Hi guys,

Recently delving into a fair bit of money spending... i went out and go myself a completely new system to suit the new car.

As below, i've got an Alping 9853R, with a DD C4 and dynaudio system 342.

I've sound deadned the doors (inner door skin and the part just behind the trim, and also have sealed about 90% of the door).

Currently i'm running the system semi passivly (as i found that the system is extremely bright with no mid bass with the passive mode).

The mids and tweets are running off the xover and the mid is running straight off the C4.

I'm running the 9853r in 3way mode, so how should i setup the cross over points for the Mid Low, Mid High and High xover points.

Currently i've set it to Mid Low Slope 3, 80hz. Mid High is 1.0khz Slope 2 and High is at 1k slope 1.

Would these be the better xover points for the system?

Any other suggestions?

maybe drop the mid low pass to 63hz

am i reading your sig right? 4 tens in a mister two? SW20 by the look of your avatar

yeah midbasses to 50hz and the tweets about 2.5, and change the slopes, 1 is -6db/octave, 2 is -12, 3 is -18, and 4 is -24db, youll burn out the tweeter if you have the sope too shallow and the midrange vocals start to sound forced when you play the tweets too low,

Mon, you'll have to distinguish between mids and midbass there, otherwise it makes it confusing. Im not full bottle on the newer Dyns, but the older ones (MW160's) never liked dropping below 80Hz. Id say the newer ones wouldnt either, they are based on the same design after all.

However, if by mid you mean midrange, you need to change the slopes quickfast or you'll tear open those domes like a tincan. They cant do anything below around 500Hz-630Hz on an 12/18 dB slope. As for the highpass, they are really good up to about 3-4kHz, which personally is where Id be keeping them. The tweeters on the new Dyn line are hands down better then the old ones, but I still wouldnt cross them below around 3kHz with a 12dB slope (especially on a 3-way set).

Why did you change away from the System 340's too? Was it just a straight upgrade?

my MW162's (in properly deadened doors) are quite happy HP 50Hz, 12dB/Oct. They do roll off a little, got the sub LP 63Hz for blending

Sorry to interupt the thread, but what happens to the dyn tweeters when they are crossed over too low? Do the coils melt?

I've run my Arvus tweeters down around 1000hz with 24 slopes and had no issues. I believe some of the Arvus tweeters are run full range in there home systems.

x2

Using a bit of underlap between the midbass and the tweeter in mine (2-way system obv.) which seems to sound ok.

Based on the fact your THE mongry SPL queen. Donate your speakers to ME and get those angry subwoofers fired up!

i would drop the woofers to 50 hz, and the high pass on the woofers mids up to like 8-900 hz,

then go down from here till you start to hear them struggling, but never go below 550hz on 18db just to be safe, as you will fry them...

I'd tend to agree with Matt's comments here.

I personally wouldn't drop the mid-bass drivers much below 80hz (63hz and the absolute lowest) as the hole would just be too significant. Overlapping will take out the hole, but from my own experiences it also causes the sound to get blurry around the crossover point where the two speakers are competing to preduce the same frequency.

I always try to keep frequencies split as much as possible and to do all i can to avoid having two different speakers producing the same sound.

It's not always avoidable, but I do where I can.

63 high pass on the woofers, and 63 low pass on 24db for the sub,

wheres that hole???


i would even go, depending on the accuracy of your sub, a 50 hi pass, and 70 low pass....


i believe fudd had his sub overlapping in his dual championship car...

at the end of the day, try them all and see what works..

Muzzy, have you actually tried these things you say? Or are they just what you "think" would work?

There is a lot of "Oh dont do that... It cant possibly work!" on this forum, rather than actually trying and seeing how it sounds.

Crossing mids at 50Hz with underlap to the sub is quite common and has produced some great and winning sounding cars.

You can do it sure, but it does lose its 'tightness' when it goes below 80, and noticeable rolloff below 63Hz. The MW162 could be different, sure, but the MW160 (especially the MkII versions) bottomed out considerably at decent volumes when X'over this low.

It simply does not have the Xmax required for solid fast reproduction at higher volumes at 50Hz.

The hole lies between the crossover point of subwoofer and the natural roll-off of the mid-bass driver.

As listed in the other thread, you will get a natural roll-off below 80-100hz in 95% of mid-bass drivers.

Let's say your mid-bass drivers show a response something like:
0dB @ 100hz
-2dB @ 80hz
-4dB @ 60hz
-6dB @ 50hz

Which is a fairly accurate 'rough' indication of how most mid-bass drivers will roll-off down low.

