Help me with my speaker project

Best of luck going forward. Basic Car Audio Electronics is a good resource FWIW - gobs of reading there to get you up to speed. He explains things plainly and thoroughly with illustrations and calculators.

And I hope I didn't come across as anti-speaker kits ready for the car. They're great. Just offering up options.

There are some impressive small subwoofers out there as well that don't require much room or power...that department keeps getting better every day. Hope you post up your build whatever you decide to do!

 

I'm a big(!) fan of JL Audio's component speakers, for instance, http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-C3-650-Convertible-Component/dp/B003WMCLFA
(specs and drawings here, http://www.jlaudio.com/c3-650-car-audio-speakers-c3-convertible-systems-99022 )

I would go to ********* or car-speaker-adapters.com and get a set of adapters for 6.5" mains and whatever tweeters. for instance,

http://www.car-speaker-adapters.com/items.php?id=SAK010 (cut with a 5.5" hole ofr said 6.5 round mains) and
http://www.car-speaker-adapters.com/items.php?id=SAK009 for the tweeters.

(I've used these guys adapters in other cars)

disconnect any factory crossover, run the speaker wires that come from the deck to the JL Audio crossover inputs, mount that crossover somewhere behind the door panel (do be sure it clears the window), and wire the main+tweeters to it. I like to use RTV (silicone aquarium sealant) to seal my adapters to the door frame, and seal the speakers to the adapters, it prevents air leaks that cause distortion and buzzes, but can easily be removed with a thin sharp knife.

This will give you VERY clean sound, plenty of midbass for normal adult listening. They will sound GREAT driven by a decent modern 50Wx4 deck, all the way up to pretty darn loud. sure, it won't shake the world, but as you said, you don't want a ghetto blaster. I listen to a wide range of folk, blues, jazz, chamber music, and even some hard rockin stuff, and have used a similar setup in several other cars. Haven't upgraded my taco yet, just got it.

 

You will get a lot of varied opinions but it boils down to what you are looking for. Door-mounted subs will not get driven with enough power off your headunit to produce a quality base tone; plus they are in a less than airtight cavity. You can get a good sound out of a decent headunit with relatively inexpensive JBL speakers honestly. One of the ways you will see a major benefit is by some level of sound deadening. It really just depends on how much of an audiophile and what your budget is. I am a music nerd so I went a bit overboard

 

Thanks all. Great info.

Gonna keep reading and sort it out over the next few weeks.

 

those speakers I linked aren't subs, they are mains + tweeters. big mains, for sure, capable of pretty decent midbass, but not subs.

if I felt I needed a little more deep bass, I'd likely add one of these or similar, along with a suitable amp. actually, there's a new version of this same box with an integral amp, so I'd consider putting that on a harness plug so it could be removed when I need the space.
http://www.amazon.com/CP110LG-TW1-Audio-Ported-Enclosure-Subwoofer/dp/B00OBZZF7S

 

On the subject of bass & not too much power

I dropped a couple of these in my doors today



That's the Silver Flute W14 5.5 inch woofer...the little brother of the W17 I mentioned earlier. With about double the power I'm feeding this now, I might be able to go without a subwoofer. That thing I said about bass in the doors...I'm eating my words. I played these full-range (err, in a passive 2-way system but with no filter on the low end) with my sub off and couldn't tell the sub was off. Amazing little driver and it's only $20!

 

No rattles from doors?

 

what would you use for a tweeter and crossover to go with those ?

 

How about I tell you what I am using. I dropped this in to replace the (comparably sad) woofer in the NVX VSP 525 kit and so far seems to match the tweeter & crossover point reasonably well although the tweeter will be replaced (too bright). On tweeters I might use with it, I mention 4 or so in a post above, and while we're speaking of NVX that X series tweeter (also SB) is nice...not to be an exhaustive list by any means, but something that can cross around 2k would be ideal (although if you read graphs the W14 behaves until slightly above 4kHz). You'd have to find your own crossovers if going the passive route. OP has active crossover capability & might not need them. And FWIF, these would not be suitable for head unit power.

 

Not so far. I put 10 CLD tiles in the doors yesterday & a liberal amount of strategically-placed butyl rope & they're dead silent. I also whipped up some new baffles & took time to make sure all that wouldn't make any noise. Seems like most of my noise issues were in the doors. I was just hearing them all over the place. The difference is profound. Still unsealed though - metal in the doors, but the CLD tiles & butyl rope don't let them resonate quite so much.

 

Forgot I snapped this before I stuck it back in the door



Butyl rope around the new baffle where it meets the factory mount and a bit of CLD on the plastic bits where available. These pieces are really solid - and quite heavy. I've been listening to these all morning without the subwoofer and they keep blowing my mind.

 

I appreciate the discussion.

Work has kept me occupied for the last couple days.

Please clarify a couple of things for me. These drivers are not made for automotive audio. And that means you have to fab up some mounting stuff. Even the adapters you can by from ********* etc... won't work. Is that all correct?

