officemanager

Have a 96 C4 Cabriolet with the factory HiFi option. The speakers are currently replaced with MB quarts throughout and I’ve got Alpine's awesome DA-7998 MP3 head unit w/matching MP3-CD changer and a Phoenix Gold TI500.4 in trunk.
It's a remarkable difference from the factory system but because I’m truly obsessive I’m thinking of pulling the MBs and either changing to a larger amp and Dynaudio’s 3 way 360s, altering the factory Hifi enclosure to handle the 8" woofers in front doors and no sub woofers [better image phasing allegedly with all the drivers in plane instead of spread around the vehicle] or replacing the MBs in the existing HiFi front enclosure with Focal’s 3 way 165 3Ws and adding 2 Focal 5W subwoofers on each door in the balance [hinged] portion of the door enclosure stiffened and sealed to form a custom box.

I REALLY DON’T WANT TO LOSE THE SPACE TO PUT IN A BOX WITH SUBS IN THE FOOT WELLS BELOW THE REAR SEATS AS I’VE GOT TWO KIDS… and hence am trying to stretch a bit more out of the front.

My feeling is the Dyns and the Focals are roughly equal and both blow away the MBs. My worry is that the Dyn’s without subs won’t go low enough and that the beautiful Focals 5W subs which where awesome in the rear deck of my 964 Coupe are misplaced in the doors 3” from my side and also may just not move enough “air” in the cabriolet to be effective… Which of course brings me back to either the 8” Dyn 360s or the Focals with 10” Focal subs in the rear and no foot room back there period in which case I should just pull one or both of the seats and built a real proper sub enclosure.

Anyone with subs got any feedback.

And let me add for the general population what I have now is awesome and I recommend it wholeheartedly… The Alpine head is amazing in itself /Focal 165 3w’s in the Hifi enclosure or 185w’s in the plain door with a Phoenix Gold Titanium or Zapco are all any reasonable person would want especially in a Coupe… I’m just being an audiophile *** about this last little bit of low bass.

cwolf NYC

Chris - 97C2

Well if you figure it out, please post it here. As mentioned in a previous post, I am doing an upgrade with some similar parts as well (lots of info in the archives, search for "alpine"). Unfortunately, as many others have posted, even after putting in a bunch of high end gear there is still a "hole" that only a subwoofer may fix. I'll post more after I get some initial problems (Alpine being repaired) corrected.

YellowC4S

i've got the 360's in my A4, in the front doors with another pair of 8's so there's 2 8's, the mid and the tweet in each front door...midbass is spectacular...

MrClifton

I put a powered sub woofer in the trunk with my Alpine and it has more than enough bass. Don't laugh, the sound is wonderful. I had the same setup in my 1984 and that one sounded good too. Same reason, I have kids.

John H. in DC Area

I've got Focal's 3 ways in the doors, as well as some Focals replacing the OEM speakers in the rear deck. Butler Tube Driver Blue amp driving it all. Blaupunkt head unit. Two 8-inch subs in the rear footwells from caraudioinnovations. If I had to do it again with the subs (and I may just do it again), I wouldn't use up the rear footwell. It actually restricts the fore-aft movement of the front seats quite a bit. I sit pretty close to the steering wheel, so it doesn't bother me, but my wife likes to push her passenger seat all the way back. With the subs in the rear footwell, the seat won't go all the way back on the rails.

If I redo the subs, I may go for something like this, which I saw in a 993 for sale on e-bay:

<img src="http://boards.rennlist.com/upload/P9250025.jpg" alt=" - " />

Phil

not to take this off topic.
If you have a v1 detector....do not get XM radio!
they do NOT work together
v1 picks up the sat. signal....and will be "on" all the time!
I think I will get rid of xm, and put in a mp3 with speaker upgrades

Randy M

Phil, are you saying that XM radio and radar detectors dont mix? Or is it just the V1 that conflicts with xm?

Kevin Reilly

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">Originally posted by John H. in DC Area:
<strong>
If I redo the subs, I may go for something like this, which I saw in a 993 for sale on e-bay:
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">John, that is a nice pic. Looks like that seat is still usable as well. If you find out more about that type of placement, please post it. Thanks.

David in LA

I don't recall ever seeing subs placed there before...that would be a perfect place. I also recall that some have put a single sub in the front passenger footwell in older 911s.

Nol, 95 993 C4

I have an Alpine headunit & amp driving BA's in factory locations (6.5") and sound is great. Adding an 8" sub even in a compromised location made a huge difference to the low end. I'd recommend a good sub any day.

The sub behind the rear seatback is a very good location, but I wonder what is behind it for achieving good sound? This location is available almost regardless of model year, yet this is the first time I've seen it. Could it be there are structural issues with the 8"+ hole in that location?

BTW is it necessary to have an enclosure? Some Kenwood subs are marketed as "free air" models (sorry, can't remember the exact phrase). They're meant for rear decks covering large volume open car boots like in an estate or SUV. Again, I'm not sure what the sound is like. The high end stuff I know all seems to concentrate on enclosures.

I currently have a single sub enclosure of the CarAudioInnovations type in the rear footwell behind the driver's seat. If safe and if the sound of this new option is halfway decent I would convert to get the footwell back. Some confirmation/endorsement would be nice before I commit the hacksaw....

Enjoy <img border="0" alt="[burnout]" title="" src="graemlins/burnout.gif" />

John H. in DC Area

I tried to chase down the installer of this rear seat subwoofer system when I noticed the ad on e-bay, but the seller was a dealer who received the car on a trade-in and they didn't know anything about how the install was done or who did it in Florida. They did say the sound was amazing with the seat backs down (forward) and there was still pretty good base with the seat backs up and the bass adjusted upwards. I'm probably going to take this pic in to my stereo shop and see if they can duplicate this. It's hard to tell what size speakers those are in the pic, do you think 8's or 10's?

YellowC4S

i haven't picked my porsche up yet...is there really enough room back there for a couple of 10" subs...JL Audio? I have to use the factory head because of the navigation so I was gonna go speaker level out into Audio Control's

Luis A.

Kevin,

Did you end up getting the Millenium?

bet

Officemanager I sent you a private message.

A.J. - 95 993

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">Originally posted by YellowC4S:
<strong>&lt;&lt;snip&gt;&gt;...is there really enough room back there for a couple of 10" subs...&lt;&lt;snip&gt;&gt;</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">From the looks of it, that would be a 10" sub. I would be interested to see how they got the clearance for the magnet. Just as importantly as how the install was performed - how does it sound? From what little I know about subs, there can be big differences in sound using the same sub just by giving it the properly tuned enclosure. Then again, some subs are designed to not need enclosures.

I'm very interested in this solution - I have an 8" sub that's currently in a small box, and would love to clear up more space in back.