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#1
Hello everyone, this is my first blog. Over the years i've had the opportunity to install numerous different hi fidelity audio systems in all of my cars and have tried brands like focal, morel, rainbow, alpine etc. but never really bothered about posting anything on social media/any forums. But NO! Not this time, cuz this is a decade long dream of mine which has come true and a lot of us have worked so hard on this setup day in and day out over a span of a week to get it absolutely right and it's so worth it that i cannot stop being more happy about it and thought I'd share it with this car community. And moreover I feel every audiophile should share their story cuz like bill says in kill bill "I see your husband's a music lover, but hey, aren't we all eh'?"
What started as a hobby in 2009 soon turned into a serious passion in the quench to find "THE PERFECT SOUND"! For me personally, It's been a very steep learning curve and thanks to a lot of automotive forums I was able to learn a few things about car audio which is like an ocean in itself and there's always more to learn. But boy oh boy wasn't it fun to learn.
As a college kid back in the 2012's I still vividly remember having so many sleepless nights where I used to stay back in my car past midnight listening to quality music and fidgeting around the stereo and the equalizer setting up crossover frequency cut off points and tuning the gains, lpf and hpf settings on the amp and doing time alignment for hours just to get better imaging and a good sound stage. But since the scope for a clean install and proper knowledge of setting up active hi fidelity car audio among installers down south in Tamil Nadu was quite limited at that time I have always had to settle down for passive 2 way systems and have blown a few tweeters too along the way simply by just experimenting! (Blew a focal ps 165 tweeter as one crossover stopped working and the installer connected the drivers directly to the amp without the crossover and this is exactly why i've stayed away from installing active setups in my hometown let alone passive 3 ways)
In my early 20's i've always dreamt of ditching the crossovers and going completely active by setting up a proper 4 way active system right from the tweeters to the midranges and to the midbass and all the way down to the woofer. That dream has finally come true now after a decade and that's right "A DECADE".
How the project started:
Well to begin with the figo's been around with us since september 2021 and it was the last batch of 1.2 AT before ford finally shut down its doors. Got a massive discount on this deal too as dealers were clearing stocks. The only thing that I had done to this car since purchasing was to do a ceramic coat, add some leather seat covers, throw in some carboy mats and led fog lights. She's been completely stock other than that. The speakers that came with the car was very basic and had mundane sound, totally lifeless audio. Heck they weren't even Coaxials. So fast forward to 2023, it was finally time for an audio upgrade. As i've had enough with two ways already, the decision was made at the very beginning that this had to be a 3 way, totally and I have made up my mind to get it installed in chennai.
Options considered for the speakers were
1. Helix P63 C (Was dropped cuz there weren't a lot of reviews online on this thing to get to know how it really sounds and heard from a friend that they're bright.)
2. Hertz Mille legend / Mille pro (Dropped as My dealer didn't have these on stock and had a long waiting period, but nonetheless have heard only wonderful things about the mille pro, they've won an eisa award too, not sure of the year though.)
3. Rainbow Germanium (Again an eisa award winner but dropped as 3 ways were more expensive and moreover I already have the rainbow soundlines on a creta and wanted to try something different this time around. Nonetheless I love the sound of the rainbows, as the tweeters are soft and provide great detail and midbass is great too)
4. Rainbow profi vanadium (Well these speaker has kinda been in my archive wishlist for ages, its a used one owned by a friend from B'lore. Well technically its unused as he never installed it in his car and has been lying around with him for so many years. They are rainbow's flagship and were originally hand built in germany before rainbow was taken over by a korean company I guess, which makes these a proper true blood old school rainbow. But had to drop this plan as I had to pay a premium for this and it was pretty old technology already.)