Also. I think you are proposing that I could use the crossover settings in my HU to drive these. Is that with or without an amp?

Thanks

TL

 

Well, if they'll fit in pre-made adapters then you can use them. It's just quicker for me to whip up something than it is to find it and get it here. And those cost me under a buck each...the price of cheesy cutting boards (before all the deadening). This 5.5 inch woofer isn't a standard car size though, so it might not be as easy although I'd be surprised if something premade didn't work. The 6.5 is probably closer to standard size, but I'm almost thinking the 5.5 might be a better choice as it plays higher more comfortably so it's a little more forgiving with tweeter choice. Maybe the vendor of your choice can supply you with diameter information.

I don't know if you can use the head unit's crossovers without an amp, but I'm going to stay on you about that one . It's really not so bad and near mandatory if you want a significant improvement. Really, you could use a 100x4 on a couple of these Silver Flutes and a pair of decent tweeters and I think you'd be pretty happy with it.

More eating my words though...trampling right back over 'em actually

I've been looking into the feasibility of small subwoofers in the rear speaker locations in my 1st gen...specifically the Tang Band W6-1139SIF 6.5 inch subwoofer.






This is in the floorboard of a convertible and again toward the rear side panels



I imagine given the transfer function of these trucks, these could be something special.

 

get 6 15's @ 1ohm

 

Or this

 

My concern about non-automotive drivers would be how well they might handle the extreme heat of summer... interior of a car can get REALLY hot parked outdoors on a sunny day. also extreme cold, where many plastics get very brittle. get in your car on a -15F morning, start it, stereo left on semi loud from the night before, and blam, the frozen foam surrounds could shred faster than you could turn it off. decent car speakers are made from materials designed to survive extremes.

a modern head unit with '50W x 4' power (thats 50 watts *peak music power*, probably more like 17-20 watts 'RMS' continuous per channel) will drive the sort of speakers I previously linked quite nicely. note those were the 'mid range' speaker from that brand, they have cheaper ones and more expensive ones in the same 6.5" 2-way component form factor.

you still need a crossover with component speakers where you have a seperate woofer and tweeter, the gen 2 tacomas came with seperate speakers so I would be inclined to stick with that. component speakers usually come with the crossover required. a good head unit will have the sort of frequency shaping (equalization) needed to keep extreme sub bass out of these so you don't overdrive them.

here's some alternatives from my favortie speaker maker... all of these are the same form factor, 6.5" woofer + small tweeter, with crossovers...
$125/pair:

JL Audio TR650-CSi 6-1/2" Evolution TR Series 2-way Component Speakers System (Pair)

http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-TR650-CSi-Evolution-Component/dp/B003QQ67HA
$180/pair: http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-C2-650-6-5-Inch-Component/dp/B0036D1DQI
$344/pair: http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-C3-650-Convertible-Component/dp/B003WMCLFA
$400/pair: http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-0699440991049-C5650/dp/B002C59TKI
$800/pair:

JL Audio ZR650-CSi 6-1/2" Evolution ZR Series 2-way Component Speakers System (ZR650CSi)

http://www.amazon.com/JL-Audio-ZR650-CSi-Evolution-Component/dp/B000LPQ3N2

those last, I would get a amplifier with about 100W RMS per channel, and they are probably way more than you'd want in a pickup unless you want to rock your whole neighborhood with high fidelity (combined with a clean subwoofer). the TR's have the crossover built into the tweeters, while the C2 and above come with the external crossovers (which are better crossovers, allowing cleaner frequency seperation, and better power efficiency.

I'm planning on putting either the c2 or c3 in my taco when I can (prioritizing the cash flow, dontcha know), along with a double din stereo + GPS + rear camera setup.

 

We aren't going boating although I think all those drivers I mentioned use butyl or santoprene surround material. And generally most of these materials will work in whatever conditions provided you keep them dry. You're going to make sure of this when you install them, right?

I got nothin

His good head unit has crossovers built in - no need for separate passive crossovers if he's using an amp.

So, what do you think about JL?

 

if he was to use the deck's built in crossovers, he'd have to use all 4 channels for his fronts to run woofers + tweeters, leaving nothing for the rear doors

 

I understood that it was at least a 5-channel...maybe 6. But I'm having a hard time finding any details about it. Can you access the crossover menu of your head unit OP?...maybe squeeze off a picture or 2?

But, if only 4 channels, yes, there'd be nothing left for the rear doors except maybe a subwoofer? Full range in the rear is overrated.

 

every head unit I've installed recently or looked at has 4 channels of speaker outputs. they generally have RCA line outs for a sub amplifier, and may have 2-4 main line outputs.

the external crossovers that come with those component speakers I linked, like many others, have a 2nd order high pass filter for the tweeters, and a 1st order lowpass for the woofer. the low end series has the 2nd order high pass built into in the tweeter and no lowpass for the woofer (a woofer is a natural lowpass filter, anyways).

cheaper 2-way speakers often just use a simple bipolar capacitor as a poor mans 1st order high pass on the tweeter.