I just bought a 93' Touring FD w/ the Bose system on the fritz. I just had the a local stereo shop install a new Pioneer DEH-P9800BT and some Arc Audio FD 6022s in the doors.

This is my way of starting, just getting some decent sound in there vs. the crackling Bose system with the wave thingy that sounds like an owl or something.

My next step will be to probably put components in. I like the Focal K3Ps w/ a 6.5 mid, .78 tweeter, and a 6.5 woofer. Question is, do you SQ guys think that'll work or sound good given that the mids will most likely go in fabbed kick panels, the woofers will go into the doors with modded door panels, and the tweets (I think) should go in the dash firing off the windshield? (or maybe a-pillar?)

I think I'll add a sub next; maybe a Focal 27 KX or two, or something similar. What do you guys think about my speaker selection and placement, from those of you who have tried to get great sound out of a car that wasn't designed for it?

 

Couple of notes here, no focal speakers will fit in the door, they are all over 2.5" in mounting depth, so you would have to build something custom, and that gets expensive. Besides that focal speakers are very bright, and not to my liking, to much midbass as well. If you want a real SQ setup for the fd than for speakers I reccomend anything from Morel, the new polk signatures, or i think the 5.25" dynaudios will fit as well. The new polks got AWESOME reviews, they retail at $900, you can pick them up for aroudn 450 BNIB on ebay. I know im going to pick up two sets of polk signature refrences, one for the doors and one for rear speakers (you can mount them coaxially as well.)

Focal makes very nice SQ subss, especially the utopia line, i would also check out for sq, velodyne, phase linear and even the imade dynamics IDQ for sq.

For amps, i would reccomend, gensis, sinfoni, or audison, those three are the best, and you will hear a difference, as i know i did.

My next sq setup will be
Alpine iva-w200 with h701 processor
Polk Signature References speakers for front and rear
Sinfoni Amplifies
Soundsplinter rlp ( good mix of sq and spl)

Check out elitecaraudio.com, lots of good guys and good information.

 

I planned on hacking up my door panel for the Focals, they had to trim the panel to get the Arcs to fit. I've heard the tweeter is harsh on the Focals but have also heard many people say that it's adjustable, so just turn it down a couple db's.

I was really wanting a three way front stage so I had every range covered. Do you think that my speaker placement is a good idea?

I've heard good things about Audison but am unfamilar with their product line. I will look more into them.

 

yes you can attentuate the tweeter and also buy an eq and tune them down, but i prefer the sound of dynaudios or morels any day of the week. Dont listen to them on a soundboard, go out and listen to them in a car. I was talking to someone who was a rep from audison and they said that focal speakers sounded worse as time went on. Dont know if its true or not though.

Audison is top notch, not sure i like the way they look though, the VRX series is their top of the line amp and can be had for about 600 used off of ebay and around 1400 from woofersetc.com, very very nice amps, 65% of competitors is sq competitions use either audison or genesis. I LOVE sinfoni amps but they are very expensive and not sure they will be that much better than the audison's.

The FD is a very very small cabin, i think a 3 way set-up is over kill, and i would prefer not to hack up the door panels, as the panels tend to get loose over time and they WILL rattle eventually.

A-pillar is a good place for tweeters or even the top right door panel, just make sure your on axis, if not you can usually eq it to make it sound right.

 

How about mounting the tweeters flushmount in the top of the dash, so that they're pointed at the windshield?

 

Yeah, i saw a pretty trick install of tweeters on the a-pillar on the sides of the front window. I'll post a pic later.

 

Yeah, I think I'll do the A-pillar to bring the image up. Just 6.5s in the door absolutely sucks when it comes to imaging. I don't know if the tweets in the door are going to cut it, it might still be too low, but then again, I know you don't want your components too far away from each other.

 

having the tweeters on the dash, would be considered off axis, its not bad, but some tweeters just dont sound good off axis, but their are some that do, mostly higher brands, and you can tune them to sound better.

Having a tweeter in the a-pillar and the mid in the door will be fine. Depending on how everything is setup, 6.5's wont suck at install, make sure you sound deaden your doors.

The MOST important thing I can say though, no matter how nice of equipment you have, if you dont install it correctly it will NOT sound good. INSTALL INSTALL INSTALL.

 

Listen to purerx7. I would not mess with the door panels it will end up sounding like poo and the door panels fall apart very easily. I did and I regret it.

 

I fit a set of focal V2 6.5 in the door of my FD. Still used the stock grills with it too. Anyways I deff say go with the focals. Sound is great and clear. There subs are nice and a clean bass as well. The tweeters in the uper end focals isn't to harsh sounding and yes they can be adjusted easy too on the loudness of the tweeters. I thought the V2s would sound harsh being mounted in the doors, but they way I set them it sounds great.

 

God, I can't wait to get my Vifa's put in, I might do that tomorrow.

 

if you got the focal v2 SLIM than yes they would fit in the door, but the regular v2 has a mounting depth of 2.9" which i know for a fact WONT fit in the doors without either cutting the glass so it doesnt hit the magnet or making modifications to the door panel. I have tried a set of mid's with 2.64" mounting depth and the window hit it so i know their is no way 2.91 would work.They are good speakers, LOTS of midbass for sure, either way if you do go focal atleast get the tn-52 tweeters.

 

Here's a blowout deal on a Vifa component system for $120:

http://www.madisound.com/cgi-bin/ind....7723&pid=2129

I experimented at great length with where to mount the tweeters when I did my original install and the best solution I found was to use angled surface mounts attached to the triangles on the doors:

 

Damon, how do those sound? I'm waiting for the new Elemental Designs 5 1/4 set to come out, but production is taking awhile.

 

looks good damon, they seem to be right on axis, vifa makes very good speakers, vifa also makes the speakers in the alpine type x set.

 

That's an idea. I was just going to mount my tweets next to the woofs on the Bose door box and use angled sufrace mounts to direct them upwards. BTW, Diamand Audio speakers are shallow.

 

Also, how'd you run the wire up to the tweeter and through the triangle?

 

There's room in the weatherstrip between the interior door panel and door to run small wires through. My wires extend up behind the triangle from inside the door and then pass through the triangle and into the tweeter pod. Tweeters don't draw much current so you don't need fat wire for them. The tweeter crossovers are ziptied inside the door panels.

 

here is my setup. if u didnt see

https://www.rx7club.com/interior-exterior-audio-26/so-i-started-my-audio-install-608463/

 

Good to know, that'll help me out a lot, thanks.