Instead of clogging up my profile with loads of image of my rebuild and the audio i decided to make a separate thread so other can see and use this perhaps as a guide or inspiration.
So mods do as you will with this.


Right then in the build im going to be designing a system that is aimed at PURE SOUND QUALITY.
I like bass sometimes but IMO musics should be a flat response to the human hearing range of around 20hz to 20,000hz.
Now for the ongoing elderly (90% of this forum @ 25+) hearing degrades so some of you may not be able to hear frequencies above 17,000 maybe less, some may have perfect hearing.
As for me i tested my hearing with frequency tones and could not hear above 17,000 myself, also i have seriously bad GLU ear so all my life i have had my eardrums fill up with fluid, leak or burst causing pain and muddy hearing until it hear.
Currently now my left ear is slightly muddy and has been for several months. Takes ages to heal.
Dont know why i told you lot that but ha ha you read it anyway.

So lets start of with the basics.
Headunits
Are the most important and best upgrade for the money. Enough said. Music played is only as good as the source it comming from.
Pick a headunit that has the feature you want from it. Generally Alpine, Pioneer and Clarion offer the best valve for money/performance and features. Also keep in mind OLD SKOOL headunits generally offer more sound quality than mordern units as back then they wernt mass produced like today popular audio.
When i headunit states 50w x 4 it will only every put out 18w or so RMS so keep this in mind you will never get 50x 4 from a headunit.

Now for me personally i like simple headunits. In my case i have gone for a Mcintosh MX406.


Its a pure pre amp headunit meaning it has no internal amps to interupt SQ. So you need an amp to get this working. It also doesnt have FF or RW. ...The DC to DC converter is also external to help with space and more SQ components can be used inside. Now also this unit has dual 20 bit DAC.
DAC stand for Digital to analogue converter. In essence your converting the digital signal from a CD into an analogue signal that goes down the RCAs to the amplifiers. The amps convert it back into digital and to the speakers. This DAC process is important. Usually the higher the better but its not always the case.
For example the 20bits DAC in the MX406 are some of the finest on the earth so we could say they are like the Type S. Then some units claim to have 24 bit DACs. You would think great more bits = better but depending on the quality of the DAC thet could really be a 4th Gen with failed 4WS, fast but flawed.

So pick a headunit to your requirements. MX406s were around £1000 when new. Got mine for £300 and was released way back in the late 90s.

Speakers
Now there are all tyres of speakers some shite some excellent.
Coaxils - These are the all in one speakers that generall are not great. They are the ones with speakers within a speakers. Alot of people put 3 way or 2way 6x9s in the backs of their ludes. Dont get me started on 6x9s.
Components are the one to go for. They have a seperate midbass and tweeters and usually a crossover.

Now Tweeters play the high frequencies usually 2000hz up.
Midrange plays midrange usually from 300hz to 5000hz some up to 20,000k if they are good. Like mine.
Midbass play the lower end of the spectrum usually 50hz up to 500hz if they are good.
Subwoofer play below 50hz and give the deep bass. Yes its necessary.

Now IMO you need to hear the speakers before you buy but that cannot always happen. Get speakers you are happy with. Generally 6.5" speakers will offer better frequency response especially in the midbass. Try to get a high sensitivity.
For example a subwoofer getting 300w and has a sensitvity of 90db will be just as loud as a subwoofer getting 600w and has a sensitivity of 87db. Power isnt everything but it helps. Its gets way more complicated but generally a good set of components between £100-200 will work very well.

I have gone for Hybrid Audio Legatia L631v2. They are a 3way active componets set (will get onto active later). My subwoofer is a Mcintosh MS100. All are high end speakers and are very expensive but are well worth it and create a natural sound. You can get SQ subwoofers. Yes there is a difference in SQ bass and general farting. The MCintosh MS100 isnt aimed at being loud, its for producing high quality deep bass.



