Anyone ever seen an a-pillar pod on one of our cars with maybe a 4" mid and a tweeter and then a 6.5 in the door for mids. Or would it look too ghetto to have that big a pod sitting there on the pillar.

I was just thinking that it would raise the sound stage, keep the mid with the tweeter and fix time allignment issues. You could run the door mids in like 85/100 - 200/400Hz range.

Comments on this frankenstein monster or links if anyone has pictures?

I've seen it on other cars with thicker a-pillars, but I think putting a 4" mid up there in a Subaru would obstruct visibility quite a bit. If your midbasses in the door will play up to 400-500hz or so, you could use a smaller dome midrange and tweeter in the a-pillar. Something like the DLS dome mid or the Dayton RS52 could work for that setup. It would definitely get your stage up nice and high.

I'm actually going to be doing this setup this spring/summer. I'm going to be running the Hybrid Audio L3, which is a 3" midrange, so visibility will not be compromised more than a bit over say, an a-pillar gauge pod. The key with a cone driver is to vent it into the dash to give it a larger volume. Otherwise go with a dome style like khail stated, as they don't require much more than just a hole the size of the driver to play correctly...but some of them can get pretty big.

are tweeters at about nose level too high?

depends on how you aim them honestly.

You also might consider Dynaudio for this as they also have a 3" dome midrange in their line... When i used to work in a HIGH END audio shop ( http://www.speakershop.com/ ) My teacher/mentor and friend would RAVE about the dynaudio line and how they were able to use "first order" crossovers in their systems.. They were incredible(i have herd them...wow) and do have a 3-way system with a 1" tweeter, 3" mid and 6.5-7" woofer..
http://www.dynaudio.com/

I am of the old school that doesn't like using "time alignment" as the more you process, the more you degrade...

At the same time, I'm not a fan of tweets OR mids high up anywhere as it increases path length differences, requiring more time alignment...

Read up on HLCD and you can see that by using the horns, they are/were trying to reduce path length differences, by getting the driver as far away from you as possible, hence decreasing the PL differences...

Blah... If your not competing, your tossing money in a hole anyway..IMO.. But that's my .02$

Not to turn this into a time alignment pros/cons thread, but since everything now can be done in the digital domain there is little to no real degradation of the signal, as all time alignment is doing it delaying the DSP from sending the signal out...not really modifying it.

Running kicks in a WRX/STi is about as smart as letting Magic Johnson bleed into an open wound on your arm...you're just asking for something bad to happen...so throwing stuff on the dash not only raises your sound stage, but also lets you aim the drivers more easily and not risk damaging them. Obviously the major negatives are path length, and visibility.

The Dyn's are nice, but unfortunately they don't have the low end extension to make mounting them on the dash worthwhile (personal opinion here). The Hybrids will play down to 150hz, so crossing them over around 250hz or 300hz is great for keeping your stage height up, as pretty much anything below 200hz is not distinguishable top to bottom...just left to right. So you cross a nice set of midbass drivers over at 200hz and the mids at 300hz...going to really give yourself a great overall stage height and depth IF installed correctly ;)

I am also basing my opinion on the audio work i did in the mid 90'z.... lol...

Can you say out-of-the-loop.... lol

Ha...with the way some of the higher end DSP's function nowadays there is really no reason to not use them, unless you are going for a complete 100% analog style install...which I might be doing in the near future on another car :D

Was it PPI or RF that had their analog version of time alignment??? It was a little dinky unit you hooked inline.

Okay - Follow up questions for Daishi00 and Khail19.

1. Which model of DLS speaker are you talking about? Having trouble finding it online

2. Is that Dayton (the 2" driver from what I see) big enough for midrange?

3. "Venting into the dash" - meaning what it's not just mounted in the a-pillar?

1. DLS dome midranges are available at Elemental Designs now. The Iridium is the best sounding one, but it's pricey. None of them are cheap, but they are very nice sounding, compact mids that do well off axis.

http://www.edesignaudio.com/edv2/index.php?cPath=1_107_111

2. I've seen some use the Dayton with success, but it doesn't play super low (for a mid) and I've heard complaints that it is too bright for some people. Might just be install related though, who knows.

