sqguy

Seems like SS bolts would work nice.

In my daily driver I like the sub facing back the best for SQ, it seems a little smoother. It is in a closed trunk against the seat, a sealed 12 I just took out for a different install. I had a different box in there ported and sealed with other 12s I tried in it...it seemed to sound best facing back too. Obviously I didn't like any of them that well so I'm trying IB into the seat now.

It would be interesting to take a meter and a smaller box, just move it around and see what produced more in the front seat. I know that some cars sure give more, and usually (for music, in my experience) the back of those cars/hatches make a horn type shape. The rear glass is usually sloped. But that is just me by ear and every car is different. And, might just be certain frequencies that are propagating too.

That is great, I want to try an 8"/1" front stage and I'm sure I'll have questions and have to do some active or passive tuning with it to get it working well. That is if I can ever get my new subs/amp installed, I'll have some time off in a week. My baffle has been much harder to make than a box would have been.

Nice ride, Explorers don't get much nicer than that. The '02 is the new style with the independent rear, a much nicer vehicle to drive IMO. I had a rental with the standard seats that sucked, I bet those are better. Felt like sitting on a big mushroom to me, but most everything else was nice. So, what are your plans for it? New stereo maybe? lol.

LOL, yes but it will have to wait...just need to get it usable first. I looked at that Clarion DXZ775USB...nice features but not sure about it. I have an Alpine in there, must be a middle of the road and is 2v. It sounds nice but I don't care for the controls and the tuner is weak. Looked at a pioneer 880 on ebay but I just got a kicker 700.5 and used up my play money for now. I need to research them some more but yes I'd like to get all that stuff in the HU and no more crossovers or EQs. Also can try a hifonics 6ch that is a little smaller in wattage, its 300 on subs at 2ohms instead of the kicker's 420. IB subs usually don't take much power, these they say 150wrms when IB and four of them....what do you think? Also have an alpine ere-g190 to try on it, was running a nak 2way. I have other amps but a 5ch should fit really nice in this car. Was about to mount the baffle frame in the car tonight, have the seat all out and then had to stop. I have it all glued together and put foam weatherstrip all around it to mount against the car. Still have to make the side plates but should go fast once I get it screwed into the car right/tight. No tunes at all in there now...no good. I should take a pic of it before I screw it in, but its pretty ugly since it will all be hidden anyway. I should get more time for it in the next week or so to finish up subs and then have to re-wire it for more power back there. I tried a bunch of single subs and boxes, all smaller and cheaper, all sucked and drove me nuts. After that I wanted to try 8s in the front stage with the 1", I found some vifa that look usable up to around 4K but hard to say until they are in the car...could sound like dog ****. I am convinced that it will be hurting for midbass badly after all those 12s get going in there. The 5x7s were way weak before with one 12 without any EQ, and I like to get it close before I lean on an EQ. They will have more power but I don't think it will change the sound of them much. This is taking forever to get installed, I feel like this guy --> Sorry I didn't turn on the notification and get back here sooner, not like I got much done though Also, nice site here. Found some good reading on some stuff that is hard to find.

Well I bought a cap for $15 a while back, a 1f. I don't plan on an alternator but will only have a kicker 700.5 running 4 12" IB. This is just for music and I only pound it for a song or two. Was thinking of mounting a booster pack in there at this power level if it dims, could have a 'portable power source' in my trunk, lol, and assume I don't have to vent it. Funny part is they are cheaper than new caps. Anyway, I read it should help my alternator live but wonder if I should have bothered. I like extra batteries myself, but I'm tight on room with this car. With the IB baffle and one 5ch amp it takes up little room so far....when I finish screwing it in there. Otherwise I'll toss the cap if it does not help because yes, it will be a pain to mount nice and it didn't come with a mount.

I was on carstereos.org until it went away last week. This is a nice site, was at another today that was not so nice.