Amplifiers
IMO very important. Nothing beat the power of an amp over a headunit.
Get a 2 channel amp to run a set of front speakers. A 4 channel amp can run 4 sets of speakers or be bridges to run a pair of components or run in a 3 channel mode for a pair of fronts and bridged to a subwoofer.
Again an amp is up to you. Get however many channels you need.
I have 10 channels of amplification but i will get onto why in a while.
Dont go for cheap amps with loads of power. I guarantee they wont produce the power they say. Also amps can sound different. Its the quality of the amplification that counts not the power. Power is important but the quality is more.
You can also get many classes of amps. Such as Class A, AB, D, G T. etc...not going to get into this but Class A amps generally ony produce 20w max but those 20w will sound way better than lets say a midrange amps with 100w. Class AB amps are usually what you get everywhere.
Iv gone for Genesis Series 3 amps. They are british, beautiful, sound excellent (some of the best) and the customer service is second to none.



Cabling
Another overlooked area.
Bigger the better is important here. All power cables must be fused...you can run all your cables together with no issues. If you are getting noise issues it will be your ground cables and earthing points. Power cable must be fused within 10" of the battery as the cables from the battery to the fuse will be unprotected.

I have 0awg streetwires cable to a streetwires 4 way fused power and ground distribution block then 4 awg to each amplifer. 14awg or 12awh is good enough for speakers cables.
As for RCA cables in going to be making my own cables as i will have 10 different cable sto make, DIY cables are cheaper to buy and are better quality than pre made. I will show you how later although it will be my 1st time too.

Sound Deadening
Cannot stress how important this is. Deadening is the process in which we turn noise, vibrations and rattles into heat. Use a deadening mat such as Maxmat or Second Skin damplifier, aplly it to the metal and it will absorb vibrations reducing the panels resonance frequency to a much lower inaudiable one. Foam and underlay can be used onto to absorb airborn noise like wind noise and road noise. I will be doing this 1st on the next message.

The Big 3
Now the TB3 for short is the process of upgrading your under hood cables to a bigger higher quality. 3 infact.
There is the
- battery negative to chassis
- Engine earth to chassis
- Alternator to battery positive.

With Lude there are more cable that are worth doing to.
They are the
- Battery negative to engine
- another engine to chassis earth
- Battery positive to starter motor
- Fuse box to battery positive (also the alt charging cable from stock.)
With Prelude the alt to battery cable is more complicated. The cable goes behind the engine to the fuel pumps and into the fuse box. I will get onto this later in more detail.
But TB3 will stabilise voltage, increase charging of the battery and make the electrics of the car more efficient.

Capacitors
Do not use these. They are useless for power of around 2000w or less. They will only add strain to a system. Stay away. Seriosuly. They are good for one thing. Using a door stops in the house.

Passive and Active
Passive is where you run an amplifer to a crossover thats splits the signal to tweeter, midrange and/or midbass. So for a steroe left and right front end you will have a 2 channel amp running 2 sets of components. This is how most people do things. All the crossovers are after amplification.

Active is where each speaker gets its own channel of amplification and all crossovers are done before amplification. Alot of you will have ran your subs this way. 1 channel directly to a sub and you control the frequency on the amp.

In my case im running a 3way front end + sub active. So i have 1 2 channel amps for the tweeters. 1 2 channel amp for the midrange, 4 channel amp (bridged into 2 channel) for the midbass and a 2 channel amp (bridges into a mono channel) for the subwoofer.
Active has many advantages over passive. The volumes can go louder on active as the power is clean and uninterrupted, You have more contol over the frequency each speaker gets, Music clarity is improved and have control over speaker phase.
Downside is that is more expensive as you need more amps, Hard to set up, very complicated, and you need a seperate crossover or headunit/amp with built in crossovers. Im running a seperate crossover that get inbetween the amp and the headunit.

