stereo gear you can hear but not see. Options

[rick 918-S]

I've never been a fan of car stereo stuff. My personal taste. No offense to anyone that has a car full of stereo stuff. I always figured the engine is what I'm listening to and I'm not driving a boom box. I don't like big ass amps hanging out all over the place with a rats nest of wires, huge thumping bass sound or anything that you can see. In fact, my son's friend came in the driveway with some big thumping bass speakers. Really.... the sound made me physically ill. Really.

So with that in mind, I want to install a modern Kenwood CD with Blue tooth in Sandy's Ravenna car. It's a KDC-BT838U. Not me car so it's ok.

But I think without an EQ, amp and real speakers that will product sound that will be pleasing and not just add noise over noise it will be a useless dash decoration.

Anyone have experience with adding sound using components that are small enough to be installed without having to look at the techno busy components and wire rat nest?

Maybe a referal to a car stereo site?

[shuie]

iPod?

[Mike Bellis]

I have the same Kenwood in my 914. Blue tooth is junk. You cannot hear or be heard over the engine. Other than that it's a great radio.

You could mount some nice 6" in the doors, under the panels and perferate the panel. You will only see tiny holes in the panel and not the speaker. They make a cool tool for it. It's a steel jig with many hollow punch's mounted on it. You set the panel on a 1/2 steel plate and pound the jig with a dead blow hammer. I used to use one years ago when I managed a car audio shop. Hit up a junk yard and find some nice door wiring grommets. Then you wont see the wires and have a factory look.

[914itis]

I use a sony radio with CD and bluetooth, upgraded the side speakers to some nice sony with built-in tweeters ,

I have a small amp in the front trunk with a small flat subwooffer that fits behind my seat. ( I am short ) and I have great sound.. I do not care about loud sound, but if i have the radio on, I like me some quality sound. No wires no mess. there are only 2 pairs of wire from the front trunk to the wooffer, they run thru the tunel. will post a pic tomorow.

[rick 918-S]

Ya, no door speakers. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon8.gif) I would add the behind the seat speakers with no issue. Mike, can you expand on the blue tooth issues?

[Mike Bellis]

The best way to describe the blue tooth... what? what? what did you say? what? can you hear me? what?

The mic is on the front panel of the radio. You need to lean into the face and talk for the other person to hear you. There is an optional remote mic that may work better. If you are parked with the engine off, it works great!

Ipod connection is awesome. It charges too. I use the all song shuffle option on my Ipod. If you do not, it will scroll from track 1, 2, 3 etc... If you are listening to a folder, it will only play that folder.

There is a built in EQ. It gives you 3 adjustment points that can be moved up or down in frequency range. The Q is also adjustable at the set point.

[r_towle]

Rick,

Rich Wilner put just an Amp in and uses his Ipod/Iphone for the tunes.
With an Iphone you can use pandora radio if you want a radio staion also.

Its totally hidden.
Amp can go in the front trunk...
Its a slick idea that I intend to do on the next round in my 914.


I did a standard setup from BB in the super loud and windy 911.
I can hear it really quite well...
I do have a sub in the front trunk, but its on really low so I am not one of the pounders that you hear.
No sub needed imho if you buy the right speakers.
I did.

A 150 watt amp is plenty.
Get component speakers (they need an amp to run) for the speak pods....Get Morphs speaker pods...the stock ones are too small.
I got the cheapest Kenwood head unit that had a CD, USB, and Aux in with pre-amp RCA jacks on the back.
aux in and the USVB let you connect an MP3 player/phone if you ever want to...and I do all the time.
I started using the little USB flash drives that are less than 20 bucks, yet hold 100s of songs...and they plug right into the head unit..
The pre-amp jacks to the amp, to the component speakers was the trick.

The head unit cost like 80 bucks...and is cheap, speakers are cheap enough..but dont scrimp the speakers...they make the system.
I got a cheap head unit cause I dont want to find it stolen...

That is really all you need.
I have the 6 inch component speakers in the 911 cab...which is really noisy to drive..I use a 150 watt amp and I can hear it all the way on the highway..

The 914 is pretty quiet on the highway..components sound alot better and all of what I got was at Best Buy...off the shelf stuff.

Rich

[rick 918-S]

The best way to describe the blue tooth... what? what? what did you say? what? can you hear me? what?

The mic is on the front panel of the radio. You need to lean into the face and talk for the other person to hear you. There is an optional remote mic that may work better. If you are parked with the engine off, it works great!

Ipod connection is awesome. It charges too. I use the all song shuffle option on my Ipod. If you do not, it will scroll from track 1, 2, 3 etc... If you are listening to a folder, it will only play that folder.

There is a built in EQ. It gives you 3 adjustment points that can be moved up or down in frequency range. The Q is also adjustable at the set point.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/lol-2.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/av-943.gif) I figured that was the case. I was thinking it was less about the equipment and more about the car it's installed in.

Nice to know about the EQ. So I need a small amp suggestion that I can hide (brand) and speakers (brands) that will fit in the stock location and maybe hide behind the seat and produce sound in a frequency that will defeat the engine and road noise without adding to the same frequency.