Now, lets say your sub is playing flat up until around 60hz where it starts to roll-off due to the crossover point.

You will essentially have a 2dB - 4dB 'hole' from 60hz up to 80hz or so between where the midbass rolls off and the sub takes over.

Overlapping can 'block up' this hole (i.e. shallow slope or higher crossover on sub) but will result in a more blurred and/or muddy sound in the region where the sub overlaps the mid-bass.
are playing down to -4dB @ 60hz,and your sub is.



Yes I have indeed tried crossover points ranging from 30hz up to as high as 160hz with varying crossover slopes.

I've also put my own car on an RTA several times and can confirm that in my own system there is a significant 'hole' in the frequency response between 60hz and 80hz when I cross my sub over at 63hz on a 18dB slope (HX-D2 doesnt have 24dB as an option).

This is largely due to the fact that a door really doesn't act as a proper enclosure because it isn't rigid enough, nor sealed well enough to function as such.

The W175 Power mid-bass I am running is an absolute bastard to install because of it's sheer dimensions, but I can assure that very few (if any) other drivers will match it's bottom end extension. If this driver cant play flat below 80hz in a leaky car door, then I can say with a great deal of confidence that very few will (hence why i plan to build door mounted enclosures for them as my next install move).

I've tried shallower slopes on the mid bass and sub, and while this does bridge the gap somewhat it takes away some of the 'snappiness' you get from a well set steep crossover. You can hear a definite and undeniable 'blurriness' on a 12dB slope that just isn't present on an 18dB slope.

Also, not only will most mid-bass drivers NOT play flat below 80hz, but they will also start to lose their cool when ttrying to do so. They will often exibit resonace issues and harsh impedance peaks at these low frequencies with lead to an unimpressive response at those frequencies - then if you try to use EQ to lift them in these areas they roll-off in you will simply reduce power handling, increase distortion, and generally cause more bad then good.

What can you do then, to fix it? Not much really... live with blurry bass, accept a weakness in mid-bass, or invest in the effort required to get abnormally large mid-bass drivers into your car (only a serious option in a three way setup).

If you don't like any of those options, then what can I say?

Welcome to the world of car audio, my friends!

sounds like your power mid isnt up to scratch mate

maybe you should try the polk??

Nah, I think I'll just upgrade to a some Stroker Pro 15 in each door !

Yes that is right. 4x 2510s in a sw20 (in the cabin aswell).







I would of thought that the crossovers that came with the set would take car of the mid and the tweet, and all i'd need to worry about is the midbass.







Mids are the 4" and mid is the midbass 7" driver.



I originally thought i was getting a system 340. But i got dumped with a system 342 on my door step



The matt, next time we have a sq tune day and i have my car, mind jumpin in the seat and giving us a bit of advice?

I reckon my Supremo SW6's play pretty well below 80Hz:

70Hz 24db/oct crossover. The values are easier to read than the actual graph.

How are you finding the supremo's after they've loosened up a bit?

I don't want to take the thread off topic, but they are performing very well. I had a proper tuning session last night, and found that the tweeter's needed another 2db of boost - from -11db to -9db. I took 2db out of 80Hz and 100Hz as vocals were sounding a little 'chesty' and this cleaned them up a fair bit. They have heaps of punch - I'm really impressed with that aspect, although (bringing this back on topic) they don't really like going below 65Hz-70Hz that much. I pulled 7db out of the sub as well - its a lot more balanced now, but will be interesting to see how this goes when driving at 140km/h (and I have done a fair bit of long distance driving lately).

Yeah, you will tend to get that with most drivers. Plenty of house speakers will play fairly low, but then the vast majority of these also sit in nicely proportioned vented cabinets, as opposed to half-sealed car doors

The Supremo mids sounded like they had plenty of potential from what I heard in Tick's car though - that reminds me how is that car of yours going? And when are we going to see it at a sound off!?

Lucky bastard. The tweeter on the newer Esotec range is heaps better then the old one. That was a free upgrade for you!

For the midbass, the lower end sounds almost identical to mine (so perfect! ) and it should work very well. The higher end you can push slightly more, and drop to allow a better stage and image (unless your midbasses are ausomely installed...). Aiming for something more along the lines of 600-700ish Hz with a slightly steeper slope (18's would be my recommendation) would suit them nicely. As for the highpass on the mids/tweeters, the same point should work nicely.

The slopes though seem a bit shallow for in the car though. Transient response is better with shallower slopes, but you cant push the units as hard without breakup. Steeper slopes will allow are better power-response, and should suit your car slightly more too.

