[nickgonzo]

Originally posted by ThePrettyPhysicist+Jun 8 2006, 06:05 AM--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ThePrettyPhysicist @ Jun 8 2006, 06:05 AM)</div><div class='quotemain'>

I designed a component system for my sister for far less then 250 including a 6channel amp. I will only bore you with the specifics if you wish.

After is all said and done, it may just be easier to go to a local car audio shop and listen to the speakers there. Tell the people what kind of car you have and ask to demo some speakers that will fit your car's openings. Then pick which ones you like best.


edit: and my component system I have here waiting to be installed in my alero cost me roughly 100 bucks including shipping and I'm pretty sure it will blow away comps that cost as much as 3 or 4x the price.

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i am interested - feel free to PM me with the specifics if you dont want to post it ...

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Grab some popcorn for this one.

First off, you have to ask what makes a component set better then the 4-way coax Rockfords you saw at Best Buy. The answer is simple, yet complex.

When you buy a 6.5" component set, you usually get 3 different items; a midwoofer, a tweeter, and a passive crossover. The most significant item is the passive crossover, I mean as far as making the set better than your average coax. (some coax speakers do come with a passive crossover, but its usually just a small capacitor for the tweeter)

If you already know what a crossover does, then you can skip ahead. Basically, a crossover will cut off part of the audio signal going to your speaker. For example, you have heard of a "bass blocker" right? Its just a simple passive crossover wired before your speaker and it magically cuts off bass, lol. Passive crossovers use capacitors and inductors to start cutting off part of the audio signal at a certain frequency in -dbs/octave. Simple bass blockers are usually -6db/octave. Most comp sets will use -12db/octave crossovers. The higher the number, the steeper the slope. 24 and 36db crossovers are pretty much brickwalls. Making a passive xover that uses 24db or 36db crossovers is impractical because they would use too many parts making them cost inefficient.

So lets say I own a speaker company, I decide I need to make a component set to compete with the other companies. I order a bunch of mids and tweeters, and have a bunch of textbook crossovers made.. put my logo on them and call it a day. This is how most comp systems are made. You will not get much attention to detail in component systems until you start buying companies flagship items.

We live in a modern world, and the modern world uses active crossovers. Active crossovers always come before amplification. Be it, in your head unit, in your amp or an external active crossover. The benefit of going active is huge, the flexibility of your system has increased tenfold. Now you can change crossover points on the fly, change the slopes with the push of a button, and find out whats best for YOUR car and YOUR musical tastes... not relying on some poorly designed crossovers.

Okay so where is he going with this. The thing that component sets taught us is that using a good crossover is a big reason why people like component sets better then coax speakers (the proper separation of sound frequencies played by a driver that is more suitable to play said frequencies). We also learned that there are different types of crossovers, and that active crossovers are superior (IMHO of course ). So now how can we use this to our advantage and not pay 300 bucks on a pair of speakers that werent properly designed?

We design our own component system! How, you ask? There are many sites that sell raw drivers (by raw I mean, just a woofer and just a tweeter). Putting home based drivers in you car isn't anything new, people have been doing it since car audio was invented. We just have a bigger audience now.

So whats a good site to buy our custom component system? Partsexpress is great for newbies. Go to the speaker page and look around.

Heres the 100 component set I am going to play around with.

mids = Dayton RS180-4 a gem in the DIY community, easily competes with woofers that cost 2 and 3x the price. And now in a 4ohm unshielded version must low pass at 2khz tho

tweeters = Peerless 811435 a great compact tweeter, that can be crossed low enough to match with Dayton mid.

we need something to power these, find a good 4channel amp that allows you to highpass/lowpass the channels variably from 50-5khz (pretty standard range on these types of amps.)

or you can get this Aura amp since its too good of a deal to pass up, and get a HU that will do the crossover for you. (I'm getting the Pioneer DEH-P880PRS which will do 3way active and it has a sweet EQ and TA. They are going for about 300 on ebay ATM, its a sweet sweet deck for the price)

Congrats on your new custom (DIY) component set

(More to come, I need a break.)