Any of you fellow vert owners have your cars set up with amps and subwoofers? If yes, can you post some pics of your set ups? Im looking at improving my set up and would like to get some ideas. Tnxs, John

Sorry no pics, but after a little experimentation I settled for the simplest solution; a Bazooka bass tube.
I previously had a 10" plate mounted sub in the trunk but with the top down at highway speeds the sound was dissapointing.
The speakers I am running now are Pioneer plates in the dash,
Pioneer tweeters mounted on L-brackets way up under the dash (almost invisible but a world of difference) Phoenix Gold drivers in the rear quarters and Phoenix Gold tweeters mounted above and forward of the rear drivers.
All are driven by Sony amps via a Pioneer head unit.
This setup may or may not appeal to you, I am an older driver (46) and a jazz fan; while I like to play it loud, audio purity and imaging are important to me.
Both are nearly impossible to achieve in a convertible.

Hi StarGate,
I removed my back seats and built a custom subwoofer box.
The box holds 2 10" subs.

It sounds awesome! You just need to get a powerful amp and ensure that the boxes are sealed correctly.

OHH where to start........back when my car was not in many pieces and I was real big into car audio...

My setup was as followed.....

custom box in trunk with 2 12" Phoenx gold subs
PG zpa 0.5 in right hand (spare tire) custom mounted carpeted
in the left was also cutome mounted zpa 0.3
port in the middle of box......

Now the probleb lies in that the subs pointed straight up at the deck lid which most of the deck lid absorbed the bass so I built a funnel type box over the subs to redirect it into the cabin...(which would only work well with the back seat down) otherwise again absorbed by the back seat.....If I remember this gained me about 15 D.B. all in all I think I maxed out at around 135 D.B. I had molded pods in the kick panels for 5.5 inch componets and tweets in the dash......and 10 inch in the rear panels.


Trust me when I say our cars (ragtops) are not designed for an awsome sound system......mine was ample at the time but Im sure all my stuff is out of date as it sits among the many other parts in my garage....

Sorry no pics

Thanks fo the input so far. I replace my front speakers with Clarion 4X6 2 ways. Sure made a big differance. I can hear things now that I couldnt in the past.

As for the rear speakers I was surprized to see they were 6.5 inch rounds vs 5X8's or 6X9's.

Do the rest of you vert owners have 6 in rounds too? I would like to have a bigger speaker in the back. Anyone done 5X8 or 6X9's in the back of these verts? If yes, any clearance problems?

Tnxs,
John

yes there are clearance problems with the 6x9's. They don't fit. Previous owner had evenm cut that aluminum brace to try to get them to fit...no luck.

I recently switched my 6x9's for some infinity 6002i 6.5's. Sound improvement YES..and they actually fit. I can hear music now that the 6x9 crammed in to the undersized space and basiclaly resting on the outer skin could never give me.

I did have to make some 'custom' plates to fit the holes that had been cut in the sail panel for the 6x9's. Used masonite and covered it with black vinyl. Used black since my sail panels are black.

I have always tried to stray away from oval speakers ie 6X9 As I have herad the soud quality just isnt there......Like I said eariler I squeezed 10'' in my rear panal but it took some wood spacers........alot of bondo.....and some carpet......

My convertible has AWESOME SOUND!!! I built a custom single 10" enclosure in the trunk. I put a pair of 6x8 alpines in the rear panels with small enclosures. And I am planning on getting a set of CDT 6.5" components for the front kick panels I have. The sub is run off a mono channel amp. And the CDT components will be run off of a 2-channel amp that I have. The Alpines in the rear are run off the deck. Many of my friends told me that its hard if not impossible to get good bass with a drop-top. I proved them all wrong. My car has awesome bass even with the top down!

I aggree that oval speakers dont have the clarity that round speakers do, but I am just using the aplines for rear fill anyway. Once I get the CDT components in the front with 150 watts going to each of them.... You wont even be able to hear the alpines anyway!