5. Alpine DP 653 (Comes as an active set from factory and crossovers can be purchased separately from alpine, but I Have the alpine spr 60C in a crysta and was initially driving this with an alpine bbx T600 2 channel amp doing about 50W RMS per channel and it was a decent no nonsense speaker. Later swapped the bbx 600 to the creta to power the rainbows as the soundlines had a sensitivity of 92 db and didn't require a lot of power to sing. Bought an alpine bbx F1200 4 channel amp for the crysta and bridged it into two channel and fed them close to 100W RMS and man they scream. They have a reputation for going super loud without distorting and the tweeters can be swiveled, not that it does anything to sq but can be swiveled and swiveling is good cuz atleast it tricks you into thinking it sounds good if you swivel it a bit midbass kicks hard and was explosive to say the least. shakes the entire car, probably the best midbasses i've ever heard, no need for a seperate woofer but the tweeters are extremely bright which wasn't to my liking and thus dropped and super glad I did as my installer has this set installed in his own car, took a demo of it and my ears were close to bleeding, it was that bright. He was running active and told me he still couldn't tune it to make them less bright. The speakers are just made that way and thats their sound signature. some ears love it and some don't, so that's about it)
6.Audison Voce 3 way (well was tempted by the 3 ways and have always had a soft spot in my heart for them, but in 2023 they're more than a decade old speakers with no upgrades yet so had to drop them too)
7. Focal Flax evo ps 165 / Access (Once this brand had customer satisfaction and top notch quality as priority but now with speakers like access and the price they demand for them I think they're scamming us now. In 2012 I bought a focal ps 165 performance series speaker for a mere 15K and thats one of the best speakers i've owned till date. For that price it was a total winner, was made by the use of best materials, the components had a poly glass cone and boasted an inverted aluminium silk dome tweeters. Vocals were extremely detailed and the only thing i didnt like about them was that they were again bright, well that's the brands sound signature anyways.)
8.Blam 3 ways (well the founders of blam are based on france and used to work for focal. They came out and started their own thing and that's how blam began, so I thought they would have a similar sound signature to that of focal and i was right. Heard from many they sound bright just like focals. so had to drop them too.)
9. Morel Virtus Nano Carbon 63 (Well say hello to my little friend! Was a bit skeptical about this at first, as I have the morel maximo ultra 602 2 ways on a vento and midbass lacked punch, tweeters were super bright and they were powered by a lightning audio 2 channel amplifier. But i've heard that morel's true sound quality can be experienced only if you go above the virtus lineup. Morel have sold a lot of these speakers and there were so many video reviews on youtube and automotive forums already, so it was tried and tested and reliable from what i've heard. They've won the eisa award for 2018-19 and to put the cherry on top, got a great deal for these through a friend from Delhi. So purchased this finally after doing so much background research.)
options considered for the amp and dsp and other miscellaneous purchases:
Since I decided to go active at the very beginning itself I knew exactly what I was searching for. A 6 channel amp and an 8 channel dsp. Just wanted to keep it simple without too much complications. So here are the considerations.
1. Helix M six (Loved it, had rave reviews but dealer didn't have it on stock and had a long waiting period, thus dropped)
2. Zapco ST 6X sq (They make extremely fine quality amplifiers and had 100W RMS which was my only criteria. The plan was to feed the drivers with just 40w rms per channel so that way the amp wouldn't be running hot at its limit all the time. Kept factor of safety into consideration and just wanted some clean power. It's a class AB amplifier and it does the job and it's built tough. It's the most heaviest of the lot and just feels extremely solid)
3. Nakamichi NDSK 4185 AU (This was the only option considered as I was overshooting the budget I had in mind already and wanted something economical that does the job)
4. Kenwood monoblock KAC 8105 D (This is a mono that used to serve a Ground Zero 12" sub that I have on my crysta. My dad uses that car now and he says subwoofers brings him headaches and has a lot of problems that brings him headaches on a daily basis already let alone to deal with the woes of a woofer banging sounds below 80 Hz on his head all the time So the woofer's been sitting idle at my house for a long time and the amp's been sitting idle on the car. So decided to use this amp to power the woofer I had bought for the figo.)
5. Morel 10 primo Subwoofer (The intention wasn't to go with morels all around, but have had my eyes set on this beauty for a long time now. They're totally intened for SQ use rather than SPL which i've always wanted. I dont want others to hear my car from a mile away, I just wanted myself to hear some proper quality bass without any boominess. Also considered rockford fosgate, alpine type R and blam shallow woofer but I knew i'll end up here in the first place just cuz of the sound quality it offers. so chose this without any second thoughts.)
6. Damping sheets: Morel damping sheets with 2.4mm thickness. A total of ten sheets were in the box and Used this to damp all 4 doors with two layers, the boot lid, the spare wheel boot well and the back and insides of the woofer's fiberglass enclosure.
