Subwoofer option for mac equipped wagons

[chriskan]

i do believe that this is what you boys are trying to achieve....

whatchyatalkinaboutwillis

[bass_ke]

Mr wagon man, this indeed sounds brilliant!

I've been trying to think of options to get a tad more punchier bass out of the stock set up as i love the clarity that it's got up front!

Next time you are out and about on cruise I'd love to have a listen!

[thezone]

I realise this thread is getting old but I am new here, just came over from OZLiberty forum. I have a my07 3rb sedan with mac system and i too have found the low to mid bass a bit muddy. I'm not a sound engineer but I am a musician and have a high-end system at home so i know what sounds good. It seems to me if you play with the fader you will notice that most of the low freq is coming from the door speakers, that thing in the parcel shelf does f@#k all. The speakers seem to be capable of low freq it's just that when you boost the bass on the head unit it amplifies to many low frequencies(mid bass) and thats when it gets boomy/muddy. I don't beleive in using eq's so maybe an option is to just replace the door splits. 05gtwagonman-You seem quiet knowledgable on this topic, do you think that this would work? Would the amp have enough grunt to drive a hungrier set of splits? I had this problem with my Accord Euro and just put in an Alpine 50w x 4 amp under the seat. The amp has a lower freq roll off which fixed the problem (together with a new set of speakers of course). The mid to high soundstage on the Mac is superb just need to clean up the bottom. Just to re-iterate, I really do think that the front speakers are capabale just that the amp (eq) is sending the wrong information.

[chriskan]

Would the amp have enough grunt to drive a hungrier set of splits? I had this problem with my Accord Euro and just put in an Alpine 50w x 4 amp under the seat. The amp has a lower freq roll off which fixed the problem (together with a new set of speakers of course). The mid to high soundstage on the Mac is superb just need to clean up the bottom. Just to re-iterate, I really do think that the front speakers are capabale just that the amp (eq) is sending the wrong information.

I have heard the outputs from the Mac deck are balanced - which would mean you'd need an amp with balanced inputs to replace the stock amp - which imo, would be a good step up, and then replace the splits.. you could go with a decent set of 2 or 3 ways upfront, leave the rears as is and a single 10 or 12 off the "new" amp and it would sound pretty good. But the determining factor is if the output from the mac is just line level, or something else?

[05gtwagonman]

Hi Guys, Sorry I have been awol for a while...

Hello 'the zone' and welcome...
Yeah the mac amp has a bit of grunt, but I'll bet, and certainly experience tells me the following:

(it bears mention at this point that if you don't know Macintosh as a company- look into them- they only do kik ass in home stereo, and this unit, keeping in mind what a car interior does to sound, follows in the same vein...)

Manufacturers give a sample car to the sub contractors to design, from scratch, the best possible system within the budget set down. Now if that budget is reasonably high, you will be very hard pressed to beat the result attained from that supplier no matter how much you spend.

You should know as a muso and having a critical ear I assume, that matching components in a system is almost as critical as the overall systems ability, and one great component may not be any better because of the limitations applied by other equipment in the chain. You do know the answer to your own question in reality- the "hungry" split, as you term it, will not work better because I know from listening to the sytem in my car, that the splits in it only start to over drive (too much cone excursion) at about the same time the amp starts to clip. Exactly how mac intended...
You could change the tonality, if you could find a split that was similarly efficient, but I know of nothing in the market that I felt sufficiently sure of to try (wasting money)...

The jl Sub works for this reason, and it's resulting efficacy is so impressive for the money I know that if I was on this forum and someone knew about this I'd wanna know...

If you have the cash to try, I'll look into the splits again and try to give you a starting point, but really you probably need to look into leaving the headunit in and changing amps as well as speakers. You'll spend a lot to get that extra tonal perfection...

Stu; you can have a listen anytime mate. Are we still getting togeather for a beer?

[pplwu]

Hi all,

Been reading the thread and thought to myself why not try it, so I pull out the w3v3 sub ported box from my garage (previous car) and hook it up directly (extra 1 metre of cable) and truth to be told I am not satisfied. I think the stock amp simply does not have enough power to drive this sub and actually making the whole sounding muddy. Question thu, what if I get another monoblock and line converter running out from the stock amp and to the sub, would make the overall sounding too much bass? and you are right I think most of the bass comes out from the woofer from the doors.

Regards,

[adam]

i don't know what you guys have been on about in the last 4 or 5 posts but.......
i play music on my car stereo and it sounds really, really....ummm......neat

[05gtwagonman]

Sorry if this sounds rude, but you guys still don't have the plot apparently...
The w3v3 series are a fantastic woofer- if you have power. You don't. Sensitivity is the key. A woofer with a lower power handling (softer suspension to push for a start) in a large very well designed box that leads to a lot of bass with little power. This is the Sh*t that good people design well and others pay a lot of money because the average bloke doesn't know what he is doing. I know what I wanted to do, but even I find it easier to just buy the box- that's some maths I'm not interested in doing...