3. Venting into the dash just basically means that the a-pillar isn't sealed totally, and that the airspace under the dash is connected with the a-pillar. I think in our cars this is already done, but I haven't looked behind my a-pillars yet. This is not necessary if you use a sealed back midrange, such as one of the DLS mids.

1) Khail has you covered with the DLS driver. Also look at www.hybrid-audio.com Scott Buwalda is the founder/designer etc...really nice guy and the Legatia L3 is an amazing cone mid. It requires a bit more space than the DLS, but it'll play much lower, and is around $250 for a set. He just redesigned the website and it SUCKS for load times (at least on my Mac :lol: ). If want a direct email let me know as I have him in my address book as I'm ordering up a set this month for my birthday :D

2) Khail has you again.

3) Our a-pillars do vent into the dash, but even then I'd still try and give yourself a little bit of an enclosure on the pillar if you go the way of a cone mid. I don't know when you're going to be doing yours, but if it's going to be a month or two I should have mine roughed in so you can get an idea.

i think i'll say i'm with aaron on this one.. the location of the apillar would sound kinda.. off

Are the ends, really going to justify the means.....???

i think i'll say i'm with aaron on this one.. the location of the apillar would sound kinda.. off

If you mean "off" by raising the sound stage, increasing distance from the drivers to the listening environment, allow easier initial imaging then I'm all for sounding "off".


As for the ends justifying the means...nothing in car audio truly justifies the means...it's simply a project :D

If you mean "off" by raising the sound stage, increasing distance from the drivers to the listening environment, allow easier initial imaging then I'm all for sounding "off".


Now D,

How is putting the drivers near the sail panel or even in the deepest corner of the windshield, going to increase the distance compared to having them in the kick panels, for instance? path length will still differ greater than the kick locations...

Oh, it never said it'll increase path length distance over kicks, but only you, keaniegiene and like one other actually run kicks in Impreza's (I'm not counting Rick...he doesn't count as he tried to fit ribbon tweeters in kicks :lol:). If I ran kicks I'd have them destroyed inside of a week :P

Plus with the way our kicks are located aiming them to give you a decent stage height would be hours and hours and hours and hours. Obviously this is simplified if you just run a tweeter down there, but still. I was simply comparing to people who flush mount them in the door, or keep them in the stock location (which after hearing over this weekend really destroys what can be a great setup).

Thanks for all the responses. I'm just kicking this around in my head. I wouldn't be doing the work myself, so I have to "justify" in my head that all this would be worthwhile - the time and money part vs. sound quality improvement. Sounds like the DLS would be the way to go for me at least - compact and simple to mount.

Back from the dead... Aaron, Dashi, & Snorekl... where are your individual projects now?

Rob

I'll throw up a thread right now with the install as it stands right now...totally not finished :lol:

Back from the dead... Aaron, Dashi, & Snorekl... where are your individual projects now?

Rob

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/showthread.php?t=24011


^^^That is about as far as I gotten thusfar... Things have slowed WAY down with the winter and not having a warm place to work...

That is about to change though, started insulating (well putting up a ceeling) in my garage. This will allow it to actually HOLD some heat rather than it all flowing out of the eve vents...

I'll have pics of the "garage mods" up soon as i'll be SUPER psyched to get back to work...

Just throwing my $ .02....

I'm using the Cdt Audio image tweeter set-up. I have one set off 1" silk domes angle surface mounted low by the woofer and another set up in the a-pillars. The a-pillar tweets are the image tweeters and they have their own l pad to control volume. It's far from a perfect set-up but I think it does a pretty good job of allowing you try to balance between the good sound stage height of a-pillar tweeters, and the better path lengths of the mounting by the woofer (or kicks if you're one of the crazies). The best part is that install is really straight forward (no customization) other than the need to either run many wires in and out of the doors, or install the x-overs behind the dash.

I was under the very strong impression that 2 pair of tweeters is a no-no, regardless of your intention.

What he's suggesting is what's known just as an imaging tweet or staging tweet...basically it only plays from about 16khz and up. It was a trick used years ago in some SQ competitions to help counteract stage height problems with kicks.