I need Midbass

[Nirvalica]

Since I got zero responses to my thread in the mids-highs section, I'm going to repost it in this section to get some responses....

As you can see in my sig, I have an 18" woofer tuned low and a pair of 6.5" comps in the front doors. I just installed my new kenwood hu and got all the DTA and positioning set up. Front stage sounds great, real similar to my studio monitors image and sq-wise. Only problem I have is that the front comps don't play midbass very well. They are shallow mount because my doors aren't very deep, so it makes sense that they aren't great for midbass. Now what I want to do is take a pair of 6.5" ID CTX mids I have and port them and have them sit behind my back seat. I will time align them with the front stage, so hopefully it should sound more like the front stage. My questions are

A. What should I tune to? I was thinking 80 hz.

B. Will the ID speakers work alright, and if not, should I buy 6.5" subs or 6.5" woofers?

C. What should I cross them over at? I was thinking around 60-200hz and have my sub play up to around 65-70hz

Please let me know what you think.

[Nirvalica]

My only conclusion is no one has experience with this...

[Gavinvoy]

kinda a strange request dont you think?

you dont usually associate good music with a rear stage, and yet you have a rear stage and in addition you want to run more rear stage?

i have no experience with this kind of thing, but it seems like every extra speaker ive seen has been in a sealed box. but at the same time, i thought that speakers were mostly free air. i know some people have said that they have less low end response when they put their speakers into door pods cause they are taking free air speakers and enclosing them.

i dont know what you drive, but is a kick pannel speaker enclosure from qlogic or some customs ones available? or fiberglassing the rear portion of your door for some regular sized speakers?

Edited January 15, 2010 by Gavinvoy

[Nirvalica]

kinda a strange request dont you think?

you dont usually associate good music with a rear stage, and yet you have a rear stage and in addition you want to run more rear stage?

i have no experience with this kind of thing, but it seems like every extra speaker ive seen has been in a sealed box. but at the same time, i thought that speakers were mostly free air. i know some people have said that they have less low end response when they put their speakers into door pods cause they are taking free air speakers and enclosing them.

i dont know what you drive, but is a kick pannel speaker enclosure from qlogic or some customs ones available? or fiberglassing the rear portion of your door for some regular sized speakers?

Well, I heard different info about at what frequency sound becomes omnidirectional. I've heard people say above 50hz is directional, and i've heard below 300hz is omnidirectional. Now say that the latter is correct, I will have these speakers time aligned so it will sound like it is coming from the front. There are kickpods for my car, but I don't know how much that'll help with midbass. I don't really want to mess with fiberglass.

Now I was also thinking that these speakers might not work well sealed. I know door speakers are usually meant to be free air, so if they won't work well, I was considering buying some new 6.5" drivers. Then my question would be to buy "woofers" or "subwoofers" for this application. I know Steve used subwoofers in his front doors, so I could probably use something like that.

[TahoeJoe]

Since I got zero responses to my thread in the mids-highs section, I'm going to repost it in this section to get some responses....

As you can see in my sig, I have an 18" woofer tuned low and a pair of 6.5" comps in the front doors. I just installed my new kenwood hu and got all the DTA and positioning set up. Front stage sounds great, real similar to my studio monitors image and sq-wise. Only problem I have is that the front comps don't play midbass very well. They are shallow mount because my doors aren't very deep, so it makes sense that they aren't great for midbass. Now what I want to do is take a pair of 6.5" ID CTX mids I have and port them and have them sit behind my back seat. I will time align them with the front stage, so hopefully it should sound more like the front stage. My questions are

A. What should I tune to? I was thinking 80 hz.

B. Will the ID speakers work alright, and if not, should I buy 6.5" subs or 6.5" woofers?

C. What should I cross them over at? I was thinking around 60-200hz and have my sub play up to around 65-70hz

Please let me know what you think.

80hz is fine for a freq response general start point but you need to first look up the CTX model and check the freq response zone of the speakers. Many mids don’t start at 80hz and may start response around 100hz. Even though I think you have other issues more pressing, if your mids were not designed to recreate a freq that low you may be out of luck having your current mids sound the way you want them to.