[Mike Bellis]

If you get a really efficient speaker, you will not need an amp. use the built in one. Bass requires the most power to reporduce. If you go with a Pioneer "pod" type speaker fo behind the seats and maybe some 3x4 speakers for stock grills you will be fine. If your wife is a true auidophile, then buy an amp and high end speakers and hide them professionally.

[914itis]

This gives me a litle bass to balance the sound, without it, I would have only treble. fi.ts nicely behind my seat since the passenger seat is not moveable on the 70's

[VaccaRabite]

For my car I just have a 70 watt amp with a line in I could attach to my iPod. I have never used it aside from testing it, though.
The amp is up under the dash. The mini-jack cable is under the carpet and comes up through the center cushion. From in either seat it looks like there is no audio equipment in the car. Once I get the cabin of my car to be a bit more quiet, I may even be able to listen to it.

Zach

[rwilner]

I have a 100% stealth setup consisting of:

• A kicker amp in my center console, which drives
• 2 polk 6.5" coax speakers in morph pods, and
• 1 8" kicker shallow mount sub, which is mounted in my footwell, all interfaced to
• my iphone, which serves double duty as my GPS.

The stock radio opening retains the stock AM radio. It's not hooked to anything and is there for looks only. It is the only visible indication that there is any kind of radio in the car, except for morph's pods and the speakers.

The whole setup is probably a solid saturday to install if you have all the parts, including disassembly and reassembly.

Currently my ipod lives in the center console. I'm installing an iphone dock in the ashtray which will both charge and provide the audio feed to the amp -- I'll post pics once that's done.

[jsayre914]

Been thinking about this configuration for my next 914 stereo build (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Chris Pincetich]

[quote name='rwilner' date='Oct 3 2011, 09:42 AM' post='1548549']
[*]2 polk 6.5" coax speakers in morph pods, and
[/list]

I have the Polk MOMO 6.5"s, and I needed to use the "Honda spacers" to make them fit in the Morph-supplied pods. Did yours fit w/o spacers??

They sound awesome w only my 50W Alpine head unit. The have a separate cross-over filter included, resulting in double the wires going to them. I am still in progress with my interior rustoration, and once I have all the carpet and seals back in, and wind noise reduced, I will decide whether or not to add an amp and a sub.

Rick - I have a spare set of new Blaupunkt 6.5s I can part with. They fit perfect in the Morph pods but don't have carbon fiber like the MOMO ones I gots in there.

[jmill]

I had a stealth setup in my bug. I had a crossover, small amp, tweets and 6x9's. I hooked up my cd player or walkman (it was a while ago) directly to the crossover and it had great sound. There's no need for a head unit these days with Ipods and the phones around now. Just put an Ipod/phone dock in the center console wired to the crossover.

On a side note, vibration subwoofers take up very little space.

[GeorgeRud]

I have a question on connectors.

Can you use an adapter that uses the headphone jack on the iPod and terminates in two RCA plugs, and simply plug them into an amp? If so, then you truly could have a stealthy system with only a 1/8" jack and a hidden amp. Obviously, this would not charge the iPod, but you could always use a lighter adapter for that function. Do these connections also work with an iPhone as well? Pandora is a very nice addition to the apps, and the few commercials are not too irritating to listen to for the amount of music that is available.

The Morphenspectra speaker pods are also a very nice upgrade, and look correct in the car. Don't cut up any door panels!

[edwin]

I sell car audio gear for a living and have been really impressed with the JL Audio amps and speakers
For a car like ours I would run an XD series amp with C3 splits in the morph pods
If you use the kenwood headunit then I would just run some C2 speakers in morph pods
I would always put one pair of 6" speakers in before using the factory mounts and trying to squeeze extras in behind seats etc
Also sounds like the sub will be overkill for you
Am on my phone now so don't have links. Ask any q's if you need
Cheers
Edwin

[Mike Bellis]

If you use the headphone jack to an RCA adapter, you can plug straight into an amp an use the ipod volume control. If you get an "ipod adapter" the volume goes to maximum when you connect it. The ipod adapter should be used with a pre-amp with built in volume control. The advantage to the ipod adapter is charging. It will charge you ipod or iphone. You will need a power switch with either type to turn on the amp.

[rick 918-S]

I sell car audio gear for a living and have been really impressed with the JL Audio amps and speakers
For a car like ours I would run an XD series amp with C3 splits in the morph pods
If you use the kenwood headunit then I would just run some C2 speakers in morph pods
I would always put one pair of 6" speakers in before using the factory mounts and trying to squeeze extras in behind seats etc
Also sounds like the sub will be overkill for you
Am on my phone now so don't have links. Ask any q's if you need
Cheers
Edwin

What model JL Amp are you refering to? Small size? and how many watts? Which JL C2's are you impressed with? I did a search and came up with a couple different ones.

[edwin]

If you just wanted 2 speakers and and amp i would choose the XD200/2
http://mobile.jlaudio.com/products_amps.php?amp_id=595
and for the speakers i really like the C3-650
http://mobile.jlaudio.com/products_compone...php?comp_id=585
bonus with these is that they are a component speaker which gives a much clearer sound but the tweeter can be mounted in the main wofer making it much easier to mount without cutting holes.
Otherwise the C2 series are my biggest sellers either the c2600 or c2600x depending on budget and sound quality.
Love those amps though. Tiny size and great power.