For music I always run the sub(s) to the rear it seems. I did have a killer box a long time ago I built with the subs to the side way in back and the port was straight up in center of box. It took up the whole hatch in a little omni (yeah that long ago...). It was about the third time I changed how the box worked, it was 4cf with two 10", originally was 4 10". The port was fairly short with the box so big maybe 3dx4l, or maybe 4" tube not sure. I had to tune it by ear way back then. It was SQ, shook the car nicely, and was a real sleeper as nobody could figure out my little ugly car was the one rattling their windows. Had a flat box with 6x9 on top of it and front speakers too; could open the hatch and stand the 6x9 box up for parties...covered it up out of sight otherwise. I used those same subs IB in other stuff. That was a nice sounding box, it had good bottom. That car kind of made a horn shape from where the subs were, if that helped I don't know. After a while I actually wanted some trunk to use and stopped doing the big boxes in my cars.

Which actually has very little to do with how good the amp is... That is the major reason I bought it. I read on a couple of tech sites that it is well built and performs good. Kind of difficult to find US made things on a budget and I don't drive this car that much...let alone finding a 5ch amp. It does look nice inside but I'm not a tech either. It does make you wonder when you see X product come up on auctions/closeouts as refurbs. Are they that popular, junk, do the owners just abuse them....hmmm.

Yeah, this kicker says "Kicker USA" on the board inside and on the bottom of the heatsink it says "made in china." Nice.

Kicker? There are a bunch of them on ubid now. I got a 700.5 and it has a remote. Not the best maybe, but the techs like them and I hear lots of good reports considering the price. Mine is a refurb and did have a couple scratches on it, but not bad. I have not run it in the car yet. Going to take the cover off and buff it out some first should be able to get rid of all marks. I don't like the sink on the bottom design IMO, I will mount it on blocks I think. There are some other brands on ubid too, shop them up and ebay see what you find. I like older amps too if you know what you are looking for. I have bought SS and alpines and others, great older amps IMO and were cheap...but that was this spring when there were a ton of them on ebay. Some of the hifonics are good too, I know people with them and no problems....though they are daily drivers and not that hard on them. Yeah its hard to beat a US amps, zed, linear power, nice amps like that but I don't want to afford them for my daily driver.

If set up good, that would blow me out of the car for a daily driver.

The Ascendant 8 was nice looking. I think if I was going to use an 8 sub in the future it would be in a ported box or maybe IB, it would have to be HD because that is why I tend to use larger unless I have a specific reason. If the cost was reasonable I would be more inclined to use multiple units to fit space better. I like to hit 30Hz in music, but sometimes you have to take what you can fit. Still 4 or more 8s can make a pretty good thunder. You cover such a small range of frequency there is little need for more than one sub setup in a typical system, save your money and put it to better use like a better front stage, better HU or crossover/etc. At least from my view which tends to be SQ orientated, though sometimes loud enough I can feel it.

I read about those caps but I thought they were still good for your alternator life, in particular a stock/stressed one?

I'm putting 4 12" into my back seat and it will just about cover the entire area, but I'll have room for the amp in the center. And all I will have in the trunk is the amp(s) and 4 baskets hanging out, no box. I could put 8s in the rear deck instead, but I want to see if this works in this car instead of tearing into it.

I always laughed at people (in private) who had a system of X brand and thought it was the best. It can be good, but with every system I made/adjusted for myself, friends, or people who paid I never once used all of one brand when I had a choice. It always worked better to have different stuff that matched the car or the use, the install, etc. These were systems for music. I found lots of products that worked great in a particular use; some were dirt cheap some not. Once I was using pyramid subs like crazy they worked great IB, but they don't make that model anymore. I used tweeters from radioshack for a while and you could not tell the difference from fairly expensive ones if you used the same size cap as the pricey ones had. And amps, some worked better with IB subs, others with sealed subs, etc. I have used few new amps, but years back most of them worked a little differently and swapping them was a tuning aid also. And way back lots of them had DIN connectors so you could not just RCA any brand together, they had their own cable. I still have an Alpine amp with only a din no gain even, have a RCA patch cord on it and its in my car right now. Some things are hard to dispute though; you take a custom sub maker who makes top shelf stuff and it is going to be hard to do better with a mass produced driver from a large corporation. Still there may be some use that the MTX does better in, maybe. Problem is you need to run all the stuff to find out.

