Speakers/Sub/Amps install and base/select model audio information

[iexiak]

Strategy and need with the MME is different.

For sure! I've been toying with the idea of filling the rears with 6.5" subwoofers (maybe some of the Daytons IDK), but I think I'm going to go with a front sub. Getting the front doors to produce 80-100hz is almost fruitless due to their location and associated cancellations unfortunately.

If'n it makes you happy I would go for it! Just wanted to temper expectations and always want to encourage newbies to go for the easy targets first, but sounds like you have a plan!

Sponsored

 

[iexiak]

I'm back with huge updates! Since I last posted I've-

Moved the amps into the frunk!

Extended the sub box and switched from dual Kicker's with a passive radiator to quad Stereo Integrity BM-11's

Added 3.5" speakers to the A-pillars

Built a front sub into the passenger footwell

And showed my car at AXPONA!

Lets talk about the frunk - why? Really simply, I wanted to add an amplifier and just did not have the space for it. This initially was to accommodate the 3.5" speakers - I was already using all 6 channels on the Helix M6 DSP and would need another 2 amplified channels if I wanted to support the rears through my DSP. Because I disabled the factory tuning, a perfectly flat signal from the head unit to the rears would sound awful. I modeled out adding a shelf in the position I was using and just was not happy with the available space...so I stole inspiration from @Bba and decided to move my amplifier stack to the frunk. When I made this decision it opened up the possibility of not just another amp to drive the rears, but a larger amp for the subs in the trunk and repurposing the amp I was using that for a front sub. Will dig into why 3.5s and front sub in sections for those!

Moving to the frunk *really* simplifies a lot of this install - no more running 0 gauge wires through the firewall and trying to make them fit under the door trim. The power runs are short and we can use the factory battery grounding point which will reduce likelihood of ground loops occuring. That ground point is right next to one of the frunk bolts, which if using 0 gauge can make navigating the wires a pain. My connections look like this -

• Red circle is the ground point. You can see to the left of it where I've sanded away the paint...that's one of the bolts for the frunk itself. Don't make the same mistake haha. This bolt is funky and you'll need a deep socket to get off the factory ground - pretty sure it's funky like that to attach an alligator style jumper to.
• Blue circle are the 0 gauge anderson style connectors. I put these connectors for the positive/ground runs so that way the frunk is still easy to take out. I'm afraid that putting the amps in the frunk will make maintenance a nightmare for a Ford tech, so I've put a ton of effort into making this really easy to remove. It still takes 2 people - one to pull the frunk out slowly while a second person disconnects these connectors...but it is done without removing any bolts.
• Purple circle are Deutsche style connectors. These are all the runs that pass through the firewall - 12 16 gauge wires for the front 3-way speakers; 4 16 gauge wires for the rear coaxials; 2 12 gauge wires to the front sub; 2 10 gauge for the rear sub; and then 4 additional wires for future needs (thinking center channel may be in the future).
• Green circle are the battery connections for positive wire. These are MRBF fuses, which are rated for marine use. I really like this style over the usual in line car audio fuses. Each are rated for 200a
  

The space in the frunk for all this wiring is *tight*! If you are thinking about putting amps in the frunk, you'll need to spend time planning it out. Highly recommend taking the frunk in/out a few times with the wires in place before making cuts just to be 100% you aren't going to run into blockers. Speaking of - here's the first cut. The power cables will run in the corner circled in red to a distribution block (this takes 0 gauge down to 4 gauge to run 3 of the 4 amps, the 4th amp gets a dedicated 0 gauge). I chose this spot so that way if I wanted to remove the amps I could cover this back up and it would look factory.

The wires that run out of the bottom go through the factory drain port (and are labeled not that anyone can see these down there haha)

Some test fitting with the first 3 amplifiers -

And then the final amp is mounted with a half inch thick sheet of HDPE. All of the amps and hardware are held on with m4 heat threaded inserts.