I considered putting more into what I have that I did but after consideration it did not seem like a good idea to me. That's me. You do what you want. My considerations were this 1) it is next to impossible to get premium sound in a convertible and having the top down severly limts the productivity of putting anything in the trunk. 2) I considered a great sound system an invitation to a slit top and damaged interior...

What I did:

Pioneer head unit 250 watts(?).
Pioneer 4x6 Three ways in front
Pioneer 6x9 Three ways in back.

To mount the speakers in the back I cut out a piece of 3/4 in plywood to mount on the surface of the sail panels and give me enough clearance to house the 6X9's. When I had the interior re-done (Oak Tweed - real close to the original but better) I had the adaptor plates covered in the same material. The sail panels were covered as well... Except for the Pioneer covers it looks original equip...

That system is enough for me. I get pretty good sound top up or top down...

If I should leave the car in an area where I have to worry about it I will take the removeable face plate from the head unit with me.

Speedy

I got two 12" Lanzar subs in a box powered by a Rockford amp. I have always been impressed with the sound, even with the top.
Im working on a new setup though...we'll see how that turns out!


Ken

mr. zo6
do u have any picx

Who has a CD Changer in their car and where did you put it? I've been considering putting one under a rear seat...

I have a Pioneer head unit. Any suggestions as to which CD Changer to get?

Speedy

The best system I found was a bass tube for the trunk, some nice dash speakers and I found out the hard way about rear speakers. After doing a lot of cutting I still had to change speakers three times. That little frame behind that panel throws everything off. To the guy who wanted to put a cd changer in, the best place I could find, cause I already had the amp under the pass. seat, was to mount it on that little step in the trunk with the door that opens facing towards the center of the trunk. However, I found that a changer was too much work for little reward so I went back to a stereo that has the cd behind the face. Going to rework my entire system this summer and will have to replace those panels in the back and cut again, so I hope to have something figured out for there soon.

I have some of Tommys vert pic's in here for him

http://www.cecoatings.com/images/oth.../TommyMRIROCZ/

I bought an Infinity Basslink and put it in the area where the spare tire once was.
Sounds great with the top up, but it does lose everything when you are doing 75 on the freeway with the top down.
If you're just cruising around town with the top down it sounds fine to me. I'm not a huge bass guy though.

Plus you still have all the trunk space.
But you do lose a spare tire thats flat to begin with.
That's what AAA is for.

Keep in mind that being a convertible makes it tough to get good sound. I believe that 120 db is the spl of wind noise with the windows down. 130 db is considered the threshold of pain.

I have 4 10" subs in the back, some custom pods in the rear sides with 6.5's along with door and dash speakers driven by 3 amps and have no problem with sound top up or down. I had to dynomat the hell out of the trunk lid and I don't have a trunk or spare tire anymore but it is not my daily driver.

Some tips:

Don't use oval speakers as they are not as efficient as a round ones.

1 db is the change in spl that the human ear can distinguish. As a general rule in order to achieve 3db you must double your power.

Hope this helps

And a 10db increase is a ten fold increase

I may not have much to add here but I am not interested in changing from my stock tuner/cassette deck. To me, it's an extra reason NOT to rip into my vert and steal something. The money is just not in the sound system.

That said, I am interested in swapping out the stock Delco speakers for something a little better (and certainly newer). Is this advisable? Are there speakers mentioned in this thread that are good OEM replacements?

Curious and valuing my TGO brothers advice,

You will definitly tell a big diffrence with a speaker upgrade. I had the stock delco radio in my S10 and replaced the speakers in it with aftermarket replacements in the stock sizes. It made a world of diffrence!

When I got my vert I had no choice on whether or not to replace the stock equipment. The Cassette deck did not work and the stereo would only intermitantly put out sound...

Where to start: Crutchfield is a great place to shop they have guides on what fits as well as what modifications would be necessary to fit somethign else into a space.

Crutchfield Even if you don't buy from them it is a good site to educate yourself on what is available before you go out and buy.

