semi slicks and race pads its noisy haha. 

 

It is cool when you see a big cruiser with a great deal of sounds and has been all sound deadened etc to hold the noise in 🤘

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Years back we built a BMW 5 series (530 maybe?) for what I call "SQL" - sound quality as a priority, but it had to get loud.

An insane amount of dynamat and expanding foam went into that car, along with well over $10k in gear, it was f***ing awesome. Did over 140dB on music and sounded really, really nice doing it, and the best part was that even at full tilt there was no obvious sign, other than the bass itself, that it was coming from that car. No rattling boot lid, no buzzing doors, just bass.

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Dont mean to hijack thread but any recomendation to sound systemninstallers in south auckland/ franklin area?

 

I installed some Sony, 6x5s up front and 6x9s in rear parcel shelf of gc8 with 12 inch sub. using wiring from previous owner but the sound quality was crap.

 

Might do away with the sub in the boot as it was a bit of a pain. Not worried super good quality but just want to get the list out of the speakers I have. Without doing sound deadening etc.

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1 hour ago, boon said:

Years back we built a BMW 5 series (530 maybe?) for what I call "SQL" - sound quality as a priority, but it had to get loud.

An insane amount of dynamat and expanding foam went into that car, along with well over $10k in gear, it was f***ing awesome. Did over 140dB on music and sounded really, really nice doing it, and the best part was that even at full tilt there was no obvious sign, other than the bass itself, that it was coming from that car. No rattling boot lid, no buzzing doors, just bass.

 

That wasnt the black bmw with the air brushing on it? think it was a Grimm reaper ? or was that the SLAP audio one.

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56 minutes ago, Inked said:

 

That wasnt the black bmw with the air brushing on it? think it was a Grimm reaper ? or was that the SLAP audio one.

 

Yeah that's the car. The SLAP one is the airbrushed one (or at least it was until it got sold).

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2 hours ago, ginganinja said:

Dont mean to hijack thread but any recomendation to sound systemninstallers in south auckland/ franklin area?

 

I installed some Sony, 6x5s up front and 6x9s in rear parcel shelf of gc8 with 12 inch sub. using wiring from previous owner but the sound quality was crap.

 

Might do away with the sub in the boot as it was a bit of a pain. Not worried super good quality but just want to get the list out of the speakers I have. Without doing sound deadening etc.

Get the best out of it without doing sound deadening? It’s like asking for a marching band to walk quietly across a wooden floor in a loud echoing hall.

 

The best you can do bang for buck is out some sound deadening around and behind the speakers in the doors. Parcel tray... well that’s kinda screwed because speakers generally work better with sealed or tuned spaces, parcel tray doesn’t give the speakers and punch (think about tapping a drum, if it wasn’t sealed / had a backing there wouldn’t be any “punch” coming off when you hit it).

 

You could install the 6x9’s in sealed enclosures if you wanted the cheapest and easiest solution for those to sound better.

 

Amplifiers will give your speakers clarity when you crank the volume up, allows for better control of the voice coils to prevent distortions but that’s going to cost you a bit more. 

Edited by Omsin
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Don't put 6x9's in a box. This is a common misconception. Most 6x9's, the manufacturers realise that the most common place they will be installed is in a parcel shelf, so they are designed with very high Qms (mechanical control) and have stiff suspension to allow them to run in this state. They work best in what is usually called an "infinite baffle", where there is no enclosure on either side of the cone, but a baffle that should be sufficiently large that the front and rear waves will never meet. If you want parcel shelf 6x9's to sound better, try closing up all the other holes in your parcel shelf, then sound deaden it to prevent the shelf itself from vibrating. Note that 6x9's with a boot sub is a losing game, because, especially in a sedan, the sub enclosure will, to some extent, effectively couple with the boot as an extension of the enclosure (essentially creating a kinda janky bandpass) and having some moving 6x9 cones essentially forming a part of that enclosure is always going to be slightly janky.

 

EDIT: Most door speakers are effectively running in a pretty s*** equivalent of infinite baffle, and car speakers, by and large, have very stiff suspension to compensate for this. This also contributes to them often having ludicrously high power ratings compared to home audio gear, and is also why home audio drivers sound like s*** in a car and car drivers don't get loud in a home audio installation.

#audionerd.

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Yep will be removing boot sub. I'm not after the best sound system out there as audio is not my main focus for the car but it would be nice to have it operating better than it is. when I fade to the back my 6x9s are extremely quiet so I think there is something messed up wiring.

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51 minutes ago, boon said:

Don’t put 6x9’s in a box.

 

EDIT: Most door speakers are effectively running in a pretty s*** equivalent of infinite baffle, and car speakers, by and large, have very stiff suspension to compensate for this. This also contributes to them often having ludicrously high power ratings compared to home audio gear, and is also why home audio drivers sound like s*** in a car and car drivers don't get loud in a home audio installation.

