6x9 Behind the Passenger Seat?

[bgsterling]

Hi all,

I've spent a good chunk of this day thinking about and researching some speakers for my Exige and could use a little help kicking around an idea. Here's what I'm setting out to do:

• Fill in the bottom end a little with some bass (not thumping, just some depth)
• Install a completely hidden system (nothing on the rear deck)
• Avoid any real impact to the passenger footwell (Stealthbox is out)
• Not spend a fortune or create an audiophile setup

I've been thinking about the minimal space behind the passenger seat. Using the soon-to-be-patented Playdoh method and confirmed with the less-accurate-but-also-soon-to-be-patented twist tie method, there is 2 1/4" between the passenger seat and the firewall as long as it's measured in the center of the seat (more recessed than the sides). The thinnest subwoofer I found had a mounting depth of 2 9/16 and the thinnest amplified subwoofer I found was 2.8" (roughly 2 3/4"). Both are out for the passenger seat (although I could put them behind the driver's seat and lose a click or two). With subwoofers out, I turned to 6x9 speakers and stumbled on these:

Retrosound-R-69N

Mounting depth on these speakers is only 1 13/16", so they'll fit. Spec wise, they fall in between the Polk DB651 and the JL 6.5" sub, two of the common "need some bass" solutions on LotusTalk:

Retrosound v JL v Polk

• Sensitivity (db): 90 v 80 v 92
• Low Frequency (hz): 40 v 30 v 50
• RMS Power (watts): 2-100 v 40-150 v 6-55
• Peak Power (watts): 200 v 300 v 165

Here's the idea I'd like some feedback on:

• Buy one or two of the Retrosounds
• Put them in a small box built to fit behind the passenger seat
• Wire them either directly to the headunit (JVC KD-AX2) or through a small amp (something like 25w x 2)
• Use a low-pass crossover to remove the high frequencies

Ultimately, use them to fill in the bass even though they're not really subwoofers.

I know there are some hardcore car audio guys on the board with some nice setups, but that's not what I'm looking for here. It doesn't make sense to me to drop big money into this buzzy, echo chamber of car (I say that with love). Plus, since I don't have the touring pack, the buzz and echoes are, arguably, even greater in my car.

Thoughts?

-Brad

[Lancia]

I have never heard of these.
Why not the more efficient Polks?

Double check your measurements.
Some speakers are measured in bizarre ways now.

You have room for a pair?

Also, no such thing as peak wattage without other info.
Meaningless.

[Lancia]

Also, you may want an actual crossover to keep everything balanced.
A low pass filter by itself is only a filter, not a crossover.
Unless the point is set very low, you will hear the overlap.

If the boxes are too small, you may have less bass than with better sized cabinets.
Sounds wrong, but is often true.
You may wish to experiment with some mockups.

[...m...]

...a properly sized and sealed enclosure will be key to hearing any significant improvements, orders of magnitude more significant than the driver size...

[Viggen]

I would think you would be better off getting a pair of 6.5's & throwing them in a box instead of the 6x9's. Room sounds like it will be tight & w/o enough air in the box the SQ will suck. A pair of 6.5's in a smallish sealed box actually sounds pretty good (not sure what it sounds like in a lotus) & you will need a amp. Get something larger then 25w, 50w RMS+ is what I would do & be sure it has a internal x-over so you can take the highs out.

A few companies have slimline 6.5's & even 8in speakers, I would consider those

[bgsterling]

Thanks for the feedback from everyone. Keep it coming. Here a couple answers/thoughts back:

Originally Posted by Lancia

I have never heard of these.
Why not the more efficient Polks?

Double check your measurements.
Some speakers are measured in bizarre ways now.

You have room for a pair?

I've never heard of these speakers before either. I just stumbled on them during my research. I'd like to listen to them to see if they're even an option, but don't know of a local dealer yet. Regarding the Polks, while they're more efficient, their bass range is more shallow than these Retrosounds (50hz vs 40hz). Since I'm trying to drive a little bass, I'm erring towards the deeper range rather than sensitivity.

The measurements are taken from the product manual. While it doesn't t show a diagram of their measuring points, it's a pretty simple speaker with a thin metal frame and no grill. Besides, even if it's mounting depth is greater than 1.7", I still have a 1/2" of cushion. Regardless, I doubt I'll have room for a pair unless I put the second one behind the driver's seat (lose a click or two) or under the passenger side dash (that would require a pretty unique box).

Originally Posted by ...m...

...a properly sized and sealed enclosure will be key to hearing any significant improvements, orders of magnitude more significant than the driver size...