I am partial to Pioneer equipment. I guess it's like fords and chevy's - so somebody else will tell you their favorite is better...

These are the speakers I have in My Dash And I have Pioneer 6X9 3ways in the rear. I don't see them on the crutchfield site.

Here is a link to the page where you can and it will pull up all the speakers that will fitSelect Your Vehicle

Hope this helps! Let us know what you end up doing!

Speedy

this weekend if i remember i'll take a pic of my set up,i have a fosgate power series 12" in a box inverted and my 2 amps and nitrous bottle are mounted on the back of my rear seats(yes they are folded down)

I'm putoff by bass-boxes in that these days, they are the predominant noise factor and in audiophile sense, it's completely wrong. As someone who favors 5.1 surround and hi end DVD Audio SACD type formats, I'd like to have a DVD indash headunit GPS type of system in the future, but for now, trying out Delco's late model RDS headunits in both my cars, to which I made a thread in History/Restoration.

These Delco units are larger but offer cassette/CD and RDS radio in the same enclosure... it may not finallize, as yet I'm only sure it works and somewhat fits, however, Going from the larger Deville factory speakers to my Firebirds, and trying three aftermarket units I currently own, I can see there is a notable difference. (bass is good from the Delco, but aided by speaker's physical size and efficiency. The aftermarkets' like Sony's D-bass control can push the bass up w/o killing the treble, and that is to be commended. At the same time, you see strong bass can illicit thuds in a woofer that is falling short in performance. Clipping I think

I want my rear seats and trunk space, and things I stowed behind the concealed rear well cargo bay have not stayed too clean or dry, I'd take precaution if mounting electronics there, I'd say

There's not much room under the seats but seams low profile hardware should certainly make it under dash
I think the treble is fairly good, so wondering what changes were noted from a coax and seperate system on the dash 'front'?
I like the idea of custom mounting tweeters up under the dash, but at the same time, I feel things hindering sound wave patterns that reach your ears as they radiate will effect how well you hear them, especially going down the freeway with (wonderful) engine noise (and not so wonderful) traffic noise.

Well, I have replaced my OEM speakers with Clarion 3 ways up front and in the back.

The upside is you get very good quality of sound with these speakers. The down side is the Bass is marginal.

If I had it to do again, I would still recommend the 3 way speakers for the front but go with a reqular 6.5 round in the back so I could get the bass tones that the 3 ways don't give you.

I still am looking for AMP recomendations. At This point Im thinking Bass Tube based on the discussions here. I have no problem mounting somthing in the trunk, but with the top down, it appears you loose a lot.

I don't really want to take out rear seats, etc.

Still open for suggestions and commnets here on Amp and Subwoofers

1 pic

another pic

Here's my setup:






I have since removed the CD changer in favor of an iPod mounted in the car...I'll post pics of that when I take some.

Here is my setup. Under the amps are two 8" JL Subs DVC. Th box was computer designed based on the measurements of the trunk. There is a port that fires into the car. They pound hard even if the top is up or down. (When you have over 1000W to the subs, there is no problem). I don't have a trunk, but the spare is still there and can be removed after removing the changer. I went with 4" round and 1" tweeter in the dash (had to cut the vents to make it fit). In the kick panels I added Q-forms and another tweeter and 5 1/4". The rear are 6" round and the subs are 8". 12 Speakers in all.

Over on Car Domain, there are more then a few bass box examples, and my downsized Deville seems a good candidate[sp?], but I do use my trunk space for stored road supplies, tools, etc., etc.

I am often curious, though, in how to utilize more power, a second battery etc, mods in electrical form. I'm having problems with my Delco experiment, but by the same token, I found at least one (I bought an extra or two to avoid jumps) battery was low on water!

Second battery really helps, see my picture above on the left is a battery.

something is wron with the pic

I've got a 1000w Memphis amp powering 2 10" Memphis Power Reference series subs. The sound, in one word, is amazing. With my 6x9 Memphis speakers in back and 4x6 Infitiy speakers up front I've got a rather affordable, amazing sounding system.

