Guys,

Anyone know the frequency range of our speakers (midrange) in the cabin? I'm replacing the sub and am trying to figure out where the Mids end and the sub should begin. I'm calibrating the crossover for my amp, JL 500/1, tomorow.

Thanks,
Gareth

 

if you use the factory sub lead, shouldn't it already be crossed over?

 

just a dumb ? of the day .. where is the factory sub?

 

My installer put a JL sub and amp in my Harmon Karden E55 and now the 2 rear lid speakers, which he retained in their previous locations, minus the 10 inch factory rear deck sub, sound barely audible, even if panning full to rear.

Any advice?

I think he took the new sub feed from the rear deck wiring.

He said the measured impedance of the 2-4 inch rear speakers was 1.5 ohms

One cool thing is the spare tire well was used as the new 12" W6 JL sub location (custom molded). Now, there was a whole lotta shakin' goin' on after the molded enclosure was finished, necessitating Dynamat througout the trunk.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

my installer put in a 10" downfiring, concealed cabinet sub, in the trunk. along with a J/L 500/1 amp. he removed the factory sub. but something is configured incorrectly because

1) there is a delay before when i should hear the bass and when i do hear it. about 1/2 to 1 second delay. (is there a factory amp, or a factory sound processor and amp? i'm wondering if the installer tapped into the amp signal rather than the signal from the processor and that would cause the delay??)
2) the frequency at which the bass should engage is much lower than it should be. for example the mids cut out at around 100/80 or so is my guess and i can hear the sub engage, but much lower....say around 60. results in really muddy bass with a bass gap.
3) the installer used the signal sensor (turned on) vs. the trigger to turn the amp on, so about 25 seconds into a song after i turn the stereo on, the amp turns on and engages and huge bass is heard coming from my trunk. is it possible to wire the 500/1 so the trigger wire is used to turn on the amp rather than the signal?
4) the volume of the bass vs. the regular sound is not matched. the bass volume is way too much for the regular volume. something needs to be calibrated.
5) the trunk rattles which i think means i need some dynamat (but i'd like to get 1-4 fixed first).

any comments/recommendations on any of this would be appreciated. i picked up the car yesterday and did not get to test it until this afternoon. i talked to the installer. he has a good reputation and said no problem, he would meet with me next week and get the tech to figure out what was the problem. this is really annoying. if any of you have the J/L 500/1, i'd love to know your settings or if you know how the installer or you set it up??

oh, they removed my factory sub so that the bass/air could pass through the rear deck into the cabin.

 

Sounds like it is "out of phase" this happens when you criss-cross wires somewhere

 

very good point. thanks. attached is the layout for anyone who is interested:

 

Dr. Crowder,

thank you. bass delay is fixed. the shop screwed up and swapped the plugs. i switched the red and black RCA inputs and everything is in sync now.

bass needs to be configured now, and i probably need some dynomat. but the bass now sounds "more" reasonable. outstanding issues are for the shop only now.

1) (FIXED, thanks dr. crowder) there is a delay before when i should hear the bass and when i do hear it. about 1/2 to 1 second delay. (is there a factory amp, or a factory sound processor and amp? i'm wondering if the installer tapped into the amp signal rather than the signal from the processor and that would cause the delay??)
2) the frequency at which the bass should engage is much lower than it should be. for example the mids cut out at around 100/80 or so is my guess and i can hear the sub engage, but much lower....say around 60. results in really muddy bass with a bass gap.
3) the installer used the signal sensor (turned on) vs. the trigger to turn the amp on, so about 25 seconds into a song after i turn the stereo on, the amp turns on and engages and huge bass is heard coming from my trunk. is it possible to wire the 500/1 so the trigger wire is used to turn on the amp rather than the signal?
4) (almost fixed, needs to be calibrated at the shop, but now that phase is fixed its not out of control) the volume of the bass vs. the regular sound is not matched. the bass volume is way too much for the regular volume. something needs to be calibrated.
5) (still needs some work, but 10x better now that the phase is correct) the trunk rattles which i think means i need some dynamat (but i'd like to get 1-4 fixed first).

Gareth

 

quite welcome, glad I could help.

FWIW stop going to this guy, now. go to another reputable installer. I have learned this lesson the hard way, which is:

Even though the original installer "owes" me to get it right, they have proven that they can't do the job, the 100 - 300 you'll spend getting someone to "fix" his work is a better option than this person continually screwing up your audio.

PS any good installer has a sound analyzer. You pop a CD in your head unit, and it can play sound from 20 - 20,000 cycles (range of human hearing) the unit has a mic and will display the level of each freq range sou that you can tune and cross over the system correctly

 

agreed.

 

From a post above

"4) (almost fixed, needs to be calibrated at the shop, but now that phase is fixed its not out of control) the volume of the bass vs. the regular sound is not matched. the bass volume is way too much for the regular volume. something needs to be calibrated."

