Spanky33

Hey everyone, I recently purchased a 1976 BMW 2002 and I would like to outfit it with a nice system. The car itself is a little restricting due to the amount of noise it makes and its size. My main question is about power consumption. Right now the car has the stock alternator in which produces either 35a or 45a, I'm not sure which. How much amperage would I need to run a little 10" sub such as the SA-10 and a set of front speakers run off of an amp? The mounting location accepts what appears to be a 4" speaker. I would also like to get some opinions on a real good set of 4" speakers for lets say around $200, a little more wouldn't kill me but I'd like to keep it relatively budget. My last question is has anybody on here ever worked on these cars and if so is there a link to a build log. I searched quite a few times and came up empty handed. I'm just looking for ideas for a build. Any help I can get is greatly appreciated, thanks.

I am I'm sure there's ways to make this system better than it is now without making drastic changes to the interior. You seem to know your stuff but your stuck with the one idea. What if I set my crossovers on the fours relatively high, say around 150 and used a set of larger drivers to compensate for the lack of midbass only? At what point does sound become localizable(sp?)?

Sorry m5 but your being an ass. I understand you want my car to be a certain way but that's not the way I want MY car. The door cards are most definitely not "shot". And either way I've repeatedly stated that I DON'T WANT TO RUIN THE INTERIOR OF THIS CAR. The previous owner actually did completely restore the interior and the motor. Cutting up an old car to put bigger speakers in is a joke. So again does anyone have a recommendation on a pair of 4's and whether or not to add larger speakers elsewhere. You can keep saying that 4's won't work but I have sat in that car at 65 miles per hour with those speakers doing just fine to keep up. And how does mixing driver sizes not make sense. That's the whole idea behind a three way speaker set up is it not?

Ah I see. I should have realized what you meant by that. The problem is the window, when it's rolled down it almost hits the magnet for the 4 so even with a 3/4 inch baffle to push the speaker out a larger speaker would still hit the window. I can't allow myself to cut a bigger hole out of that door. I understand that I could have a great system but in this case I'm building a system that is secondary to the look and performance of the car. What I'm looking for is advice on how I can make the best out of the situation I have which is 4" speakers in the front door panels and maybe 6.5's in either the center console or the rear deck. I looked on SDSD and he has some vinyl sound barrier that I can use for the firewall and I'll deaden the doors as well. The only remaining issue is how to get the best sound out of my options.

I know it will be but those little 4's pack a bit of a punch at full tilt even at 4000-4500 rpm I can still hear the music well. Not perfect but clear enough. I'll deaden the doors and the firewall either way I just would rather not add too much more. Is that sufficient to keep noise down at least some? you'll have to trust me when I say it is VERY cramped back there. building a box off the door is an idea but I'm attempting to keep some semblance of originality to the car. What about the 4's up front and 6.5's in the center console? Shitty Imaging but I'll get some output that way.

Heres the only photo I have of it right now. It's a cell phone shot so kinda blah but I'll get some more tomorrow before work. It's also pretty dirty, the trials and tribulations of living on a dirt road. the second photo is of the door mounting location. I can't really see myself adding more weight than I have to so I think I'm gunna skip the deadening and allow the beast to scream if it pleases. the speakers are more for times when I'm putting around in the city or freeway driving when the noise is relatively low. I could also cut some space for some speakers in the rear deck if I wanted. Maybe some 6x9's for some midbass and the 4's up front for the detail? I don't know I'm just trying to get this thing all set up so I can just enjoy it.I also found a bolt on Bosch alternator that has an output of 85a. Is that enough to run 600w to my sub and another couple hundred for my speakers? Its a 50 amp difference from the stock alt.

That's a bummer, I thought for sure someone would have done one. The thing about the sound is that most of it is coming from my engine not the road. These things make a lot of noise at high rpm. Is there a way to help with that? I've attached a photo of my door where I want to mount the speaker. I took the speaker off and even if I make a larger hole a bigger speaker still won't fit because there's all sorts of metal back there. I thought about kick panels but with the amount of clutch work in this car I don't want to cramp that area. Even in a tiny little car like this a set if 4" speakers won't produce enough sound? I'm not expecting great mid bass from them but it's still sound right.

Hey I'm getting a new car as soon as i get paid this month and I'm planning on getting some new stuff for it. I'm wondering about putting the Qs in a sealed box. Has anybody run them like this or maybe heard a sealed set-up? I'm really just wondering if they'll still sound good sealed up. Its also going in a Toyota 4Runner.

I did a search and I'm not coming up with a whole lot on the AA components. I also didn't see them on the AA site. Anybody have a link to some info and/or where to buy some?

Ya it was killing me.