7. Wiring: Quaden wiring and RCA cables all around 16 gauge ofc for speakers, 8AWG for 6ch zapco and 4AWG for kenwood mono.
Some pictures of all the goodies:
Now to how they sound:
The morel nano carbons are by far the most sonically accurate speakers i've ever heard. Its sharp and precise staying true to its roots and have that authentic signature morel sound that the brand boasts about.
I couldn't even put it in words to explain/describe how incredible this thing sounds. Its got this mellowed down laid back sound signature that could give anyone eargasms! The tweeters are not harsh/bright and produce some crystal clear highs and you can listen to these ladies sing all day in n day out without getting any ear fatigue. Deep vocals (400hz - 5.5Khz) that come out of the MW-4 midranges sounds so heavenly like the greek gods themselves have come down here to put an end to all your woes with those therapeutic vocals. And it is at this very frequency band these drivers totally shine and the mw-4's are defenitely the show stealer here.
Now what do I speak about the 10" primo woofer. It totally blew me away by its exceptional top notch sound quality. It blends with the entire system, hits hard, deep and tight with no boominess/rattles to it and one moment it makes you wonder how low can this thing go without distorting and the other moment you never even know that its there and it's that silent when it doesn't perform. Sounds so tonally balanced and clean and can pickup anything from a bass guitar to a tuba/contrabass clarinet!
Frequency cut off Points:
Woofer: 20 - 80Hz
Midbass: 125 - 400Hz
Midrange: 400 - 5.5KHz
Tweeters: 5.5 - 20KHz
After a decade of want/search I'm finally happy that I got myself a setup that feels like your sitting in the studio with the musician right where the song was recorded and my ears can pick out and hear so many different notes and instruments from songs that i've heard all my life which i never knew existed in those songs before!
Installation:
Many thanks to the boys yuvraj, bhuvanesh, karthik and vijay kumar for helping me out with the installation. They're the most friendliest bunch i've ever worked with. Their attention to detail was incredible and carried out one of the finest workmanship i've ever witnessed in my experience through all these years of my audio journey. A lot of engineering and design has gone into the fabrication of the "A pillar" pods and they're all angled and placed on axis in such a way that the sound stage comes right from the dead centre and reaches every listener's ears at the same time as if you were wearing your earphones but still it's a bit driver oriented and setup in a way where the driver gets the best experience of the lot.
We've put in so much effort and man hours in fine tuning the entire system to eliminate any brightness, white noise, pink noise and distortion and the speakers have been time delayed to perfection with the help of a RTA mic.
For now, I've been running the midbass, the tweeters and the woofer close to flat with just minimal adjustments to the graph and proper eq has been done just for the midranges as the drivers are still in their break in period and from what I've heard these speakers need to play a minimum of 30 - 100 hours of playback to get seasoned, and that's when you could experience its true potential and the sound signature too changes a bit over time. So the plan is to run them in for 100 plus hours and then head for another retune. Can't wait to do that already. I'm pretty sure that they're gonna sound even better by then.
And many thanks to my fellow crazy audiophile brothers rohit and sarabpreet (An audio enthusiast and an expert tuner from whom I've learnt a lot from) Without these guys this project was never possible and they helped me plan this thing to a "T" and that's exactly why I love the brotherhood of the ever growing indian audiophile car community. It's filled with so many good folks like these helping out a total stranger like me whom they just met online, just so that they can put a smile on a fellow audiophile's face by helping them achieve thier dream sound! Cheers to many more years of our friendship and the quest to continue to keep searching for the best sound up until eternity!
I wish you could upload videos directly on this forum so that I could share it with all you audiophiles out here how this system sounds, Cuz youtube keeps giving copyright strikes for my video if I upload it over there.
But anyways thanks for taking the time to read this, until next time lads, Cheers! ✌
What started as a hobby in 2009 soon turned into a serious passion in the quench to find "THE PERFECT SOUND"! For me personally, It's been a very steep learning curve and thanks to a lot of automotive forums I was able to learn a few things about car audio which is like an ocean in itself and there's always more to learn. But boy oh boy wasn't it fun to learn.