Either way, it'll be fun playing with them at the next meet....

Most likely round 3 muz. No CA exams at the moment which is a bonus. Been thinking of some upgrades for the future too, but no solid plans as yet. Have to get some cash together first...

I'll just be down at round 3 making up the numbers...

Thanks guys!

i set the mid-low xover @ 53hz with a 4 slope, and they sound insanely good now... extremely punchy and good down low!

now for the rest of the shizz to get here....... -_-

tweeters at 1kHz is bad generally.
try 1.6kHz 24dB/oct slope but preferably 2.8 or 3.2 kHz, 12dB slope

but since you have 3-way's which run semi-passive then 710Hz at 12dB is fine for the crossover. Oh, wait, does that head unit allow you to set the "High" output so low???

maybe not.

bother huh?
better just to run all passive on the dyn's and get the installation right, and make sure they're getting enough clean power.

yap, the high output runs that low

I now have the full 3-way system in and have done a fair bit of playing around on it and it's sounding excellent!

Thanks for the advice guys

Its a good idea to fully SD the outer door skin as well. I've just finished doing mine (double layers) and the improvement is very noticeable. The midbass thumps harder and vocals etc are cleaner, more precise. IMH0

Lots of bandaids on my hands right now though, LOL

After having a few people sit in my car and have a listen there have been a few issues that I have been told that I should probably have a look into if I really want to compete in SQ classes.

Issue #1:

Sibilance. I need to lower 16k a few notches to get rid of the sibilance.

What I've done:

I've now started to play around a little bit with my EQ. I've got a few EQ points set with the 5band PEQ onboard the deck.

So far I'm only playing with the Top end side of the EQ as, as far as i'm concerned so far....... the lower end sounds REASONABLY good, unless i'm told otherwise anyways!

Starting in a reverse order, point 5 is set @ 16k with a 1.0 slope and -2. Second point is -10k with a 3.0 slope and -1.

Is there any other bits of advice that any one can give me (maybe common points that i should be playing with (even in the lower end) and I will decide when i'm playing if it sounds better or worse... or if it just rolls smoothly!

Issue #2:

Noise. There is a sort of "rainy" sound when played at fairly high levels (26-30/35) with tracks that are fairly low volume (EG some of the tuning cd's such as chesky records, my disc 2000).

What I've done:

I've sat there and gone, DAMNIT. I've found that while playing music off my I-Pod on the Alpine I-Pod adapter I do not experience much of this noise, but I do not have any of the low volume tracks such as chesky or my disc on there.

Any suggestions on what I should do to reduce this noise or even eliminate it?

if your tweets have sibilance running of the stock passive , they prolly need to be removed .If your running a custom combo setup with mismatched tweeter/passive crossover/midrange then its forgivable.Thats what i reakon anyway..........cors

any one else have any other suggestions...

Unfortunately there is no other way of running the splits... unfortunately i cannot afford another amp *plus space is a premium in an mr2!*

set your hu on flat EQ , then add a extension wire to the tweeter speaker wires so u can move them around.See if taking them closer or futher away fom the woofer reduces your SSSSSS factor, what about loooking at how the tweeters sound by them selves and also see how the woofers sounds by themself.....cors

If you want to meet-up sometime I'll have a go using my method. The only thing is time, I'm flat out lately and usually end up working Saturdays. I'll send you a pm and give you my number cos I don't go online every day.

cheers



Doug

thanks powervan. will def take you up on that offer once i have the subs going in the car.

This may sound insane, but have you tried to EQ up 20khz on a wide Q?

I had similar issue with exhageration of the 's' sounds from my tweeters up around say, 14khz-15khz which some may call 'sibilance'. The issue however was not what you'd expect..

Put on an RTA, the top end was actually extremely flat up to about 15khz after which it started to drop off quite heavilly. I'd say this is probably due to where I have located the tweeters, as they are slightly blocked.

Think about how a graph would look if it was pretty much flat to 14k, and then began to roll off exponentially. By the time you get to 20khz you are down by a huge amount, and so by comparison that 14khz point appears to be a peak (as it is so elevated so much compared to 16k+) and so you ears get fooled into thinking it's a peak.

How did I get rid of the so called 'sibilance'?

I actually increased 20khz on a wide Q to +12dB on my head unit, which result in a smooth increase that pretty much mirrored the drop off. According to RTA the top and is now within 1dB of flat all the way to 20khz, and the percieved 'sibilance' is gone.

Sounds crazy, I know, but it worked. With that single bit of EQ added in, these tweeters sound absolutely stunning.

Car audio can be a decieving game, sometimes.