From left to right -

• Infinity Kappa K1000 - this is driving the front sub at 600w
• Helix M6 DSP/Amp - this is taking the factory signal, doing DSP work (tuning and time alignment), and then has 6 100w amplified channels for the front 3 ways and 4 RCA outs that are feeding the other amps.
• Kicker CX360.4 - this is driving the rear door coaxials at 100w each
• Sundown Audio SALT-2 - this is driving the rear sub at 2000w. SALT - Sundown Audio Low Voltage Technology - means it's rated to do this power at 12 volts and not 14.4 volts that is common when looking at car audio amps. This is pretty necessary to get this kind of power out of our car.

A set of fans helps keep everything cool, though I'm not sure if they've even turned on yet.

Rebuilding the sub box - with more space available now that the amps are out of the way, I wanted to dig even deeper and get rid of the grills that stuck up above the box to get more flatness and space back. Step 1 for this was to cut the top off and then add a new corner to square it out.

The bottom of the box is fiberglass in layers of biaxial cloth and matt.

I got a 3d printer a few months ago and have been learning CAD! I designed and printed my own subwoofer mounts to lower the speakers down so the floor can go right on top. These are printed in Carbon Fiber ASA and then acetone welded together. Below you can see some of thesuccesful prints and some failures - turns out printing carbon fiber infused material will burn through extruders :/

Along with the mounts I printed out router templates that made routing the lid super easy-

A little paint to ensure any carpet misses are hidden -

aaaand the carpet -

I used some leftover CLD on the factory floor to reduce vibrations and some fibermat to stop rattles-

I'll be honest it sits higher than I want and I'll probably chop the top off one more time to drop it another inch...but it sounds incredible, so I don't have a lot of motivation to do that at the moment.

The dash pods - The location of the 6.5" woofer in our car leaves a lot to be desired. It's high enough that it helps bring the sound stage up, but low enough that it still feels like its coming from your feet. It's in a weird position where the left side will always have a null at 80hz and the right at 115hz due to reflections in the car; and we don't get any of the bass boost you would normally get from reflections off the floor because of it's height. I brought my tweeters as low as they could go (1500hz), but really felt like the sound stage needed to be higher. In comes the pods - these are Valicar pods with Focal 3.5WM. They are great at covering ~200-3000hz and really help a lot with imaging. There isn't much to say on installing these, drill a hole in the A-pillar and then they just bolt in. Easy enough to route wires up the a-pillar with some wire fishing tools. Search the forums for guides on removing the a-pillars. I didn't break any clips but it was not an easy in and out like many of the panels on this car. I did also swap out the a-pillars from the beige color to black, this makes it easy to return to factory at a later date.

Oh yeah! I did design and print the grills with the same carbon fiber ASA-

The front sub - I didn't take many pictures, this is a pretty straightforward MDF box set to fit in the available space. It's set to the right so to not block the foot heating for the passenger. My son is very offended at the loss of leg room, but my tall adult friends have no problem haha. It always seems like no matter how many clamps you have, you always need more...

My car had a couple open brackets right below the glove box for install (wonder what these are meant for?)

And the box is wrapped with a 2 layer hexagon vinyl to help tie it to the 3.5s

And some glamor shots of the subs with some trunk LEDS-

And because somebody out there will want a clipped video of these running (Loud noise warning)

 

[RockinVs]

My one question is... how does the crappy little 12v battery handle all this? LOL!

I'm worried about just adding a sub/amp. The 12v battery is small and weak.

 

[markboris]

My one question is... how does the crappy little 12v battery handle all this? LOL!

I'm worried about just adding a sub/amp. The 12v battery is small and weak.

I had the JL 12" sub with 400 watt amp for 3 years and never an issue. I did replace the battery right at 3 years though. I know several members that have the same setup and no one has ever mentioned problems with the battery. Traded in the '21 and put that sub/amp in the '24 and it's doing just fine.

 

[RockinVs]

I saw your thread on that. Was maybe going to go the same route.

Also, for the OP... under the glovebox used to have a beauty panel in the first couple years. It was removed later for... weight reduction? Probably cost savings, but I'll say weight reduction.

