Car Audio Subforum?

[Gatordaddy]

How does audio modification affect resale value? Seems harder to justify spending something you're going to sell. Restoring to stock could be a PITA.

As far as I know sellers mostly don’t check or care. As long as you don’t alter the factory wiring returning it to stock is the easy part.

 

[Jdunk54nl]

Ya, returning to stock isn’t too bad as long as you don’t hack. But most don’t care as long as it works and you’re willing to start over or put in cheaper stuff when you sell it.

 

[Gatordaddy]

Fyi I have two car amplifiers to test....

I'm looking forward to seeing more. I tried to get my hands on both the pioneer and the dual but they are both about 2x the cost vs when they were reviewed.

I suspect the Dual especially is probably a lot nicer than many "upmarket" offerings

 

[AudioAaron]

car audio has been all but dead for the last few years, reasons being too complicated oem installs (can't remember a single car in the last few years with a double/din shaft)

This is what made me give up on car audio. Installation used to be very easy.

There were a lot of good ways to run active stereo setups in the car before minidsp was available for the home. It was great trying out different woofers and tweeters in the car with different x-overs then adding in some time alignment.

Being able to turn your car volume to 11 with a good setup was a nice way to get a fix if you lived in an apartment.

 

[bravomail]

I'm wondering if there is enough interest in the community for a car audio subforum, or if members here have advice for a place for car audio measurements/analysis. Asking because DIYMA (though providing a wealth of information) seems pretty quiet besides for their for sale section.

Car audio still seems like the wild west when it comes to specification claims and tuning methodology, even though sound quality is probably higher than ever before.

Modern cars will have ~70dB noise on a highway. What if it rains and windy? Automakers also add artificial engine noise thru the speakers, to make your car "sportier". And those are considered "quiet" cars. That leaves you 26dB for "CD-quality". So no matter what u do ur amp will have 26-50 dB SINAD. Any noise of the amp will be drowned in the road noise.
Now to speakers and "room correction" - should I even start it? Depending on the number of passengers in your car your "room correction" will be useless.
Of course, you can sit in the idling car, alone, and enjoy your music. But during travel - forget it.
Add to it that big family rarely agrees to listen to the same music, rather everyone will read their phones, or wear a headset.
Then there are highrollers - with huge subs installed in the cars, capable of destroying the glass in the car. I hope u r not one of them.
Bottom line for me - use your car's built-in audio and don't ask for more. If you're leasing, or you car is old - audio upgrade is out of the question. If you're buying a new car - try getting the one with better audio and dealers will happily charge you extra thousands of dollars, as u see, top audio only comes with a top car trims. U r screwed. Just use Bluetooth and SiriusXM.

 

[Gatordaddy]

Yelling at clouds

I mean i guess thats cool. My car stereo sounds pretty good

 

[HedgeHog]

I'm wondering if there is enough interest in the community for a car audio subforum, or if members here have advice for a place for car audio measurements/analysis. Asking because DIYMA (though providing a wealth of information) seems pretty quiet besides for their for sale section.

Car audio still seems like the wild west when it comes to specification claims and tuning methodology, even though sound quality is probably higher than ever before.

I'm interested but I'm not sure home audio forums are best for car audio fans. Quite different in perspectives.

Also, most probably won't have the hands-on experience in what's current in car audio. They have crazy good stuff (like the aforementioned Audio Frog, Micro Precision, Helix, Mosconi, Focal Utopia, etc.). For those worry about road/engine noise, sound deadening has played a major role in making the car more hospitable for audio.

I find some of those YT vids showing off those high quality audio to be quite good.

If users have projects they want to document, I would love to have a subforum for them to post in.

 

[Doodski]

I'm wondering if there is enough interest in the community for a car audio subforum, or if members here have advice for a place for car audio measurements/analysis. Asking because DIYMA (though providing a wealth of information) seems pretty quiet besides for their for sale section.

Car audio still seems like the wild west when it comes to specification claims and tuning methodology, even though sound quality is probably higher than ever before.

I think that is a good idea. With a increase in mobile audio tests here at ASR it would come in handy. It'll be like speakers where when some people expected the tests to take up resources and waste time but turned out to be a source of major amounts of commentary and participation.

 

[Pearljam5000]

There's no need for it
Just buy Focal car speakers and you're done
They sound X1000 better than my older speakers

 

[Webninja]

My adventures in audio started with cars. From simple speaker updates to full custom with fiberglass speaker mounts and lots of amps. Had two 15s in a hatchback that at full volume would unseat the hatch glass.