What type of vehicle is this set up in? Is the sub in the same airspace as your mids? (all in the cabin or sub in the trunk?) What is the cut off freq of your sub? You said it is tuned low but how low are we talking?(not box tuning but crossover wise) How are you crossing the mids over? Amp high pass? What are your settings adjusted to?

Other than my questions keep in mind that you have only 2- 6.5's competing with an 18 on your human ears. Sounds properties make perfect sense but almost all studies have been recorded in controlled environments (ideal space, temp, constant controlled power etc) and don’t always work in theory inside a terrible acoustical environment. (all cars) Have you listened to the mids with the sub off? If so, are they responding to the midbass freq or just sound like shit on the good midbass notes? If they sound good you may need additional mids to achieve a complete sound.

[Nirvalica]

80hz is fine for a freq response general start point but you need to first look up the CTX model and check the freq response zone of the speakers. Many mids don’t start at 80hz and may start response around 100hz. Even though I think you have other issues more pressing, if your mids were not designed to recreate a freq that low you may be out of luck having your current mids sound the way you want them to.

What type of vehicle is this set up in? Is the sub in the same airspace as your mids? (all in the cabin or sub in the trunk?) What is the cut off freq of your sub? You said it is tuned low but how low are we talking?(not box tuning but crossover wise) How are you crossing the mids over? Amp high pass? What are your settings adjusted to?

Other than my questions keep in mind that you have only 2- 6.5's competing with an 18 on your human ears. Sounds properties make perfect sense but almost all studies have been recorded in controlled environments (ideal space, temp, constant controlled power etc) and don’t always work in theory inside a terrible acoustical environment. (all cars) Have you listened to the mids with the sub off? If so, are they responding to the midbass freq or just sound like shit on the good midbass notes? If they sound good you may need additional mids to achieve a complete sound.

This would be going into a 95 Jeep GC, so obviously the sub is in the same airspace as the rest of them. I have the sub crossed over around 70hz, but the box is tuned to 28hz. The front mid drivers I have crossed over at like 100hz (they are shallow mount woofers and couldn't take too low of a crossover) and the rear drivers (the ID's) I have playing like 60-200hz. They can play low and sound good, but just not loud enough. That's why I was thinking of building a ported box for them.

[jbondox]

you can time align all day the rear speakers, but if mounted behind your back seat... they are still behind the back seat... what SQ is that going to do?

maybe get some better gear, tune the system better, or better design it.

[TahoeJoe]

This would be going into a 95 Jeep GC, so obviously the sub is in the same airspace as the rest of them. I have the sub crossed over around 70hz, but the box is tuned to 28hz. The front mid drivers I have crossed over at like 100hz (they are shallow mount woofers and couldn't take too low of a crossover) and the rear drivers (the ID's) I have playing like 60-200hz. They can play low and sound good, but just not loud enough. That's why I was thinking of building a ported box for them.

Ok speaking in general about your set up. In the rear you have 18" sub 70hz and 6.5" starting at 60hz. You can pretty much forget about hearing your rear mids from 60hz-80hz because they are competing with an 18 at full RMS power. Now if you start your freq for mids at 70hz you need to up your mid power across the board. You will need more power and cone area (add'l 6.5s) to hear an audible difference in the mid bass. May even want to look to 8" subs in a small enclosure for this.

If money is an issue I would move the mids up front and concentrate on your front stage only until you can dump some cash into it. Plus even though your sub is a Q you may want to consider downsizing if you aim is to achieve solid SQ.

Don’t know what else to tell you but unfortunately you can’t fix your problems without cash. For instance I have 2 18’s with 1200w per sub and I have 6-6.5 and 6-1” tweets. I still need more balance.

[mad drunx]

Hell no to the 6.5 in a ported box lol.Add more speakers to front and back and or bigger speaker's such as 8's or 10's.Sub = bass, woofer or midbass speaker=midbass.You can try some pro audio stuff such as b and c,selinium,rcf,beyma,or powerbass.Or go to usspeaker.sea ow em Just my opinion though.

Edit =Ohh yea, and man up and do some fiberglass.

Edited January 17, 2010 by mad drunx

[mr.p]

id do 2 8" prosound woofers, UNDER your seats and target the 70-500hz range. Lower the frequency the less "directional" the sound is, in other words a tweeter has to point at your head, a midbass would not.