 

[markboris]

I saw your thread on that. Was maybe going to go the same route.

Also, for the OP... under the glovebox used to have a beauty panel in the first couple years. It was removed later for... weight reduction? Probably cost savings, but I'll say weight reduction.

The panel was there to reduce noise and was eliminated in '21 Job 2 cars so was only around for a few months. It has sound padding on the top side to reduce noise where the HVAC fan motor is and the recirculating air intake. They eliminated it because of cost, not weight saving. That panel weighs less than 1/4 lb I bet but costs around $90. I installed that missing panel back in both my '21 GT and '24 GT.

 

[iexiak]

My one question is... how does the crappy little 12v battery handle all this? LOL!

I'm worried about just adding a sub/amp. The 12v battery is small and weak.

And the DC/DC is big and strong. All of these wattage figures are with sine waves playing at max volume, that just doesn't happen in music. I did demos for 3 days straight without charging (no charging allowed in the venue) with no issues. I still need to get a voltage gauge setup to monitor but I don't really have any concerns/never noticed voltage drop or other weird problems that would usually be associated with not enough battery to run the system.

The panel was there to reduce noise and was eliminated in '21 Job 2 cars so was only around for a few months. It has sound padding on the top side to reduce noise where the HVAC fan motor is and the recirculating air intake. They eliminated it because of cost, not weight saving. That panel weighs less than 1/4 lb I bet but costs around $90. I installed that missing panel back in both my '21 GT and '24 GT.

ah that's interesting and makes sense. Glad they left these mounting points

 

[RockinVs]

And the DC/DC is big and strong. All of these wattage figures are with sine waves playing at max volume, that just doesn't happen in music. I did demos for 3 days straight without charging (no charging allowed in the venue) with no issues. I still need to get a voltage gauge setup to monitor but I don't really have any concerns/never noticed voltage drop or other weird problems that would usually be associated with not enough battery to run the system.

Interesting. I'm sure you have the car on so the high voltage battery is helping the 12v. I just know my old cars with bigger batteries (12v) would struggle with just my 500 watt system. Lights would dim under hard base, old class a/b amp. From what I've seen on this forum, the 12v battery and system aren't as robust as some. I'm no expert at all on this stuff. Just used to tinker back in the day... before kids.

 

[markboris]

Interesting. I'm sure you have the car on so the high voltage battery is helping the 12v. I just know my old cars with bigger batteries (12v) would struggle with just my 500 watt system. Lights would dim under hard base, old class a/b amp. From what I've seen on this forum, the 12v battery and system aren't as robust as some. I'm no expert at all on this stuff. Just used to tinker back in the day... before kids.

The last couple of systems I did in my cars I installed a dedicated battery for the stereo in the rear cargo area right at the amps. Never had an issue but then I did it just so the amps were never strained with power input. Seems like iexiak has it figured out and after reading his posts, I miss doing systems like this. ?

 

[Mach-e4x]

I'm back with huge updates! Since I last posted I've-

Moved the amps into the frunk!

Extended the sub box and switched from dual Kicker's with a passive radiator to quad Stereo Integrity BM-11's

Added 3.5" speakers to the A-pillars

Built a front sub into the passenger footwell

And showed my car at AXPONA!

Lets talk about the frunk - why? Really simply, I wanted to add an amplifier and just did not have the space for it. This initially was to accommodate the 3.5" speakers - I was already using all 6 channels on the Helix M6 DSP and would need another 2 amplified channels if I wanted to support the rears through my DSP. Because I disabled the factory tuning, a perfectly flat signal from the head unit to the rears would sound awful. I modeled out adding a shelf in the position I was using and just was not happy with the available space...so I stole inspiration from @Bba and decided to move my amplifier stack to the frunk. When I made this decision it opened up the possibility of not just another amp to drive the rears, but a larger amp for the subs in the trunk and repurposing the amp I was using that for a front sub. Will dig into why 3.5s and front sub in sections for those!