Rear speakers
This is different to people tastes but when at a concert where does the music come from..............yep in front. The only thing you hear behind you are rear waves from echos or some fat geezer checking you out.
Rear speakers when played at ful range ie up to 20,000hz such as coaxilas drag the sound stage back which you dont want. All the sound stage should be upfront. You cannot localize bass frequencies thats why when subs are in the back you cannot tell where the sound is comming from but for say 1000hz up music becomes more directional. So rear speakers will be heard from behind when music should be from upfront.
Now you can have rear speakers playing bandpass frequencies ie 200hz to around 800hz to add atmosphere and depth but its hard to set up.

So IMO ditch rear speakers. Let the rear speaker holes vent the subwoofer bass in.

Thats it for now. Iv covered all the basics but not in great detail. Just to much to cover.
I will explain more as i go along.

STEP 1 - PREPARING THE CAR

Pics so far from todays work.

So 1st things 1st is to sound deaden the car and apply all wiring. Since the car is offroad etc i stripped it. Take car stripping the car. You dont want to break panels. The back on the bammer can remove some of the capet clips.

The boot.




Doors, as you can see i previously applied flashing tape as a temp fix and i removed the inner doors leaving brown residue. The flashing tape on the outer skin is staying as its stook on very very well and does do something. Couple of sheets of maxmat ontop of it will make it better. The MDF rings wont be used for the L6s. Will be making new ones up.




Nice flexible roof panel just waiting to be deadened.


Blurry pic but the rear.


Oh and that Golf install i linked. Im not doing it exaclty like that. Its the bootbuild that i like the most. I plan do do a similar false floor without the lighting. Only difference is i cant fit 4 amps, a crossover and a sub in there. I suspect i may end up putting the amps on the back of the rear seats and the sub/crossover in the wheel well. The sub is slimish and hope to build a 0.5-7 cuft box for it.
Right now to copy and paste this onto other forums.

Here i tried a hammer and screwdriver to see if the stock tar came off. Luckily it comes of very easily :love: i though i would have to dry ice it but since its nearly winter it comes off with one hit on the hammer and driver.



Here is the dash, i bought a JDM double din stereo cover to help with stereo security. I still needs a slight trim to sit more flush but you get the idea.



I also test fitted the MX406 a while back just to see how it looks. Its not wired in but..........suit the interior very very well. But so did the double din Subaru Mcintosh unit i had in previously.







Oooow and finally found some money under the carpet.

g[/IMG]

Yes i found 100yen....thats going back where i found it. :clown: Its add at least 10hp and helps with stereo imaging :confused:

Tomorrow im getting up early (11am for a jobseeker is early) and removing all the stock tar deadening and black vinyl mats from the front, clean everywhere, Apply some Bilt Hamber Dynax S50 in the cavities to protect from rust, treat the rust in the wheel well and start applying the Maxmat around the car.

I am going to watch this thread with great interest man

Can't wait to see how you're gonna install the 3-ways, great info there man, giving me awesome advice for my next project there

I think the first post should be made a sticky, so separate from your build thread but with the info in it

That'll be cool man with the sound deadening You'll have one deadened lude and not talking about the engine

Nobody knows everything though, that's the wonder of life. There will always be more stuff to learn, always


Though I am now looking at 3 way components for my build from what you were saying, just makes perfect sense really thinking about it as I have them in my home hi fi system

Ahh, that's fair enough then man. Yea, that's the thing really though isn't it, having to do the work dependant on the car?

If you have the space for various bits, great, but if not then as you say, you have to adjust appropriately

STEP 2 - REMOVING STOCK DEADENING

So to tackle this i bought some canned air off AMAZON. 4 cans for £12 delivered. Used one on my PS3 though.

So i want to remove the stock tar deadening to the deadening i apply down will work better on the metal, plus removing the stock stuff will save weight so when i add new deadening the weight i add wont be massive.

So i figure this would be a 2 hour job, clean it all and then apply my new deadening. WRONG.