My box is home made and fits perfectly in the trunk. It is 3/4" thick MDF with 2 baffles inside to let the sound bounce around a bit.

I hit a 126db with my old amp which was about 1/3 the output of the one I have currently. I'm anxious to find out how well it registers with the 1000w amp.

I'll get a picture of the new setup and show it to you.

Holy thread resurrection Batman !!

I've wanted to get some kind of subwoofer setup because the stereo sound in these Third Gen Verts do suck. My only ever real complaint in all the years I've owned one. My biggest fear of doing it is losing the Trunk Space. I like having the trunk space, especially after living with the non-existent storage space in my C4 Vert.

My sub box sits flush with the two sides of the trunk (the ledges). The top of the box is an MDF board that goes the length of the trunk resting on top of the ledges, and then the rest of it sits inside the space below. I mounted my amp with velcro tape on the angled carpet right behind where the convertible top rests in the down position.

ANY PICS BLUEZEE28 OF YOUR SET UP

I went with the basic set-up of upgrading all the OEM speakers with high-end speakers. All replaced the stock headunit with an aftermarket one. All the installations were done to be reversible. I still have all the original equipment. To add a little thump, I added a Kenwood self-powered tube that fits perfectly in the trunk. It has controls mounted up front. I like this idea because I use the trunk a lot (as there's already little storage to begin with) and the sub is easy to remove.

That's an interesting sub. I've never seen one exactly like it before, at least not in a 3rd gen. I can understand why you went with that one, but at the same time my view was that it's not like I'm losing a ton of trunk space if there's not a ton to begin with.

do you have any pics of your sytem installed

I looked on my computer and didn't have any of the new setup with my new amp. The car is in storage right now but I'm getting it out on March 9th for a cruise. I'll get a picture of it then for you unless I happen to stop by and get it out before then.

Yea these verts are hard to get good sound out of. Here is my system which i'll be changing/upgrading in the coming years when I tear it apart and start over. Rockford 5-1/4 with 1" tweeter in a kick panel I made myself which sucks. 2 more rockford 1" tweeters under the center dash vents. 6-1/2' mids and a 1" tweeter in the sail panels I think there pioneer. Then a alpine type R dual vioce coil 12" sub with a 500W mono amp, and a 50x4 amp running the the rest. Sound good with the seats down and top down, soundsbetter with the top up but why would I be driving it with the top up? O and an Alpine head unit.

BlueZee28 how much air space do your subs have

Here's my setup. http://www.thirdgen.org/techboard/ca...-12s-vert.html (2 12's in a vert) Adam :-)

your amps is mounted on your box or what

The cones sit about the same level as the ledges in the trunk on the left and right side. So they have from that point to the bottom of the trunk. I'm not sure on the exact dimensions but you know what I'm talking about right? I need to make this easier and just go take a picture for you, I swear I will this week.

so what you are saying is that your box sit in the middle hole and then you have your amps mount over that right?

what type of subs you have and how does it sound

Yea well kind of...the amp (I only have one really big powerful one) sits on the angled part of the trunk right behind where the convertible top rests in the down position. It's hard to explain, I'll just have to get a picture of it for you.

And my subs and amp are Memphis Audio, very high quality products. You can't buy this stuff at Best Buy, you'd have to go through an actual audio shop to get it, or online. The sound is....amazing.

did you have to any mods for your dash to fit (what type of infitiy speakers you have)

You're referring to the 4x6's in the dash I'm assuming?

I had to cut away a small piece of the housing for the gauge cluster for the Infinity's to fit under the dash properly. They magnets on the back of those speakers are much larger than the stock speakers so they were not sitting down in the holes enough for me to be able to put the dash back on.

Ok I'm really sorry it took so long to get pictures of this setup. I kept forgetting to go do it honestly.

So here it is, I took a picture with the top in the down position so you can see that the placement of my amp does not affect anything. The rear bow on the top slips neatly behind the amp. The amp itself is attached to the carpeting by velcro strips.