Moving to the frunk *really* simplifies a lot of this install - no more running 0 gauge wires through the firewall and trying to make them fit under the door trim. The power runs are short and we can use the factory battery grounding point which will reduce likelihood of ground loops occuring. That ground point is right next to one of the frunk bolts, which if using 0 gauge can make navigating the wires a pain. My connections look like this -

• Red circle is the ground point. You can see to the left of it where I've sanded away the paint...that's one of the bolts for the frunk itself. Don't make the same mistake haha. This bolt is funky and you'll need a deep socket to get off the factory ground - pretty sure it's funky like that to attach an alligator style jumper to.
• Blue circle are the 0 gauge anderson style connectors. I put these connectors for the positive/ground runs so that way the frunk is still easy to take out. I'm afraid that putting the amps in the frunk will make maintenance a nightmare for a Ford tech, so I've put a ton of effort into making this really easy to remove. It still takes 2 people - one to pull the frunk out slowly while a second person disconnects these connectors...but it is done without removing any bolts.
• Purple circle are Deutsche style connectors. These are all the runs that pass through the firewall - 12 16 gauge wires for the front 3-way speakers; 4 16 gauge wires for the rear coaxials; 2 12 gauge wires to the front sub; 2 10 gauge for the rear sub; and then 4 additional wires for future needs (thinking center channel may be in the future).
• Green circle are the battery connections for positive wire. These are MRBF fuses, which are rated for marine use. I really like this style over the usual in line car audio fuses. Each are rated for 200a
  

The space in the frunk for all this wiring is *tight*! If you are thinking about putting amps in the frunk, you'll need to spend time planning it out. Highly recommend taking the frunk in/out a few times with the wires in place before making cuts just to be 100% you aren't going to run into blockers. Speaking of - here's the first cut. The power cables will run in the corner circled in red to a distribution block (this takes 0 gauge down to 4 gauge to run 3 of the 4 amps, the 4th amp gets a dedicated 0 gauge). I chose this spot so that way if I wanted to remove the amps I could cover this back up and it would look factory.

The wires that run out of the bottom go through the factory drain port (and are labeled not that anyone can see these down there haha)

Some test fitting with the first 3 amplifiers -

And then the final amp is mounted with a half inch thick sheet of HDPE. All of the amps and hardware are held on with m4 heat threaded inserts.

From left to right -

• Infinity Kappa K1000 - this is driving the front sub at 600w
• Helix M6 DSP/Amp - this is taking the factory signal, doing DSP work (tuning and time alignment), and then has 6 100w amplified channels for the front 3 ways and 4 RCA outs that are feeding the other amps.
• Kicker CX360.4 - this is driving the rear door coaxials at 100w each
• Sundown Audio SALT-2 - this is driving the rear sub at 2000w. SALT - Sundown Audio Low Voltage Technology - means it's rated to do this power at 12 volts and not 14.4 volts that is common when looking at car audio amps. This is pretty necessary to get this kind of power out of our car.

A set of fans helps keep everything cool, though I'm not sure if they've even turned on yet.

Rebuilding the sub box - with more space available now that the amps are out of the way, I wanted to dig even deeper and get rid of the grills that stuck up above the box to get more flatness and space back. Step 1 for this was to cut the top off and then add a new corner to square it out.

The bottom of the box is fiberglass in layers of biaxial cloth and matt.

I got a 3d printer a few months ago and have been learning CAD! I designed and printed my own subwoofer mounts to lower the speakers down so the floor can go right on top. These are printed in Carbon Fiber ASA and then acetone welded together. Below you can see some of thesuccesful prints and some failures - turns out printing carbon fiber infused material will burn through extruders :/

Along with the mounts I printed out router templates that made routing the lid super easy-

A little paint to ensure any carpet misses are hidden -

aaaand the carpet -

I used some leftover CLD on the factory floor to reduce vibrations and some fibermat to stop rattles-

I'll be honest it sits higher than I want and I'll probably chop the top off one more time to drop it another inch...but it sounds incredible, so I don't have a lot of motivation to do that at the moment.