Now its not too cold outside but cold enough. A hammer and chizzle (screwdriver) is all that i used tool wise. Plus some Yorkshire tea.


Basically you start hammering away but you dont realise how long it takes. This was about 30mins work.


Now eventually i found a great technique that DOES help.
If you spray the canned air around 2 cm away from the deadening all over it and then hammer the tar all over this helps unstick it slightly so when you chizzle away it comes off in chunks.
Worked well apart from some part that you can see. But i got 98% of the tar off.




This is what your left with. In the bag is the tar from the boot, rear seats and all 4 floorpan pieces plus the 2 vinyl mats.


I weighted them both.

11.6KG

Not bad IMO. I did weight all the deadening im putting into the car but i will get onto that tomorrow when it goes in.

So tomorrows task is to degrease & clean all metal and then DEADEN THE BITCH.

Nice work there man!!

With the canned air, did you spray it over right way round or upside down??

Impressive amount of deadening there though, that's a 1/5th of my body mass right there

I'm coming to Leicester so you can help me.. At the moment i aint got the money to do anything but im gona do some overtime at work and get the cash to buy all the sound deading and decent ICE..

I hoovered the car to remove all dust and stone and tar i removed, degreased with BH Surfex HD, then use white spirt to remove the residue that the car left, window cleaner to remove the access white spirit and the another hoover again.



All yellow residue off the doors etc.



Before i apply the deadening i have treated all the surface rust and wax the cavities with Dynax S50.





Sprayed up that cavity. That hole and on the other side will be made bigger to fit the L3s.


The other Kick,, note the fuse box in the way a bit.

STEP 3 - SOUND DEADENING AND LAYOUTS

Right then here is all the sound deadening im going to be using.
From bottom to top
- 4 large sheets of Maxmat pro around 5sqft
- 40 sheets of Maxmat Pro 43sqft
- 11 sheets of Second Skin Damlifier 22sqft
- 1 gallon of Second Skin Spectrum (liquid deadener)


The total weight of the above is 24.6kg and i have removed 11.6 kg in stock deadening alone. So im only adding 12kg and the benefits far far outweight the weight.

Always plan out where the deadening is going to go.

IMPORTANT
You only need to cover 20% of any panel to achieve 80% effectivness. So its alot better to cover as many panels as possible rather than cover the whole of one panel. BUT you need to cover 80% of the panel to get close to 100% effectivness.
So with this in mind id cover 50% of many panels and really concentrate the deadening around the speakers. If deadening the door midbass speakers apply the deadening to the metal that the speaker is attached to not on the panel behind it. If sub woofer is in the boot deaden around the areas its going to sit.
Try hitting the metal to see what else rattles and cover them up.

ALSO STICK ON DEADENING 1st, LIQUID DEADENING GOES ON AFTER.

So here is where i plan to put the 40 sheets of Maxmat and the 4 big sheets of max mat.

2 on each footwell. And one for each kick panel



4 for under the rear seats, 2 sheets for each rear quarter.


2 for the rear parcel shelf.



2 large sheets for the bootlid


12 of sheets for the boot floor and sides plus one big sheet. Trying to cover the whole boot



And the 6 sheets for the roof, obviously will be stook on the other side.


The above may not go exactly to plan as you will see soon.

So tool needed, small roller, stanley knifffeeeee, scissors (maybe) and a cutting mat.


Really roll the mat into place getting all the creases and contours. Make sure all the air bubbles are out.

Remember to plan ahead and watch out for bolt holes. Just cut then before you stick the mat down.


The roof, as you can see i ended up using 4 sheets not 6. I cut 2 sheets up and split them. I used 2 big sheets on the centre bit. Glad i did this and the roof is acoustically dead now. And i have saved 2 sheets for else where. Amazing difference.



I also finished maost of the cockpit and the bootfloor but twilight happened early so packed up and forgot photos. Will continue it tomorrow.

Great Progress!!