My last car had a system from MusicarNW. It was superb. No visible modification and played everything well. DSP was programmed in the shop from a custom tune using my exact car model made by measuring interior frequency response. I kept that car a few years longer just for the system.

Home | Musicar Northwest

Integrate - From the Latin Integritās soundness, correctnessand purity -a complete whole Our Approach Car audio is not that important — but enjoying music i ...

musicarnw.com

Current car has a Lexicon system that is the best factory system I’ve heard. First system I don’t feel the need to upgrade.

 

[Kevbaz]

I haven’t had any car audio for years now, mostly since I didn’t want to mess with my car whilst under warranty
Back in my days at Uni I had a Mini Clubman with 12” Hifonics Zeus sub, DLS speakers all powered you Hifonics (zed audio made) amplifiers. Sounded really good, didn’t do the small car battery much good though
Cheers
Kev

 

[ClosDeBen]

Would vote for an auto section too. I've found only the lowest quality (existing amp reviews here notwithstanding) "influencer" reviews for car speakers and amps. Clicking through the author and you find their skills are in driving up "likes" and site visibility. Audio not so much. Save for the amp reviews I was so relieved to find here, I'm still searching for a knowledgeable review source for basic component recommendations. My Sprinter is a fairly hostile place for an audiophile. I want good enough sound but don't want to pour money past where I'll hear any benefit.

Anyone know a good existing source or at least a "good enough" recommendation for a 6.5" component speaker set ?

 

[Webninja]

I’ve used CDT and Morel in the past and been happy with both, no measurements though.

Maybe JBL though, just thinking they usually measure well for home, maybe we take a leap and hope the same design is in their car products.

 

[trl]

I'm wondering if there is enough interest in the community for a car audio subforum

I would vote for it, so go ahead and create a subforum, I don't see why not.

Just isolated with sound deadening and isolating materials my car's doors and plastics and also upgraded the default speakers and the audible results were absolutely stunning. I got a better sensitivity (a higher volume on the same volume knob level), less door vibrations, about 20 Hz lower bass resonance frequency and better trebles as well.​

Default front door (driver) @40 Hz (measured with ECM999 + Motu M4)

Isolated & speaker upgrade front door (driver) @40 Hz (measured with ECM999 + Motu M4)

Default front door (driver) @25Hz (measured with ECM999 + Motu M4)

Isolated & speaker upgrade front door (driver) @25 Hz (measured with ECM999 + Motu M4)​

We can clearly see a 10 dB lower THD+N and a higher sensitivity on the isolated door with the newer speakers. With original speakers and non-isolated door I couldn't pass 6 mark on the volume, due to an odd resonance between 150-250 Hz (men voices) and door vibrations, but now I can get up to 16 mark of volume (volume is insanely high).

I'm posting below some works done, just in case someone would like to try it out sometimes and have it tested before vs. after.

Original plastic from car's back door

Isolated plastic from car's back door

Isolated plastic from car's front door

Isolated front door

Inside isolated front door

ESX Horizon vs. default speaker - front

ESX Horizon vs. default speaker - back

ESX Quantum vs. default speaker - front

ESX Quantum vs. default speaker - back

ESX Quantum coaxial - interesting mount of the tweeter

The ESX Horizon & Quantum used for this car modification

​

A proper sound isolation to doors, roof, base, hayon and to other internal elements from inside the car will greatly improve the audio quality. Also, under most circumstances, upgrading speakers will also help, just look what speakers I had installed by default by the manufacturer. Imagine that the "crossover" for tweeters (not shown in the above pics) was made out of one single polarized capacitor, while the ESX crossover has coil, resistors and non-polarized caps too.

 

[Dal1as]

Yeah. I still jam my system in my Trans Am with t-tops off at 90 so hell yeah. It can sound good!

 

[HedgeHog]

I see some are using machined aluminum rings in the doors in lieu of expanded PVC. Pricey.

 

[Chrise36]

One thing i should mention from my experience is to choose speakers with fabric tweeters. Avoid mylars and i think metal tweeters sound harsher i have not heard beryllium in car though. What is the members experience about this?

 

[Digby]

I think any car with subwoofers (or dump valves/modified exhausts/noise making equipment) should be impounded, and the owner should pay for the crap, ahem, modifications to be removed and destroyed, before the car is returned. This stuff is a blight and shouldn't be encouraged.

 

[Dal1as]

I think any car with subwoofers (or dump valves/modified exhausts/noise making equipment) should be impounded, and the owner should pay for the crap, ahem, modifications to be removed and destroyed, before the car is returned. This stuff is a blight and shouldn't be encouraged.

Ok... I think not.

 

[ZolaIII]