The dash pods - The location of the 6.5" woofer in our car leaves a lot to be desired. It's high enough that it helps bring the sound stage up, but low enough that it still feels like its coming from your feet. It's in a weird position where the left side will always have a null at 80hz and the right at 115hz due to reflections in the car; and we don't get any of the bass boost you would normally get from reflections off the floor because of it's height. I brought my tweeters as low as they could go (1500hz), but really felt like the sound stage needed to be higher. In comes the pods - these are Valicar pods with Focal 3.5WM. They are great at covering ~200-3000hz and really help a lot with imaging. There isn't much to say on installing these, drill a hole in the A-pillar and then they just bolt in. Easy enough to route wires up the a-pillar with some wire fishing tools. Search the forums for guides on removing the a-pillars. I didn't break any clips but it was not an easy in and out like many of the panels on this car. I did also swap out the a-pillars from the beige color to black, this makes it easy to return to factory at a later date.

Oh yeah! I did design and print the grills with the same carbon fiber ASA-

The front sub - I didn't take many pictures, this is a pretty straightforward MDF box set to fit in the available space. It's set to the right so to not block the foot heating for the passenger. My son is very offended at the loss of leg room, but my tall adult friends have no problem haha. It always seems like no matter how many clamps you have, you always need more...

My car had a couple open brackets right below the glove box for install (wonder what these are meant for?)

And the box is wrapped with a 2 layer hexagon vinyl to help tie it to the 3.5s

And some glamor shots of the subs with some trunk LEDS-

And because somebody out there will want a clipped video of these running (Loud noise warning)

And the DC/DC is big and strong. All of these wattage figures are with sine waves playing at max volume, that just doesn't happen in music. I did demos for 3 days straight without charging (no charging allowed in the venue) with no issues. I still need to get a voltage gauge setup to monitor but I don't really have any concerns/never noticed voltage drop or other weird problems that would usually be associated with not enough battery to run the system.




ah that's interesting and makes sense. Glad they left these mounting points

How much weight does it add? I would be concerned about how all that will effect the crash worthy ratings? in the front?

 

[Mach-e4x]

How much weight does it add? I would be concerned about how all that will effect the crash worthy ratings? in the front?

 

[xRowdyxBurnsx]

So happy I found this thread. So much good information!!!

I have a ‘23 with B&O I am about to start working on. Don’t quite have the cashflow for an absolutely stunning build like this but will work with what I have. I read somewhere that the stock electrical can only handle about 1000 RMS which results in Glitches on the Factory electrical. Your build debunks that completely!!!

My biggest issue right now is whether to go ported or sealed for subwoofer. Coming from a ported build that was in a trunk so Mach E is totally different.

I would like to know your thoughts on this. I listen to all types of music. I like a punch but I also like some low pressure.

Already have a Monoblock and DSP from my last vehicle. Also have three boxes, sealed, 4th order Bandpass reflex and a ported box, all 12”. None of them fit what I want to do which is to save trunk space like you have. I’m an ideal build, I would go 15” sealed but that is going to require custom work.

Choosing Components, a 3.5” and a 4 channel should be the easier part.

Hope I can get some feedback on the sub setup since I have never done a build in a SUV/Hatchback. Thanks!!!

 

[stoopid]

For sure! I've been toying with the idea of filling the rears with 6.5" subwoofers (maybe some of the Daytons IDK), but I think I'm going to go with a front sub. Getting the front doors to produce 80-100hz is almost fruitless due to their location and associated cancellations unfortunately.

If'n it makes you happy I would go for it! Just wanted to temper expectations and always want to encourage newbies to go for the easy targets first, but sounds like you have a plan!

Just doing my own followup on my prior thread hijack -- the rear door speaker swap added a little more bass but more importantly the overall clarity improved and for my fairly limited use, the stock system is proving to be adequate. I think a small sub, similar to what they include with the premium audio option, would fill things in nicely but it's more work than my hour or two weekly of driving justifies. I've been able to EQ things very satisfactory. For what they are, the front door 6.5" speakers create enough bass for the primarily rock and metal I listen to.