Understood. Again, if the mounting depths are accurate, the speaker will mount successfully behind the seat with the cone parallel to the back of the passenger seat and the magnet parallel to the firewall. This gives me the space between the passenger seat and firewall to build a properly sized box. While it would be a very thin box, I would have some flexibility to build it wider and taller. The larger, but still ultra thin, Pioneer 8" subwoofer requires 0.15 cu ft to 0.5 cu ft in a sealed box with 0.4 cu ft being recommended. I'd think this would take something similar or less (hoping for manufacturer or reseller input here). Plus, these speakers are designed to be free air in a trunk or dash of an old American car. While not ideal, it may still work this way. Hell, the passenger space of the Exige is about the size of the trunk of a 60s Caddy.

Originally Posted by Viggen

A few companies have slimline 6.5's & even 8in speakers, I would consider those

I agree that a true sub will sound better. That's where I started. I found a lot of thin subwoofers, but none would fit in the space. The thinnest mounting depth for a sub I found was the Pioneer TS-SW841D at 2 9/16". That's 5/16" deeper than I've got space for behind the seat. Add in the box's wall thickness and it's even deeper. I'm not in love with these Retrosounds. I've never even heard them. If you know of a 6.5" or 8" with a 2 1/4" mounting depth, I'd be really interested.

[...m...]

...have you looked at chuck risen's package shelf subwoofer enclosure?..he's not selling it separately from complete systems anymore, but basic concept is sound if you feel up to fabricating something similar...

...i'm running 5-1/4" polk db component midrange drivers in the rear (just tossed the tweeters aside) with 4" coaxial polk db speakers up front, and am pretty satisfied with the sound i'm getting from the stock head unit and speaker locations...it's not audiophile quality, but it certainly sounds good enough, far better than the stock speakers and perfectly listenable given the 111's acoustic environment...

...i actually have an 8" subwoofer on order with chuck risen's package shelf enclosure to install with separate amplification and a nicer head unit at some point in the future, but i'm quite content with just the basic polk db speaker swap in the interim - my bass mightn't be profound, but neither is it unlistenably anemic anymore...

[Lancia]

I wouldn't take the specs too seriously.
Polk may simply be more honest.

Crutchfield thinks the component sensitivity specs from polk are too optimistic, by the way. (relative to their one piece drivers)
Best brand for cost I know of though.
Polk has a shallow mount speaker but they mean shallow on the outside.

[Viggen]

I found one that's needs 2 in however it's a 13in sub, so much for that

On woofersetc.com I only saw the pioneer sub you mentioned

I didn't think of this but if there isn't enough room between the speaker & the back seat sound could be muffled somewhat.

I would just do what someone else did on this site & throw in a pair of JL 6.5 in subs in the oem rear location..... then again I don't have a lotus to go look at & figure out what I do or don't want

[bgsterling]

Originally Posted by Viggen

I found one that's needs 2 in however it's a 13in sub, so much for that

I saw that one too. I think it was JL Audio. Pretty impressive, if it works. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that it does. I think they want like $500 for it.

Originally Posted by Viggen

I would just do what someone else did on this site & throw in a pair of JL 6.5 in subs in the oem rear location

I may still consider that. I walked away from that thread understanding that the sound wasn't optimal because the rear wasn't sealed enough. Also, I don't remember, if that car had the track pack harness bar. I was checking out the rear speakers in my car and had to flex the rear, plastic cover to get the grills off. I'm not sure there would be room for the 6.5". I should probably go back and check.

-Brad

[Viggen]

If I recall whoever installed the 6.5 JL sub made a spacer ring to push the speaker out from where it sits. Doesn't a 5.25 sit there normally?

[gpheck]

Originally Posted by bgsterling

I saw that one too. I think it was JL Audio. Pretty impressive, if it works. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that it does. I think they want like $500 for it.



I may still consider that. I walked away from that thread understanding that the sound wasn't optimal because the rear wasn't sealed enough. Also, I don't remember, if that car had the track pack harness bar. I was checking out the rear speakers in my car and had to flex the rear, plastic cover to get the grills off. I'm not sure there would be room for the 6.5". I should probably go back and check.

-Brad

6.5 will fit in the rear, but you will need to make spacer rings due to depth of most 6.5, or even 5.5 speakers.

I don't like the idea of subwoofers or any serious (large/highpower) speakers in the rear because you'd need a sealed enclosure for it not to sound like crap.

I don't like the idea of larger speakers in the rear becasue the sound won't be balanced at all (small speakers with bad placement up front), and realistically you're wasting your time putting much back there because the seats completely block the speakers.