As a college kid back in the 2012's I still vividly remember having so many sleepless nights where I used to stay back in my car past midnight listening to quality music and fidgeting around the stereo and the equalizer setting up crossover frequency cut off points and tuning the gains, lpf and hpf settings on the amp and doing time alignment for hours just to get better imaging and a good sound stage. But since the scope for a clean install and proper knowledge of setting up active hi fidelity car audio among installers down south in Tamil Nadu was quite limited at that time I have always had to settle down for passive 2 way systems and have blown a few tweeters too along the way simply by just experimenting! (Blew a focal ps 165 tweeter as one crossover stopped working and the installer connected the drivers directly to the amp without the crossover and this is exactly why i've stayed away from installing active setups in my hometown let alone passive 3 ways)
In my early 20's i've always dreamt of ditching the crossovers and going completely active by setting up a proper 4 way active system right from the tweeters to the midranges and to the midbass and all the way down to the woofer. That dream has finally come true now after a decade and that's right "A DECADE".
How the project started:
Well to begin with the figo's been around with us since september 2021 and it was the last batch of 1.2 AT before ford finally shut down its doors. Got a massive discount on this deal too as dealers were clearing stocks. The only thing that I had done to this car since purchasing was to do a ceramic coat, add some leather seat covers, throw in some carboy mats and led fog lights. She's been completely stock other than that. The speakers that came with the car was very basic and had mundane sound, totally lifeless audio. Heck they weren't even Coaxials. So fast forward to 2023, it was finally time for an audio upgrade. As i've had enough with two ways already, the decision was made at the very beginning that this had to be a 3 way, totally and I have made up my mind to get it installed in chennai.
Options considered for the speakers were
1. Helix P63 C (Was dropped cuz there weren't a lot of reviews online on this thing to get to know how it really sounds and heard from a friend that they're bright.)
2. Hertz Mille legend / Mille pro (Dropped as My dealer didn't have these on stock and had a long waiting period, but nonetheless have heard only wonderful things about the mille pro, they've won an eisa award too, not sure of the year though.)
3. Rainbow Germanium (Again an eisa award winner but dropped as 3 ways were more expensive and moreover I already have the rainbow soundlines on a creta and wanted to try something different this time around. Nonetheless I love the sound of the rainbows, as the tweeters are soft and provide great detail and midbass is great too)
4. Rainbow profi vanadium (Well these speaker has kinda been in my archive wishlist for ages, its a used one owned by a friend from B'lore. Well technically its unused as he never installed it in his car and has been lying around with him for so many years. They are rainbow's flagship and were originally hand built in germany before rainbow was taken over by a korean company I guess, which makes these a proper true blood old school rainbow. But had to drop this plan as I had to pay a premium for this and it was pretty old technology already.)
5. Alpine DP 653 (Comes as an active set from factory and crossovers can be purchased separately from alpine, but I Have the alpine spr 60C in a crysta and was initially driving this with an alpine bbx T600 2 channel amp doing about 50W RMS per channel and it was a decent no nonsense speaker. Later swapped the bbx 600 to the creta to power the rainbows as the soundlines had a sensitivity of 92 db and didn't require a lot of power to sing. Bought an alpine bbx F1200 4 channel amp for the crysta and bridged it into two channel and fed them close to 100W RMS and man they scream. They have a reputation for going super loud without distorting and the tweeters can be swiveled, not that it does anything to sq but can be swiveled and swiveling is good cuz atleast it tricks you into thinking it sounds good if you swivel it a bit midbass kicks hard and was explosive to say the least. shakes the entire car, probably the best midbasses i've ever heard, no need for a seperate woofer but the tweeters are extremely bright which wasn't to my liking and thus dropped and super glad I did as my installer has this set installed in his own car, took a demo of it and my ears were close to bleeding, it was that bright. He was running active and told me he still couldn't tune it to make them less bright. The speakers are just made that way and thats their sound signature. some ears love it and some don't, so that's about it)
6.Audison Voce 3 way (well was tempted by the 3 ways and have always had a soft spot in my heart for them, but in 2023 they're more than a decade old speakers with no upgrades yet so had to drop them too)
7. Focal Flax evo ps 165 / Access (Once this brand had customer satisfaction and top notch quality as priority but now with speakers like access and the price they demand for them I think they're scamming us now. In 2012 I bought a focal ps 165 performance series speaker for a mere 15K and thats one of the best speakers i've owned till date. For that price it was a total winner, was made by the use of best materials, the components had a poly glass cone and boasted an inverted aluminium silk dome tweeters. Vocals were extremely detailed and the only thing i didnt like about them was that they were again bright, well that's the brands sound signature anyways.)