The w3 needs power. Yes a mono with a high level in will work -not really clean but it's bass so it shouldn't be too bad... Power?- A common miss conception... More power should clean this particular woofer up, not make it muddy. Just make sure that you get an amp with level and low pass controlls. Are you boosting the bass at the head unit? In my system, bass 0 or +1 treb +3 -the system rus out of headroom at around 30 on the dial (I'm sure this would change from system to system at least a little.
You probably don't want to change woofers, but the JL I have is much cheaper, you could probably fund a brand new woofer with the proceeds of the w3 sale...

-Adam: I like $20-$30 bottles of red when I can afford them, my old man says "yeah that's nice... but I can hardly tell the difference from my 2l box wine" I and realise that I'm better off being greedy and not sharing 'cause he don't know the diff.
It's horses for courses Adam...

[adam]

-Adam: I like $20-$30 bottles of red when I can afford them, my old man says "yeah that's nice... but I can hardly tell the difference from my 2l box wine" I and realise that I'm better off being greedy and not sharing 'cause he don't know the diff.
It's horses for courses Adam...

soz.. i was trying to be funny in a self deprecating way.that's what my little red-faced man was there for, highlighting my own embarrasment.
certainly wasn't trying to take the piss at all.
more of a "i know nothing and really don't hear all the nuances that you are all referring to" way.
it's actually quite interesting listening to guys chat so knowledgably about things i'm a dumb ass about.
This is how i am learning. When i first joined here i didn't even know what an intercooler was, let alone that you could get TM and FM, plus of course, lots of other cool stuff.
p.s. wine = MMMmmmmmm. Just picked the latest grange, RWT and St Henri today.

[05gtwagonman]

Adam, you and I are on the same page... I sell audio gear for the home (this is what frustrated audio engineers to to make ends meet often) and every day I meet people who have no idea why we would be able to sell 15 grand amps and 65 grand speakers. Some genuinely can't hear enough difference to justify a 10th of the asking price... Nothing to be embarased about there... It really is horses for courses...

When you say just picked, are you telling me that you are a man that I need to make really good friends with? Nudge nudge ????
Are you on the contacts thread as a wine buddy for tight arses like me who are allergic to retail pricing?????

[adam]

When you say just picked, are you telling me that you are a man that I need to make really good friends with? Nudge nudge ????
Are you on the contacts thread as a wine buddy for tight arses like me who are allergic to retail pricing?????

I own a pub and we get allocated a certain amount of the release each year but as we are a small pub we don't get heaps. I usually get the lot as we don't sell it through the business and my business partner loves wine but isn't that fussed on penfolds. This year we got 2 grange, 6 RWT and 6 St Henri. If you'd like a few bottles at cost + shipping we can talk. I'd be prepared to let 1 of the Granges go and up to 3 each of the others go.
bear in mind that, even @ cost the prices aren't exactly cheap.

[Gambit]

Sorry to dig up an old post, but just wanted to say thanks, this was informative as i have an old MTX 12" sub in a big ported box that i just installed as per OP. and it works a treat, much better sounding now

[05gtwagonman]

It's the advice that just keeps on giving!
Glad to see another follow the path to enlightenment... Well done!

[Q]

It's the advice that just keeps on giving!
Glad to see another follow the path to enlightenment... Well done!

Hey Rich, good to see you are still hanging around in the background!! What you driving now? I read this thread last night as I'm also considering the sub option as well and was going to PM you to see if you still had some contacts!!

Can you do any wheeling and dealing for me and get me an amp that I just plug in (no time for building boxes and the like) ?

[05gtwagonman]

I couldn't bring myself to buy the new liberty, and still can't. I Have had a few different cars including sating the inner bogan with a modded xr6turbo -F*#k they are easy to get big power out of...
Started to break it, and run out of points so I 'settled down' with a VWt5 transporter...
It now has windows all round, a back seat, 1.5m long drawers for all my rep detritus. The front of the drawers have been extended with custom made slot port Boxes to house two jl 13 1/2' 8 ohm running down to 4 ohms. These are hooked up to a JL 500/1 mono, and older MB quart reference series 6" splits running off JL 300/4 bridged.
Lets say- it is the loudest sound quality based system any of the Guys at JB have heard. It's certainly the loudest and the cleanest system I have heard. There are plenty that just go loud...
Still have strong contacts within JB if you need 'em Rob...
I'm not sure if they are still doing exactly the 12" I used but we will be able to advise you the next best way to go...
BTW- my old 12" came in a prefab JL box that looked great...