While your at it, you should make a custom cup holder, why did they leave that out.

 

They left that out, because Germans are very different in their driving, they are correct to leave no cupholders, since when you are driving, you should only be driving and not f'ing around with other tasks. Imagine spilling hot coffee when you are driving 120mph on the autobahn

 

should have thought twice for american models, we easily get bored with 20, 30, 40, and 55 mph here in the city limits

 

Thanks for checking in man, it's been a while. How's your system coming along? I remember you said you are thinking about doing some kick panels or something.

Yeah, all of those lumps came out just fine with the belt sander and bondo. There were some air bubbles, but it's very rigid so I'm not too worried about them.

 

i have a cupholder. Its name is Matt, and it is related to me too.

*hits brother and forces him to hold ice cold kool-aid*

 

Newer Benzes have cupholders.

I always tell my wife that same thing - cupholders are for people, not drivers - but she's obsessed with them.

I put one in my armrest - I'll post pics in my "interior" thread when I get a chance.

 

Yeah, I have the custom kick panels, I've just been pre-occupied on another project so the 124 has just been sitting. Once, I'm done I'll tackle the 124 and finish up the audio/video system.
~Cali

 

alright, so I am being lazy at work and decided I should clue you guys in to the pics that don't work on the first page of this thread. So here are pics of everything else I've been doing in the car...

I'm too lazy to explain everything, but feel free to ask if you have a question. The reason I'm sharing this is so others can learn some things and can teach me things as well. Enjoy!

Focal polyglass 3-ways in the front (w/ 6" woofer in custom door pod and tweeter in a custom tweeter pod on the a-pillar, 4" speakers in stock dash), biamped with the tweets on their own channel from the amp. Main amp is a JL Audio 500/5. Rear speakers are the matching 4" speakers running off of a JL audio e2150 amp (these are only for rear fill and will be turned down pretty low). Head unit is a Nakamichi CD-400. I've had it for a while and I love it. It fits the look of my car and it sounds incredible. Sub is a 10" Infinity Kappa Perfect 10vq running via infinite baffle (i.e. "free air", or no box). The trunk is sealed from the cabin (which is necessary for proper infinite baffle setups). I'll also be running a 6-channel equalizer (trunk mount) from Audio Control (Audiocontrol "EQS"). The interior was stripped and sound-deadened using 2 layers of Damplifier Pro and 1 layer of open cell foam mat. Rear speakers are in custom fiberglass enclosures since I had to seal the stock speaker holes for the subwoofer setup. I rebuilt the med kit door out of 3/4" MDF to ensure no rattling. All custom interior components are/will be upholstered with color-matched vinyl.

Overall goal is to keep the car looking as stock as possible while improving the sound quality as much as possible within my budget. I'm not the guy who puts flashing lights on stuff or rolls down his window with the bass thumping. I'm only running 200w RMS of pure, clean power to my sub. I find loud bass irritating. I believe it should reflect the original artists' recordings, not enhance the bass to the point where it overwhelms all other frequency ranges.

Here is a basic diagram of my setup.

 

hole cut in rear dash (the interior hole was cut much bigger later on, no pics of it)





some pics of the sound-deadening:

 

rear deck sealing and deadening (notice the expansion foam). Also notice in the second pic below the trunk hinges. Those posed a problem because they need to be able to move, but they needed to be sealed. So I built some covers and sealed them up.











The next pics show another sealing challenge- the rear headrest actuators. I tried and tried to come up with a reliable solution to seal them while allowing them to operate, but alas, I had to give up on that. So the headrests will be stuck in the put position from now on. Those wood boxes cover them up.



The subwoofer baffle:





w/rope caulk:



mounted:

 

working on the tweeter pods:







The rings for the door pods:







map pockets removed from doors, vinyl stripped, holes drilled, backing built out of 1/4" MDF:

 

covered with fleece:







soaked in resin:





fiberglass laid up, sanded w/belt sander:

 

bondo/sanding (sorry, I know these are repeats but I'm on a roll):

 

working on front speaker baffles:

 

If I were you I wouldn't bother amping the rear speakers and just use power from the HU. Especially since they'll be playing quietly its just a waste of money.

btw, I lost my ambition on my IB set up. After modeling different speaker enclosures on winISD, it showed that I would gain almost 8 dB of low end (60 to 30 hz) if I went with a ported set up and a good amount of power handling. Your IB set up should still give you a good amount of low end, especially in comparison to a normal sealed enclosure below 50 hz tho.

