Hello,
Recently I've upgraded my Coupe speakers. Main theme is tweeter placement, don't know if it's been covered on forum but wanted to share my experience.
In the end, I have a question, regarding rear speakers.
This is a basic passive system - headunit and speakers in stock positions.I wanted "decent"
sound quality at low to moderate volume. I didn't want to get amplifiers, subwoofers, active crossovers for multiple reasons - mainly fear of never ending project, tinkering with the interior, and rising cost.
As a baseline, I know (or think I know) how a decent "neutral" sound quality system should sound. Years ago I had an interest in home Hi-Fi, listened to some amazing high-end gear, had a decent Marantz / Denon amp/player and floorstander speakers; now i have a Pioneer AV receiver (average sound, but love the other features) and Qacoustic 3020 speakers.
It took me a while to get the sound "right".
Short(er) version:I've changed the head unit, and then all the speakers, then swapped the tweeters, finally changed the tweeter position. Phases:
1. old Alpine + factory speakers
2. Alpine HU + factory speakers
3. Alpine HU + Hertz speakers, tweeters in dash
4. Alpine HU + Hertz + ESX SQ6.2T tweeters in dash
5. Alpine HU + Hertz speakers, tweeters in pods
I'll write my (subjective) marks on different arbitrary categories and scale:
1=bad ... 3=good ... 5=excellent
Overall sound - how pleased am I with the overall sound
Clarity/Detail - how much of finer tones, voices or melodies can be heard
Stereo imaging - how balanced are left/right channels and how wide/deep is the imaginary soundstage
Smoothness - opposite to "harsh" = no sharp tones or vocals; does not cause fatigue on long and/or loud listening.
..... OVERALL SOUND ... Clarity/Detail ... Stereo imaging ... Bass ... Smoothness1 .......... 3.0 .................... 3 ....................... 3 .......................... 4 .......... 3
2 .......... 3.5 .................... 4 ....................... 3 .......................... 2 .......... 4
3 .......... 3.5 .................... 5 ....................... 4 .......................... 3 .......... 2
4 .......... 3.5 .................... 4 ....................... 4 .......................... 3 .......... 3
5 .......... 4.5 .................... 5 ....................... 5 .......................... 4 .......... 4
My conclusion - aftermarket tweeters don't work well in stock "in dash" position. The couple (Hertz, ESX) I tried sounded very harsh, much worse than factory ones. Could be that factory tweeters have particular on axis/off axis sound dispersion patterns.
Experiment, try and test what sounds best. Massive differences lie in placement.
Long version:Years back (2004), when I purchased the car (second hand) it had a basic Blaupunkt HU, and I swapped it for a mid-level Alpine. I was pleased with the sound on stock factory speakers - I didn't listen at high volume, and it had decent overall balance - enough bass, no harsh treble.
Since that Alpine didn't have USB (or Bluetooth) 2 years ago I swapped it for Alpine CDE-177BT. It's high-end model from the "classic" 1DIN line; it has many features for tuning the sound (parametric EQ, time delay , HPF, LPF filters etc.) I had vastly more detailed sound, but somehow, lost quite a lot of bass. However, I refused to go the "upgrade the chain" route.
Then, a year ago, I replaced stock speakers in my other car, and hearing the benefits, decided to do the same on Coupe.
Since I'd let the HU power the speakers directly, I looked for high sensitivity ones - bought Hertz ESK 165L.5 2-way components (Energy series, 120€) for the front and DCX 170.3 2-way coax (Dieci series, 60€) for the rear.
I've let the local audio shop install them, and sound-deaden the doors and rear panels, both body metal and trim panels. The tweeters went to stock position (behind mesh on the dash), other speakers also.
After the install, the sound was very different. There was much more detail, but even less bass, and treble was very "bright". The installer said Hertz speakers tend to have "bright" tweeters, but everything should "loosen up" a little with run-in.
With more listening nothing changed - there was very little kick-bass, and the tweeters sounded very harsh on some tones - piercing on high male or female vocals, sharp "s" consonants etc. I could EQ some of it with HU (with boost in 100-400Hz and dip in 2-8kHz), but then the back speakers sounded really muddy and unnatural. Displeased, I've even opened the dash side panels and checked all the wires and connections to the supplied speaker crossovers etc, but everything was wired ok.
After 2 months I got back to audio shop, and they talked me into changing the tweeters - they proposed ESX SQ6.2T (60€), and i had them put in the dash, replacing Hertz units. The sound became smoother, but after listening for a few days, I noteiced it lacked some detail and musicality compared to Hertz.
Displeased, I searched the web, and after reading various oppinions and advices on in-car reflections and speaker placement, decided to try and place the Hertz tweeters (that I liked better, regardless the harshness) in supplied pods, somewhere on A pillars. Since I didn't want to alter the interior, I mounted the cups at the base od A pillar, with a longer bolt that goes to the existing hole in the pillar trim panel. And that's it - the harshness is gone; the tweeter volume is lower, so the bass gets a little better; I can listen a lot louder without fatigue.
Now the question - has anybody put just 16cm woofers (without tweeters) in the back side panels, instead of 16cm coaxials?As is, I'm very pleased with the overall sound. The rear speakers produce a lot of bass, and nicely fill-in the cabin, but I have to adjust fader to +5 (on a scale -15 to +15) to the front. If centered, the front sounstage gets dispersed. Would loosing the tweeters in the back focus the image back to front, and how would it sound for the (occasional) rear passengers?
I have a pair of 16cm Hifonics Titan woofers with full 18dB/octave crossover on idle.
SOME PICTURES
HERTZ tweeters in dash
HERTZ tweeters on A pillar pods