Subwoofers and speakers

[Salteen]

So I need some opinions. I picked up a 1000W amp recently and I figured I would go ahead and show off my audio that's going in my truck. It's a 12" punch sub and 4 6" truck boxes going behind the seat a 6x9 in the center under the dash and the 2 speakers you see (one has a LED frame though I have 2 I need to extend the wiring on both) all to a custom bluetooth chip that powered the lights and speakers with LR audio (sub and 6x9 are wired to both speakers so that it plays constantly) and I also have led ligjtbars for the floor too. What do yall think?

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[Salteen]

https://youtu.be/_aIs9XzGxeU

[geezer101]

The Punch 12" is gonna give you chest pains in a truck cab lol. If you want loud, you've got it with everything you've posted up. If you want staging, don't put the 6x9 in the centre of the dash - leave it out of the equation. The 2x6" pairs won't give you a nice clean sound from behind the seats and probably are overkill+. The standard cab trucks don't leave you a lot of options for setting up audio so whatever you do it will be a compromise to some extent. I would put splits in the doors and windscreen pillars (tweeters + 5.25-6.5" mids) a pair of 4 to 6" for rear fill, a sub either under a seat or facing the back of the cab and the amp under the passenger seat. You're gonna need sound deadening or the cab will buzz like a hornets nest. I'd like to build an overhead rear cab mount for speakers as it won't take up valuable cab space and improve staging. This is just my opinion but if you've picked this stuff up for cheaps I'd go for it and see how it sounds.

[Salteen]

I havent spent a dime on anything but the 2 little speakers and the LED's. It's funny I actually had a bluetooth speaker box from a snall grocery store for like 20 bucks. I like taking stuff apart and seeing how it works so I said 'let's see how this works'. So I stripped it and said 'well, now that its apart, what if it were in my truck?' So I threw it in there and magnetized the speakers to the back of the cab. Well here I am now with a custom chip. The sub and the truck boxes and the 6x9 were all given to me from dad who said he didnt need them and he wasnt gonna use them and I could have them. The 3" speakers came out the bluetooth box and it actually had 2 2" tweeters too. The amp I have I actually traded 2 super 10 mufflers and a honda civic gauge cluster for. It has helped alot though in the video it wasnt hooked up (wasnt even 100 volume lol more like 50 or 60) so yeah I think its gonna be loud, which I like tolling down dirt roads volume 100 listening to songs like that. I actually have a 500 song playlist I can share too if you would like to listen, ots on spotify.

[geezer101]

Wheelin' and dealin' - everyone loves a bargain :thumbup:

[Salteen]

thats right. most of my music is rock and metal (or actually all of it lol) so I feel like the 6x9 is essential really so I may as well keep it. what do you think???

[geezer101]

I'm kind of a car audio snob lol. I've installed a few good 'entry level' systems for myself and a few people who wanted something decent. I always go for splits up front, a pair of single or dual cones in the rear for fill, a good bridgeable 4 channel amp and a quality head unit (not Pioneer or Sony - ugh...) If you have a bunch of speakers that are the same diameter they lose range and depth and a pair of tweeters with cross overs are a must when installing splits. Good thing is car audio has become a lot more affordable, and if you're not a butcher with a jigsaw and a steak knife you can achieve both a good sounding and looking system. My first quality install way back was $3500 :shock:and now I can pull off a better sounding set up under $1k easy. I have some absurdly expensive audio gear stashed away that I'm too scared to use as I know it'll get stolen and stripped out in 5 seconds :shakehead:

[claych]

Apologies ,
I have to ask - what sound system have you is installed in Your ?L200?

[geezer101]

Apologies ,
I have to ask - what sound system have you is installed in Your ?L200?

Right now - nada. I deleted the single DIN head unit slot in the dash for a triple 2" gauge panel and, because I've made new door cards, there aren't any provisions for speakers at the moment. I was given a mechless single DIN DAB+ head unit and the L200 has a power antenna fitted so I'm not sure of what I really want to install or even if I will do so. I have a weird old school SRS amp/equaliser with a pair of Philips 6.5" splits that I can mount with some old fiberglass door pods and would work well in a small cab, that but I don't have a practical solution for rear fill. The only way I can see around not chopping up my interior further for a head unit is to make a mounting chassis with aluminium extrusion and anchor it to the upper frame of the cab but I'm not sold on the idea. I do have a MacIntosh MC240 amp and an Alpine integrated DSP module with a CD head unit and 6 disc stacker but that stuff it worth 4 times more than my L200 and that is just asking for trouble (and self harm) and will be tricky to cram into my truck.

[Salteen]

My truck is a Power Ram 50, the 4x4 Ram 50. I have 2 5: speakers in the dash right now and that's it. I have a kenwood radio that's getting swapped out for a pioneer bluetooth radio. And pioneer in american is actually good. I picked up my 1000 amp from my freind in trade for 2 super 10 mufflers barely used. So yeah good deal lol. I have made a diagram to my understanding of how this works so correct me if I'm wrong.