One more thing, makes sure to use as sharp of a crossover as possible on your sub to avoid messing with your soundstage.

All in all, I think your set up is going to sound really good. Just out of curiosity, what kind of tweeters does your component set up have?

 

rear deck setup:

 

and that's it for now!

 

I hear ya. The IB setup is definitely not the setup to go with if you're looking for a bit more power. I just want to be able to get a flat frequency response overall...

As for the rears, my cables are run, my amp rack is set up, and the amp has been purchased (long ago). But most definitely, if I could do it all over again, I would've simply taken the rear speakers out and not hassled with them. I spent way too much time working on the rear speaker enclosures when in the end I don't even really care what they sound like.

I'm curious though, what do you mean about the sharp crossover? I'm assuming you mean do like a 24db per octave roll off or something? I don't think I follow. Thanks for the comments.

Edit: sorry I missed your question. I'm not sure I know what you mean by what kind of tweets I'm running, so here's a link to them:

http://www.focal.tm.fr/accueil_en.htm

click products, and 1665 V3E slim

 

I read somewhere that because the woofers are right in your rear deck, its much easier to allocate the source of your bass. If you use a shallow crossover slope like 6db/oct or 12db/oct it'll be more noticable. But with a 24 you should be all good.

As far as tweets go, I meant the material they are made of. Focal usually uses a metal tweeter in most of their speakers. The general concensus on metal tweets is that they are very detailed, but are harsher and more ringy then a silk tweeter. Since you said you were going for smooth and flat response I thought these may not be exactly what you are looking for. However, it says that the tweeter is made out of "tioxid"??? I dont have a clue what that is.

How much longer you think till you wrap things up? I think it would be great if you posted a review. Use maybe 4 different diverse but critically respected tracks and tell us how the system responds. This is the first install I've seen so far in a w124 that in my opinion has actually been done well. Most people throw in some coaxials, and a sub and call it good. I cant wait until I get mine finished.

 

Thanks man, that's a very nice compliment.

As far as the tweeter material, it's definitely not metal. It's not polyeurethane either. I'm really not sure what it is. As far as the harshness goes, my previous installation had my rear 4" components in the front (which are the same ones that are in my 3-way system). I didn't find them to be very harsh, but I used the attenuation switch on the crossover to mellow them out. I think I cut them down 3db or something. I'm not sure.

But obviously we're not talking about volume, we're talking about tone. So the only thing attenuation will do is help make them less noticeable, but the harshness would exist regardless.

You better believe I'll write up a review. I'm going to use a spectrum analyzer and my trunk-mount 6ch EQ to tune the crap out of this system. So I am expecting that to be a day-long project, really.

 

Really brilliant looking work Pete

 

Vinyl work came out great. There are a few very minor wrinkles here and there, but it's a million times better than anything I was coming up with on my own! I'm so excited to put my door panels back on this weekend!

 

wow man, im excited for you. it looks real good, almost stock. i bet it sounds amazing too. what did you pay just for speakers and amps and subs?

 

Honestly, I don't want to answer your question cuz it's gonna depress me. But here are some estimates:

Not cheap though. Just to give you an idea, the front 3-ways were roughly $700, the 500/5 amp was probably $900 back when I bought it a few years ago, the rear speakers were roughly $500, my Nakamichi head unit was around $500, cabling around $200-$250, JL Audio e2150 amp roughly $200ish, sub was about $150-200, EQ was like $300, other miscellaneous wires/connectors/relays/fans, $100, sound deadening materials around $500, all of the fiberglass supplies and wood probably around $300, color-matched vinyl $100, labor on for the upholstery work on the front speakers, $320.

So let's see. We're probably in the ball park of $5g's. Plus the alcohol I'm going to drink right now to drown the disgust I have with myself for spending more than my car's value on a stereo.

Seriously though, this has been a challenging but rewarding project. But I'll withhold my full judgment until I finally get to hear how it sounds!! And most of the equipment can go with me to my next car, so I'm not quite as worried about the expense.

 

Pete, it's a disease. Why should you be any different than the rest of us. (LOL)