My biggest issue right now is whether to go ported or sealed for subwoofer. Coming from a ported build that was in a trunk so Mach E is totally different.

I would like to know your thoughts on this. I listen to all types of music. I like a punch but I also like some low pressure.
...

Hope I can get some feedback on the sub setup since I have never done a build in a SUV/Hatchback. Thanks!!!

I've had two SUVs in the past with modestly upgraded systems, one ported and one sealed similar size/output subs, and it didn't matter a lot. I find the quality of the speaker, amp, total system output, and box placement/vehicle's inherent acoustics matters more. It sounds like you have as much experience (or more) than me, so you might know this intuitively already (or at least you asking and expressing uncertainty hints that this is the case). You're just going to have to flip a coin and roll up your sleeves.

 

[iexiak]

How much weight does it add? I would be concerned about how all that will effect the crash worthy ratings? in the front?

The sub box is ~100lbs without subs in it. The subs weigh 16lbs each, so another 64lbs. The amps including the tub are an easy lift, probably around 70lbs or so. I can't find weights listed for all the amps unfortunately. I probably have at least 100lbs of sound deadening. I don't think this affects crash rating in any way? Maybe the sub box being fiberglass messes with the crumple zone of the trunk...but if the trunk is crumpling that much we are talking about some serious forces, I'd imagine magnitudes past what strength the fiberglass is adding. I do have slight concerns with the side curtain air bags and a-pillar speaker pods, but they are solidly mounted and well away from the angle where they would stop the air bags from deploying so I'm not that concerned. The frunk is designed to hold cargo and I have 0 concerns about anything I've done affecting front crash crumple zones.

I have a ‘23 with B&O I am about to start working on.

Awesome and good luck! Since you have a DSP you'll be able to fix the factory signal which is great...but you will not be able to get a flat signal straight out of the headunit like I did because you are getting the signal after the B&O amp. I have not had a chance to measure what comes out of a B&O, so you might find that it actually pushes down to 20hz with no rolloff but I have some doubts...

Hope I can get some feedback on the sub setup since I have never done a build in a SUV/Hatchback

and it didn't matter a lot. I find the quality of the speaker, amp, total system output, and box placement/vehicle's inherent acoustics matters more.

I'm going to echo @stoopid. Given WinISD you can tune a ported/sealed/4th/6th/etc to have pretty much the same output. Especially with a DSP you can fix a lot of box issues after the fact.

Adding a port means that you must add a subsonic filter to protect the sub from over-excursion. I tend to listen to a lot of music with low hz content and am pretty sensitive to 20-40hz sounding quieter than 40-80hz. It just feels like the floor is dropped out, and a lot of modern artists hide undertones under the fundamental notes (especially in electronic music) that get washed away if the sub can't carry it right.

The good news is that in all cars we get some cabin gain that can help mitigate this subsonic filter we'll need. The bad news is that we get reverse cabin gain around 60-70hz depending on seat position. Roughly explained below.

Putting the sub under the floor and as far back as possible helps mitigate this, but you can expect in our car for the sub to play well 15-50hz and then just start tanking. No amount of boosting the sub will get you more output, simply because the waves are interfering with each other in 2 path lengths (sub to trunk door and front window to listener) causing standing waves.


At any rate this is a really long-winded way of saying I've been fighting for more response in the 60-80hz range. We run into this exact same problem from the front doors - they both encounter nulls do to the wavelength between speaker/listener/front window/other door side.

the rear door speaker swap added a little more bass but more importantly the overall clarity improved

I've actually been playing a lot with using my rear speakers to fill in more between 60-80hz. It actually works out really well because while they experience nulls like the rear sub and front doors, they are different nulls. Turns out having multiple speakers playing the same frequency is a good thing, though you'll fight phase to get it perfect.