Well a company has to make what they can sell, depends on if there is a better demand for an 8" subwoofer or a woofer. I found a home based 8 on sale cheap (<$30+ship) I might try for fun, its pretty smooth up to 2K maybe more according to some but power handling is marginal. Of course I really need to finish my IB sub install in my car before I go back into the doors, and that is why I know I will need lots of midbass to keep up with 4 12" subs IB. But if a home speaker can sound that good with a 10 and 1", then my car should be able to get by with an 8 and a 1" in front...I just hate screwing with passive crossovers but it might be worth it. Also have an active EQ I could use. They use these drivers for little home speakers (well maybe normal size today since I have 15s in my house) and studios, they use ported enclosures so maybe they can do IB ok. If not I might be using them in a home speaker.... I have this silly idea that a mid woofer 8 is a great idea in the car, but I could be wrong. You are limited to custom installs.

I been toying with the idea of an 8 midbass in my front stage...I'd like to just run a 1" softdome with it. I have some old EPI home speakers with a fairly long travel 10" (for back then) and a little tweet and they sound pretty nice. Good size sealed cabinet, of course I want an IB 8 to do that in a car door....not too deep but I can fit an 8 without much trouble cutout wise. If it can hit 80hz strong and go high as possible I would try it in a second. I don't want a (dome) mid really, and it does not have to be absolutely perfect sounding. Even if someone made one with a passive crossover to smooth it out, that would rule. I would not run much over say 100Wrms into each if they are fairly efficient. If I find a cheap one to try I'm going to give it a go. 8" subs can sound nice if you have the need for them. People complain about space but I don't see anyone trying to sell IB car subs...they really take less space than a box.

I've bought a few, well maybe 10 this spring. I had one that was never sent with a 97% and well over 1K points. Had to go paypal dispute and got my money back like 3 months later. Had one that run for a minute and quit, old kenwood, they took it back just cost $7 shippage. The rest were good deals, some really cheap but they worked....were really dirty. Given few of them were high dollar, the most was around 100 shipped, all older amps like alpines, kenwood, sherwood, mtx, jbl, etc. I bought a lot of cheap stuff from the circuit city stores but they look dry now, most of it was as described or was real close....made some pocket money off that stuff. I had one issue with them a pair of speakers came with no parts or packing and tweeters blown, were supposed to be good with grills. They refused the return because the grills were not in there....I had to email and raise a big stink on ebay to get my stupid $27 or whatever back. Everything else was packed good and worked like they said. Been using a temp sub I have $28 tmd total into...an explode 12 the black one and a new qlogic sealed box. Sub had a tear I glued a little (was a demo I think), but it works fine and better than nothing (not the best sq though). Also some of that stuff had amps on boxes, all that stuff was tested and as they said. Early this spring I got a better deal at a local pawn shop though, got a rubicon and a dual amp both 300rms x 1 bridged for $80...could nearly sell the SS for that on ebay but it works too nice. The dual amps are 100+ship new all over the place. It seems to need a lot of input voltage, and its big and heavy. It was on a dual BP 12s box but I don't know a thing about dual except best buy sells it. I have not used it in a car yet if ever. In fact I got a refurb kicker amp off ubid and it has a scratch in the front cover, most refurbs I have bought are 99% this is the worst I've seen. I may be able to buff it out but for a factory refurb its poor. Yeah the price was good, but they could not play kickball with the product before I get it....used to be a store would not take back damaged stuff even if it died, unless the store did it.