#audionerd.

Just going by what I’ve experienced.

 

i had the same 6x9’s in a box and also mounted in the rear tray of my last car. Definitely sounded better in boxes running off an amp. Guess it really depends on the brand and model of 6x9. I’m guessing the quality of sound is more to do with brand as well to some extent - I’ve never heard many good things about Sony and other commonly sold stuff which usually makes it way to Supercheap auto and repco on special.

 

I would never mount normal speakers in a box but definitely worth sound deadening the doors they go in.

 

For what it’s worth most oem speakers are made with paper cones and tiny magnets, I don’t think they put much thought into how they operate... more likely to be interested in cost and meeting a budget at the end of the day and ticking the box for car audio off the production checklist 😛

Edited by Omsin
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6x9 are average at best. Get a good 8-10” and some 5-6” mids. 

 

6x9 in are box are better than parcel shelf if you have a big sub in the boot. 

 

Paper is fine for speakers depends on how it is treated, though they don’t age well as they often have foam surrounding. 

 

Tiny magnets can be great try alpine high end stuff not the R ones but F1, X or DDdrive 

 

Bigger magnets are a sales or heavyweight cone and high power for dB thing. Plus it’s sometimes a trick and lower power magnets. 

 

If you want to get geeky try Morel and hexagonal wire in the coils to reduce wasted space. 

 

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20 hours ago, ginganinja said:

Dont mean to hijack thread but any recomendation to sound systemninstallers in south auckland/ franklin area?

 

I installed some Sony, 6x5s up front and 6x9s in rear parcel shelf of gc8 with 12 inch sub. using wiring from previous owner but the sound quality was crap.

 

Might do away with the sub in the boot as it was a bit of a pain. Not worried super good quality but just want to get the list out of the speakers I have. Without doing sound deadening etc.

Give the bro Perret at Audio and upholstery a call. Owns a shop down Glasgow Rd behind music mania. Did the install in this altezza. 

 

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1838995233045416&id=1771939836417623

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On 30/08/2019 at 4:13 PM, Omsin said:

i had the same 6x9’s in a box and also mounted in the rear tray of my last car. Definitely sounded better in boxes running off an amp. Guess it really depends on the brand and model of 6x9.

 

This is just potato. The usual stupid 6x9 boxes you see on the market are like 10 litres maximum. A 5 second look at some random 6x9's (middle of the road Kicker ones) has the Vas at 42 litres. Compare this to say, a reasonably high-performance 12" sub (DD 3512) - recommended enclosure size of 1.75-2.75 cubic feet (roughly 50-75 litres), but that driver has a Vas of just 22 litres. I mean somewhat apples to oranges but putting a speaker with a Vas that huge in a tiny box is basically like "let's prevent this cone from moving worth a s***". It probably sounded better because it was getting caned without a high-pass, and the tiny box helped it to not run out of xmax when the bass dropped :/

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Update. Have decided to make a ported Subwoofer box . ( @boon's recommendation)

I got some 18mm MDF and cut bits of wood using a design (below).

Have finished cutting, gluing and screwing all the bits together. Im not that good at woodworking so there are some rough areas.

I have felt carpet for the exterior and also polyester to line some of the inside.

Design:

http://ddaudio.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/12_compact_size.pdf

My Photos:

20190906-204502.jpg
20190906-222431.jpg
20190906-224253.jpg
Looks pretty rough but for a first time its not tooo bad. I actually have some nicer MDF I just got (after I cut out these peices) so im tempted to make another box, maybe another design. I rather enjoy making these things.

The extra bit poking out the back is so the box pushes against the back of the seat making it more secure.

My brother cut and folded some of these for mounting it.

IMG-20190827-WA0000.jpg

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7 hours ago, Subru said:


20190906-222431.jpg
 

That white box in the background looks like it could house a large sub 🤔

 
 
Did you glue / seal all the joins? All the boxes I’ve had have had a sealant applied inside to seal all the joins (air tight)
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I used a decent amount of glue but no silicone. It 'looks' air tight.

 

Edit: Found some silicone and and put a bead on the inside but couldnt access the front face due to the caulking gun being too large so I put a bead on the outside of those joints and will just cut back excess and the carpet will hide it. 

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1 hour ago, Subru said:

I used a decent amount of glue but no silicone. It 'looks' air tight.

 

Edit: Found some silicone and and put a bead on the inside but couldnt access the front face due to the caulking gun being too large so I put a bead on the outside of those joints and will just cut back excess and the carpet will hide it. 

Be a man and use ya finger 😂

 

squirt on finger, rub finger along inside, spend next few hours cleaning hand 

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