"Invisible" audio for the Porsche 914 Options

[Chris914n6]

I had to flip your end result and mount the tweeter low.

You will want to surround the speakers with closed cell foam or equivalent. The single plane baffle won't stop sound wave canceling so you won't be getting 100%.

Cover the sheetmetal behind the boxes with vinyl and stuff it with polyfill. Should make the mid range cleaner.

When your done run a tone generator/sine sweep to find vibrations.

[horizontally-opposed]

I had to flip your end result and mount the tweeter low.

You will want to surround the speakers with closed cell foam or equivalent. The single plane baffle won't stop sound wave canceling so you won't be getting 100%.

Cover the sheetmetal behind the boxes with vinyl and stuff it with polyfill. Should make the mid range cleaner.

When your done run a tone generator/sine sweep to find vibrations.

More good input. Have always noticed the hard metal with the dimple die hole; didn't think about ideas on how to improve sound back there.

That little tweak to the great template PDF from @johannes, which crops off the opposite corner so that two corners are cropped off, allows each board to be used on either side of the car—so experimenting with the tweeters low or high will be a snap. The JL tweeter mounts are also pretty neat, allowing you to "aim" the tweeters (a bit, anyway…but it might be enough).

Funny you mention a tone generator/sine sweep to find vibrations. My car used to be tight, but two paint jobs later has an annoying buzz I've been trying to trace. Thought it was in/around the seatbelt, but nope. Thought it was in the door, but nope. Thought it was in the dash, but… Will look into this, as it would sure beat having someone else drive over a road that triggers it while I try to isolate it (my next plan).

[horizontally-opposed]

Not surprised at all with out a proper dsp you can not get sound staging correct. So placing the speakers down low put the two traditional sound locations as close to the same distance to the drivers ears as can be in a car interior. Simple math, gets the sounds waves to your ears as close to possible, minus all the reflection found in the cabin.

Higher end builds in competition world you use DSP and movable tweeters to get the tweeters pointed right to the judges or your ears. I have even seen tweeters with a laser "sights" on it to get them right on target.

As of today I would just go with an amp with a dsp and build the system how ever you can, then get a good set of ears to help you setup the sound stage how you want it to sound. Sony has one, but you can go crazy and spend $1000s on a DSP AMP or A separate DSP, and separate amps to drive what you need driving.

^ Laser-sighted tweeters! Man, those are my people…just the audio version to my car version. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)

All of the above makes sense—but is well beyond the scope of my build. I am just looking to do something that's sort of "OEM+" while benefitting from audio component improvements over the last 50~ years.

As a hack sound board operator who has a decent ear for a room (but vastly prefers an analog board to the far more capable/cleaner/expensive digital boards), I suspect I'll get this system, wired up, EQ'd for most of the music I listen to, and then simply fire up my iPhone when I'm in the mood for tunes. I'm not even sure the system will be any good against a six with Webers and a sport exhaust—but we'll see… (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)