Sound imaging is probably the most important part of good sound.. the elise/exige completely sucks for sound.. Imaging is bad due to speaker locations, the car is a rattle trap, and there is no sound absorbtion whatsoever in the car, so IMO there's no reason to have an audiophile setup in the car...

that said - heres my setup

- pdx 5 ... 75x4 and 300x1 (mounted in passenger airbag location)

- 2 sets (4) jl audio vr 5.25" (.5" rings in the back for depth clearance)

- Kenwood excelon kvt-819 dvd headunit

- ipod and iphone 3g jack on passenger side... 120mb usb hard-drive also

- Navigation module, hd radio module, also had the bluetooth, but you cant hear anything in the car anyway so I scrapped that and put it in my truck (all of these (and the excelon dvd unit etc are mounted under the dash behind the drivers side guage cluster)

- 10" Blaupunkt subwoofer in custom easily removed box in footwell (yes this subwoofer is a cheap crappy sub, but I bought it for the box - it was a complete setup and the sub turned out not to be that bad so I kept it in there



.... If I had it to do all over again, I'd just get a set of earphones and an ipod


I track my car, so I take the sub out when I do... I also have harness bar/6pt harness setup, so I was very limited on the options for the rear

[A7594217]

Originally Posted by bgsterling

I saw that one too. I think it was JL Audio. Pretty impressive, if it works. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that it does. I think they want like $500 for it.

I might not be able to read but what are you guys talking about here. Can you post a link please

[Viggen]

Originally Posted by A7594217

I might not be able to read but what are you guys talking about here. Can you post a link please

this is the one I was talking about....

Thin-13 - Power Acoustik Shallow-Mount 13" Dual 4 ohms Subwoofer

just saw thisone

Stealth-13 - Soundstream 13.5" Shallow Mount Subwoofer

both of which I would think would be to big for your cars....

[jlj3394]

If you don't care about quality, you can shoehorn one of those Kenwood powered subs behind the passenger seat. You'll need some velcro to keep it from sliding around on the package shelf.

IMO, the 5 1/4 spacer rings sold by Jim_clayton offer the biggest sound improvement for the Elise. You have to spend sick amounts of money to get 4 inchers worth a crap, while there are plenty of good sounding 5 1/4s speakers out there for good prices.

We've got the Polk DB651S (the S stands for shallow) in the rear and they do well back there and can be purchased for a song.

My winter plan is as follows:

8 or 10 inch sub in a custom enclosure behind the driver's seat. I know what you're thinking: "hey moron, you gotta seal that for it to work worth a hoot!" I understand this and plan on fabbing a whole panel peice with an extra that I bought on here, a lot of dremeling, and a lot of fiberglass.

Any ideas to help me would be greatly appreciated. Right now I'm thinking that the foam comes out and dynamat comes in.

The biggest question revolves around where I'm going to locate the sub. I've thought about the middle, but I really don't want to lose the storage space. I'm considering under the stock speaker location, but open to suggestions.

[stinkyonion]

I would recommend an amp in the trunk, then chuck risens subwoofer and 6.5 inch slimlines in the back. If chuck risens solution is too expensive (like $700 i think), then instead would get 6 inch subs in the back with speaker rings to increase the volume and upgrade the front speakers to 5.25 alpines. You wont be able to use a harness bar with speaker rings though.

You have to choose between foot space and rear shelf for a real subwoofer. You still wont get enough cubic feet for a 10 inch sub, forgeddaboutit. I have listened to chucks, and with about .25 cubic feet and 8 inch sub next to your shoulder it cranks a surprising amount of bass with thump you will feel. Never heard the stealthbox, but there are plans for doityourself stealthbox early on in the audio forum if you want to go cheap.

Replaceing the whole real panel and making a new one. Hmmmm. Ive taken my rear panel out like 10 times now, considered this, and gave it up because didnt think fiberglass would be durable enough for the compression fit and amount of flexing required to place it. Instead, think you would have to destroy the stock rear panel by cutting a big rectangle in it, remove the foam entirely, and make a larger fiberglass insert than Chuck's. I considered this but was chicken unless I can get another rear panel cheap, and you would still loose much of the rear shelf.

[bgsterling]

Thanks all. I appreciate the input. But referring back to my original post, my intent here was to not use the parcel shelf, not impact the passenger footwell, and not create an audiophile or big booming setup. I'm just looking for a little more depth to the music. My thought was that the Retrosound thin 6x9 could be boxed and driven with an appropriate filter/x-over to deliver that little bit more, all the while being tucked behind the passenger seat. The parcel shelf stays empty. The passenger footwell isn't impacted. The imaging would remain just as crappy as it is now with me hearing my left rear channel and my right front channel. The difference should be slightly deeper base compared to the Polks that is omni-directional and helps fill the space. At least that's the hope.

-Brad