Hail to everyone that gives input to the different topics on the forums.

I am looking for any bits of information, personal advice and expertise that I have not picked up yet.

I have a '90 GXL with a JVC head unit and some Pioneer three-way coaxials in the towers. I will be installing a Rockford Fosgate component set in the doors and tweets on the dash. I will be using the Kenwood 959 5 channel amp (40x4 and 100x1)and a Bazooka RS10A (10" with 150 watt amp). I have studied my wiring diagrams etc. and feel prepared to start the job this weekend.

Thanks to BamBam7 for talking to me about sound dampening. I have the VE-1 lightweight sheets from parts express for the doors, and Fiber fill for the towers.

My goal is produce a nice stage area (not to shatter glass).

My question is to those that have experienced with a complete stereo upgrade:

Are there any areas that are susceptible to bass vibration other than the doors and towers?

Are there any professional techniques that I should be aware of?

As a side note: I have the infamous 3K drone from the exhaust. Is there any way to help dampen this?

I will be eagerly looking for input from all of you experts.

Thanks a lot!

TJ

 

Be careful with the seperates. For best sound imaging your do not want to have the primary front speaker seperates more than 12 inches apart and on the same plain. Off axis speakers as it sounds like you are describing can sometime lead to very poor imaging.

The only exception to this rule would be if you are using dedicated high/mid/low/sub amps and you can time align, either electronicly or through additional passives.

 

To produce nice stagine your 3 ways in the shock towers will have to be turned way down to keep the music from sounding like it is behind you (atleast that was my experience).

I as far as rattles I found that the licence plate rattles and some stuff in front of the tail lights. The glass in my drivers side mirror is a little loose and it makes a buzz under heavy bass as well. Overall though it is a pretty tight car.

I have the bonez super flow cat and have the same 3k drone. I have thought about playing with the timing to get it to go away. Maybe when it warms up. For now with the bass up I can't here it anymore.

Happy listening

 

Try using some dynamt on the liscense plate , and inside the trunk, doors, trunk, on all the sheet metal you can, especially near the speakers> I have an FD and just installed Dynamt on it, and an Infinty system, and my road noise has been signifacanlty dampened, along with speaker vibration. my old speakers caused alot of vibrations, but now the dynamat has made a difference. I did this with 10 Sq. feet which adds about 8-11 lbs. overall it has given me a quieter ride.

 

When the two of you had advised around the licence plate - I am picturing that that is on the inside of the car behind the spare. Is that correct?

Right now I notice that my towers have a slight buzzzz. I'm sure that is caused by the speakers trying to pass subsonics that it can not produce. Is that correct or is there something that I should be aware of and dampening?

Thanks

TJ

 

I mean THE licence plate. The bottom would vibrate and make a pretty good racket. Also the area around the spare seems to make some noise too. keep in mind I have my sub jammed into the spare so the vibrations are most intense there for me.

What kind of speaker covers are u using on the speaker in the shock towers. I am using stockones and when fed lots of base they actually hit the cover making a buzz sound. I put a bass filter on them. With the sub it's not an issue for me.

 

First I would like to say thanks to Icemark, Enthu, and Enthu for giving me their two cents.

I was going to use the stock grills.... Any suggestions on that?

I have 80Hz and 150Hz High pass filter switches on the amp, so I thaink that will take care of low frequencies sent to the rear Pioneer "tri-axals". So... are there any other parts [EVERYONE] that may rattle/buzz in the car that I need to know about and correct the first time around? [Thanks Everyone].

Thanks Thaniel, for clarifying the licenceplate issue.

TJ

(ignore tipo's)

 

OK hsere is my update.

I installed the stereo this wekend. Note that I ran all new wires. Using an oversized Zip-tie for fish-tape worked great when running new wires through the "S" shapre wire way that runs from the body to the door. It seemed a little harder on the drivers side. I believe that this is because there may be more wires on the drivers door. I had installedthe VE-1 dampening sheets from partsexpress.com. in the door panels, and under the buckets on the bare metal. Also filler in the towers. I had nearly an extra sheet and layed it down in the cargo area. In addition I used a Base Mechanic CD which has different frequencies on each track to isolate noise and tighten things up (tower covers and adapters gave me a hard time)

The rockford-fosgate component set has a -3db jumper for the tweeters. I took note of that and during testing I opted to set the tweeters down. Now they do not seem so bright (as in hearing them come directly from the dash). After setting the HPF on the AMP to 150Hz and adjusting the gain on the Bazooka....

I swear to god that the sound is not directional. When you close your eyes you can not point your finger to the source of the sound. In my oppinion the 40w/ch was a good call it can get a little loud but not make your ear drums bleed. I have had several people listen to it and they think that it sounds like I took it to a Auto Stereo shop to have it installed and tuned.

By the way I do not have any problem with the licence plate.

Anyways, I am extremely happy with the installation and wanted to post this update and say thanks to those that took the time to reply.

JT