Ok so almost 6 months ago I loaned my car to a friend and when I got it back my subwoofer was not playing. I started a thread on here asking about how to fix it and what not and I never really came to a conclusive answer. I just got a Sundown SAZ-1000D and plugged it in and went to check the output voltage of the amp and even at high volume with the gain pretty high the highest I get is 3.x AC volts. I am getting power to the amp and it turns on without the protect light or anything I checked the DC voltage at the amp, its in order. Now the one place that does not seem to be right are the RCAs. No matter what I do I can't get them to register ANY voltage no matter how loud the music is. But at the same time I'm wondering if I'm measuring it wrong because if i play it through the sub I do get some noise just not very much at all. I also checked and they are plugged in to the back of the head unit and I plugged them into a little stereo system and it played but very quietly. Any ideas as to what I can do to solve this problem? I would love to get this figured out, I'm dying having this new amp and not being able to really use it. Thanks for the responses in advance. Edit: Also my DMM is a cheap one from Radio Shack and I only have two range settings in AC voltage, a 200v and a 500v.

So I replaced the RCAs and now I have a fully functioning amplifier and sub. Stoked out of my mind right now! Six months with no bass and now its back. Next up a 12" Fi BL. Edit: Thanks guys. I'll Update in a few weeks when I put in the new sub.

So I was thinking about it today and I hear a lot of mixed opinions on subwoofer size and its benefits regarding sound quality and SPL. I'd like to here everyone's say on this one between a 10 a 12 and a 15 what are the main advantages or disadvantages of each of these as well as say 2 10s vs. 1 12 or 2 12s vs. 1 15 or even 2 or more 10s vs. a 15. what would you gain vs. what would you lose. As much details and actual real world evidence as possible. Lookin forward to hearing some good responses. Have at it. Also you could vote for your favorite setup above.

Really? I was told by some people on another forum that as you got bigger the sound was less punchy and tight. Is that not true? Can a 15 play through a super intricate bass line as tightly and accurately as a 10 could?

I'm sure that's true but to the ear I've found that different sizes of the same sub produce slightly different characteristics. The other day I listened to two type rs next to each other both boxes built to specs both tuned to 30 Hz. And I could easily year the difference. I just wanna know why that is. And there's isn't a specific install I'm just trying to gain some knowledge. The specific goal is purely to compare and contrast different woofer sizes and see what people in general think about different sized subwoofers.

It is a CDX-gt240. So let me just be sure I tested the RCAs right here is what I did. I turned on the car and turned the volume up to a decently high level. I then turned the dial on the multimeter to AC and the closest setting to 5 was 10 so I put it there. Once all this was accomplished I put the tip of the red tester thingy-ma-bob onto the little post that sticks out of the center and the black one on the outer metal ring type thing. Is that right because in both mine and my friends car we got nothing and to the best of my knowledge his RCAs should be working. The amp and all that has been taken out for a while but we checked and they were plugged in so what gives?

So basically I let a friend borrow my car and while he was using it he messed up the trunk latch and when he couldn't fix it he tied an extension cord around my subwoofer and box and held the trunk down with it. When he drove it back to me he played the music all the way up and when I got it back my subwoofer wouldn't play. I figured it was the woofer being held back while trying to play but then I tried another sub on it and it still wouldn't play so I tried another sub and again it didn't play. What could it be causing my issues. What could I do to diagnose my issue. The light on the amp goes on and it looks like everything is working. any help would be awesome. Thanks.

So I looked up how to properly check the voltage of the RCAs and I still got nothing from them. However I also tried to get a reading off of a friends and still got nothing. I also tried plugging his RCAs into my amp and still nothing played. So at this point I'm assuming that my amp is fried. Kind of a bummer. I'm going to pull my buddies amp out of his car and put it in mine just to make sure but we'll see. Thanks a lot guys I learned a ton trying to get this fixed so its not a complete loss.

Mercedes e320 with a shit sony head unit. I put the positive to the end of one of the RCAs and grounded the negative side. Is that the wrong way to do it. That method seemed to work for the power and remote cable.

The way you told me too. I used AC volts instead of DC and it read nothing. I tried turning the music up and down but nothing. I also tried it playiing a cd, the radio and my ipod. nada. I posted in a car specific forum hoping to get some info on how to get my head unit out but no luck so far.

Im pretty sure I did that. I went to subwoofer and turned it up from ATT to 0 which is where I usually have my sub. I'll look but I don't think there's another way to alter the sub in there.

So I checked all the power and what not and the main power cable and remote turn on lead are both registering fine. The RCA cables however are not registering anything. The bitch is that I cant figure out how to get to the back of the head unit to see if they are unplugged. It doesn't just slide out with din tools I think I need to take off some paneling to get back there. Are there any other fuses other than the two 30's on the back of the amp i need to check because both of those are perfectly fine.

Taj-he-spitz / I see a bop

Its an alpine type R on a alpine mrp-m500. I mean to be honest its all coming out soon I just want to fix it in order to be able to sell it and stuff.