Realizing now I didn't super answer your question @xRowdyxBurnsx...I kinda prefer a sealed sub in most applications just because it's so much easier to build and not mess up. The passive radiator setup I had before was good, but my sealed setup now is great. Could you make a ported setup that's great? Absolutely....

but now that I've been competing it's almost a meme that sound quality competitors either have giant holes in their car to vent the sub to the exterior for infinite baffle setups or stick to sealed boxes. Loudness competitors are almost 100% ported/4th or walled setups. IMHO you will have an overall much easier time building a sealed box and using your DSP to dial in the way you want it to sound. There's a lot less to worry about like port placement/bracing in a sealed box, especially when considering packaging it under the floor.

 

[Vice]

The sub box is ~100lbs without subs in it. The subs weigh 16lbs each, so another 64lbs. The amps including the tub are an easy lift, probably around 70lbs or so. I can't find weights listed for all the amps unfortunately. I probably have at least 100lbs of sound deadening. I don't think this affects crash rating in any way? Maybe the sub box being fiberglass messes with the crumple zone of the trunk...but if the trunk is crumpling that much we are talking about some serious forces, I'd imagine magnitudes past what strength the fiberglass is adding. I do have slight concerns with the side curtain air bags and a-pillar speaker pods, but they are solidly mounted and well away from the angle where they would stop the air bags from deploying so I'm not that concerned. The frunk is designed to hold cargo and I have 0 concerns about anything I've done affecting front crash crumple zones.



Awesome and good luck! Since you have a DSP you'll be able to fix the factory signal which is great...but you will not be able to get a flat signal straight out of the headunit like I did because you are getting the signal after the B&O amp. I have not had a chance to measure what comes out of a B&O, so you might find that it actually pushes down to 20hz with no rolloff but I have some doubts...






I'm going to echo @stoopid. Given WinISD you can tune a ported/sealed/4th/6th/etc to have pretty much the same output. Especially with a DSP you can fix a lot of box issues after the fact.

Adding a port means that you must add a subsonic filter to protect the sub from over-excursion. I tend to listen to a lot of music with low hz content and am pretty sensitive to 20-40hz sounding quieter than 40-80hz. It just feels like the floor is dropped out, and a lot of modern artists hide undertones under the fundamental notes (especially in electronic music) that get washed away if the sub can't carry it right.

The good news is that in all cars we get some cabin gain that can help mitigate this subsonic filter we'll need. The bad news is that we get reverse cabin gain around 60-70hz depending on seat position. Roughly explained below.

Putting the sub under the floor and as far back as possible helps mitigate this, but you can expect in our car for the sub to play well 15-50hz and then just start tanking. No amount of boosting the sub will get you more output, simply because the waves are interfering with each other in 2 path lengths (sub to trunk door and front window to listener) causing standing waves.


At any rate this is a really long-winded way of saying I've been fighting for more response in the 60-80hz range. We run into this exact same problem from the front doors - they both encounter nulls do to the wavelength between speaker/listener/front window/other door side.


I've actually been playing a lot with using my rear speakers to fill in more between 60-80hz. It actually works out really well because while they experience nulls like the rear sub and front doors, they are different nulls. Turns out having multiple speakers playing the same frequency is a good thing, though you'll fight phase to get it perfect.




Realizing now I didn't super answer your question @xRowdyxBurnsx...I kinda prefer a sealed sub in most applications just because it's so much easier to build and not mess up. The passive radiator setup I had before was good, but my sealed setup now is great. Could you make a ported setup that's great? Absolutely....

but now that I've been competing it's almost a meme that sound quality competitors either have giant holes in their car to vent the sub to the exterior for infinite baffle setups or stick to sealed boxes. Loudness competitors are almost 100% ported/4th or walled setups. IMHO you will have an overall much easier time building a sealed box and using your DSP to dial in the way you want it to sound. There's a lot less to worry about like port placement/bracing in a sealed box, especially when considering packaging it under the floor.

Hi,
It looks great but how about a video sound test of how it sounds sitting in the front seat to experience how it sounds to You, that would be great
Thanks for sharing.

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