1000 Watt amp
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How I rigged ti test if it worked
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Diagram
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[geezer101]

For the head unit Red = 12v+ accessory power, Black = ground, Yellow = permanent power for memory, Blue = amp remote trigger, White/blue = power antenna. Do not use 12v+ power for the amp remote trigger - it will roast it. Everything else is just speaker channels or RCA's - pretty easy. Hooking up a sub - take one channels' +ve connection and -ve for the opposing side channel to bridge it. Make sure you have the wire polarity right on the sub or it'll sound like crap (like any other speaker if you mess up the polarity lol) I would also make the Punch 12" sub removable for those times where you need the space. I'm using something like this so I can take out my 12" sub tube from the cargo are of my wagon -
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Round-Recessed-Speaker-Sub-Terminal-Plate-Cup-with-Spring-Loaded-Push-Tabs/283458386607?hash=item41ff6fbaaf:g:XtMAAOSwGjtcu5F d

[Salteen]

Oh yeah my sub and my truck boxes have that tab thing on them, seems real handy! Also good if you want to swap between cars and stuff, because I just picked up a cheap 1995 yota 3.4. I am seriously thinking about selling my 87 because I love this truck. Remember the maroon puckup in the background of some photos? Mine now and it's awesome. I need to pull the 3.4 out and get the dowel pins fixed and I need to mod the hood. But this is all for the yota forums not the ram 50 forums lol

[geezer101]

It is safer for the amp if you have the spring terminals soldered to speaker cables running off the amp, that way if you accidentally rip a speaker cable out it won't dead short a channel and blow up the amp. I make a habit of installing spring terminals for sub installs as the rest of the speaker channels are fixed and concealed under trim/carpet.

[Salteen]

thanks for the tip geezer! i personally don't like when my electricals barely touch, I like to have a truck that isn't a rolling fireball lol. electrical short = possible fire = certain death

[geezer101]

It won't fireball you if the speaker wires short out on each other or the body of the truck, but it'll blow the amp and kill your hard work. The one you need to be protective of the is the amp main power. That will be disastrous if it isn't secured and shielded. The amp needs a fuse as close to the battery as possible and tucked in and taped down somewhere safe.

[pennyman1]

large amp fuses should be securely fastened down and not floating at all...

[geezer101]

large amp fuses should be securely fastened down and not floating at all...

Sorry should've elaborated - I was referring to the main amp power cable being secured but the amp fuse should be secured also. I am a hypocrite though when it comes to that course of action. I have a sealed weatherproof blade fuse holder suspended next to the battery, but the cable is zip tied to the frame rail firmly so it won't vibrate free or float around.

[Salteen]

yeah, I went to walmart and bought some 'wiring harness' some thick wire and an inline fuse. I was going to just wire it to the fuse box in the cab but a few people have convinced me otherwise. i also picked up some spring terminals from the hardware store, like you suggested geezer. oh, I cant forget: BLUETOOTH RADIO W/ RGA PORTS!!! all of it was ~150ish bucks if I recall correctly. i have like 175 Bucks a couple of mufflers and a Honda civic gauge that have paid forward to this setup. I think it'll sound good.

[Salteen]

there is a fuse on the Amp, shouldn't that be good enough????

[geezer101]

Nope. That's great to protect the amp, but if you get a short between the battery and the amp it'll kill the battery and possibly start a fire. Always have a fuse as close as practical to the battery when running a high demand accessory. Decent ICE installers will always run a fuse up front on a block or a sealed fuse holder when setting up a good system.

[Fordubishi]

I'm an Audiophile myself. I competed in IASCA for 8 years with my 90 Sidekick. A good system like Geezer said should be Front Fill, Back fill and Sub. 6x9" speakers are crap for sound quality you're better off with 5.25-6.5" round in the front doors, and a 6" in back. Right now my system is a set of 6.5" JBL 2 ways in the door, and 2 10" Low profile JL Subs behind the seat. the subs are run off a JL Audio 2 way amp bridged to run 250watts mono at 4 ohms. The Fronts are run off my deck power (50watts x2) and the freaking thing POUNDS HARD. I build Systems for customers and If they bring me any oval speaker I tell them to get round ones. Don't get hung up on wattage as more is not always better. My Sidekick was set up for SQ+ and when I did the SPL test I could hit 127dbs with a total of 104watts @4 ohms driven. I was lucky enough to get my hands on the very first Kicker Solobaric 12 the day it was released. 2 years ago I won "Best Car Audio" at one of the car shows over people that had spent thousands on their systems as according to the judges mine had the best sound and a very clean install.

I totally agree with Geezer as i have a ton of old car audio in storage that I don't want to use on anything but a show vehical as it "might" get stolen.My D-50 in 1998 was going to be sponsored by Coustic Audio but they were bought out by MTX the beginning of 1999. so I have a bunch of stuff that was bought but never installed.

[geezer101]

I get where salteen is coming from - he's got a bunch of stuff that he hasn't had to sell an organ off to buy and wants to put it to use which is a fair call. Used or old doesn't mean crap. My SAS 10" tube that I've been using is 25 years old now and still has the ability to loosen your dental work lol. Add to that a Philips XP640 4 channel amp which is an ancient amp and an Alpine CD player that was given to me (which I'm contemplating ditching as the disc player is glitchy...) You can get pretty ordinary audio stuff to provide an acceptable sound but don't expect concert clarity. It's especially difficult to pull it off in a tiny truck cab. Set up your gear and experiment with it - speaker locations, balance and fade, audio settings etc til you get it to where you know it's limits. I thought having a 10 band graphic equaliser and a pair of carrozzeria box speakers running off a factory cassette deck sounded awesome in my first car - until I learned about amps, subs, crossovers and splits. But it was a place to start :)

[camoit]

Now you must drive around blasting this from your truck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLuNy8qfK9Q

[Salteen]

Hahaha I just might do that camoit!

[Salteen]

I'll take note. Thanks for the advice, Fordbishi and Geezer!