I have always had the installer add an attenuation/sub volume control knob to the system, as different program cources require more or less sub boost(at least the was me and my 5 kids hear it). The small control knob fits neatly in the ashtray console area. I would like to know if anyone has an alternative to this system in car applications. On the home audio front, I have programmed all kinds of logic into my Crestron system to adkust many parameters of the audio gear to program source, volume level, etc., however.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

Great point! I forgot about that, Yes I have one too in my Z4. I use it often as we switch between Alternative (me) and Dance / Techno (her / us both sorta) demands that I adjust the bass.

 

i have that knob installed. the problem does not lie with that knob.

at home, i have my home theater setup so that the decibel level of the subs is +10dB in relation to the rest of the speakers.

however, if the car were my home theater, the sub's decibal level was like 40 to 50 decibels in level greater than the rest of the speakers. this was mostly solved when i patched their phase error and switched the incoming RCA jacks.

their is an input sensitivity knob on the 500/1 and according to JL, when the volume of the car is at 3/4's of max volume, w/o the sub connected, the voltage across the + and 1 termianls should be roughly 45 volts.

 

I have the same amp and am running a JL dub6. If the gain on the amp is set anywhere close to max, in this car's setup, the sub attenuation knob's effect can approach zero. I just got the car back today, so I haven't checked different settings. I still have a rattle from the plastic shield below the spare tire well, which now houses the sub (glass molded in place).

What I was getting at with the Home Audio automation is, for example, to change the sub's delta as, say, Genre changes. With a product like Audio Request and rs232 bidirectional control, simple. This would be just great in a vehicle, but subject to all kinds of motion related issues. I have heard of it being installed, however...

Thank you very much

Fury

 

i hear you with regard to the knob. i just need to fix the input sensitivity problem first before i can truly take advantage of what the knob can do for me.

as for audio request. very nice. i have one of the 250Gb models.

 

do me a favor srgnt,

please check to see how they have wired the 12volt trigger. are there 3 wires coming from that area of the amp, or one, or none at all? does your amp come on when you turn on the stereo, or when you turn on the ignition?

thanks,
Gareth

 

Hi Gareth,

Well, I went out to the garage, opened the trunk and heard some gremlins. Apparently they have wired the amp to power up as soon as the vehicle is unlocked or an portal is opened , if already unlocked (I confirmed this). The amp powers down after about 30 seconds of inactivity.

Wiring checks will have to wait for Desparate Housewives/

I do hope you have Request zones and a proper automation system-like Crestron to take full advantage of the pieces.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

thanks guys. they wired the trigger to some non-existent place in the HK processor. so i wired the trigger to a 12v source connected to the ignition (power adaptor in trunk, left rear on side). now the amp powers on when the key turns to power up everything else. ideally it would only turn on when the stereo turns on, but this will have to do for now.

sgt, seems that your 500/1 is switched to check for a source. climb in and look at the switches and you'll see if it is or not. this solves all my problems now. i'll duramat it at some other place and i definitely will not return to this installer (recommended by the dealer).

Gareth

 

for those of you that have 500/1's, and have their rear deck sub removed, with a sub in the trunk...

curious what your settings are on your 500/1 sub amp?
1) low pass crossover frequency
2) parametric eq settings (center frequency in particular and Q (i know this depends on your sub).

most of the issues are addressed from the start of my initial post, but my bass is not dialed in. sounds a bit muddy/not tight, and slightly boomy. as mentioned before, i have a 10" sub, in a sealed enclosure, pointed downward in the right rear corner of my trunk (enclosed located / attached to back of back seat). any other suggestions are more than welcome.

 

Hi Gareth,

I'll check the settings later today.

Could you check the volume of your rear deck lid 4 inch speakers fully rear panned on content that allows clear audibilization and compare output to, say, the sides or front? My are barely audible.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

fury,
i actually did last night. they are good and same level as rest of car. if you can't hear yours, perhaps check fade settings, or Sound settings (stereo vs. 7 channel). could be a chance that your guy disconnected them by mistake. not hard to reconnect, but annoying i'm sure. thanks again for checking.
gareth

 

Hi Gareth,

I specifically rear panned the 7/1 setup and hear only whisper level audio. Do you know how the installer wired the sub and rear deck speakers. Oh, just thought that you may not have removed the 10" factory sub. Was that removed? My installer took the 3 apeaker rear deck lid housing off and remounted the 2-4 inch speakers.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

my installer only removed the sub (i checked), but did not remove the deck itself. he just took the braided wires going to the subwoofer and rerouted them into the JL sub ( as RCA inputs )

 

Hi Gareth,

There are 2 wires comimg from the 12volt trigger. One has a very thick shield, however.

Now, somewhere you asjed about the On/Off sense setting of the amp. This is Off and as I noted so, somewhere above, my amp powers up on unlocking the vehicle or opening any portal, if already unlocked.

Thank you very much

Fury

 

thanks sgt. seems they wired your power directly into a ignition controlled power source. mine is direct to the battery, so i'll have to use the trigger to turn it on and off. thanks for all the help.

i emailed aura sound and one of their engineers is now helping me figure out what box to use. he said most definitely not a downfiring one (what this shop chose). the one thing i do not know much about so i decided to take it in to get it done. and it turned out not so good.

we should keep a list of good vendors local to certain areas. not a black list, but a good list, so people from this forum can get the quality they deserve.