8.Blam 3 ways (well the founders of blam are based on france and used to work for focal. They came out and started their own thing and that's how blam began, so I thought they would have a similar sound signature to that of focal and i was right. Heard from many they sound bright just like focals. so had to drop them too.)
9. Morel Virtus Nano Carbon 63 (Well say hello to my little friend! Was a bit skeptical about this at first, as I have the morel maximo ultra 602 2 ways on a vento and midbass lacked punch, tweeters were super bright and they were powered by a lightning audio 2 channel amplifier. But i've heard that morel's true sound quality can be experienced only if you go above the virtus lineup. Morel have sold a lot of these speakers and there were so many video reviews on youtube and automotive forums already, so it was tried and tested and reliable from what i've heard. They've won the eisa award for 2018-19 and to put the cherry on top, got a great deal for these through a friend from Delhi. So purchased this finally after doing so much background research.)
options considered for the amp and dsp and other miscellaneous purchases:
Since I decided to go active at the very beginning itself I knew exactly what I was searching for. A 6 channel amp and an 8 channel dsp. Just wanted to keep it simple without too much complications. So here are the considerations.
1. Helix M six (Loved it, had rave reviews but dealer didn't have it on stock and had a long waiting period, thus dropped)
2. Zapco ST 6X sq (They make extremely fine quality amplifiers and had 100W RMS which was my only criteria. The plan was to feed the drivers with just 40w rms per channel so that way the amp wouldn't be running hot at its limit all the time. Kept factor of safety into consideration and just wanted some clean power. It's a class AB amplifier and it does the job and it's built tough. It's the most heaviest of the lot and just feels extremely solid)
3. Nakamichi NDSK 4185 AU (This was the only option considered as I was overshooting the budget I had in mind already and wanted something economical that does the job)
4. Kenwood monoblock KAC 8105 D (This is a mono that used to serve a Ground Zero 12" sub that I have on my crysta. My dad uses that car now and he says subwoofers brings him headaches and has a lot of problems that brings him headaches on a daily basis already let alone to deal with the woes of a woofer banging sounds below 80 Hz on his head all the time So the woofer's been sitting idle at my house for a long time and the amp's been sitting idle on the car. So decided to use this amp to power the woofer I had bought for the figo.)
5. Morel 10 primo Subwoofer (The intention wasn't to go with morels all around, but have had my eyes set on this beauty for a long time now. They're totally intened for SQ use rather than SPL which i've always wanted. I dont want others to hear my car from a mile away, I just wanted myself to hear some proper quality bass without any boominess. Also considered rockford fosgate, alpine type R and blam shallow woofer but I knew i'll end up here in the first place just cuz of the sound quality it offers. so chose this without any second thoughts.)
6. Damping sheets: Morel damping sheets with 2.4mm thickness. A total of ten sheets were in the box and Used this to damp all 4 doors with two layers, the boot lid, the spare wheel boot well and the back and insides of the woofer's fiberglass enclosure.
7. Wiring: Quaden wiring and RCA cables all around 16 gauge ofc for speakers, 8AWG for 6ch zapco and 4AWG for kenwood mono.
Some pictures of all the goodies:
Now to how they sound:
The morel nano carbons are by far the most sonically accurate speakers i've ever heard. Its sharp and precise staying true to its roots and have that authentic signature morel sound that the brand boasts about.
I couldn't even put it in words to explain/describe how incredible this thing sounds. Its got this mellowed down laid back sound signature that could give anyone eargasms! The tweeters are not harsh/bright and produce some crystal clear highs and you can listen to these ladies sing all day in n day out without getting any ear fatigue. Deep vocals (400hz - 5.5Khz) that come out of the MW-4 midranges sounds so heavenly like the greek gods themselves have come down here to put an end to all your woes with those therapeutic vocals. And it is at this very frequency band these drivers totally shine and the mw-4's are defenitely the show stealer here.
Now what do I speak about the 10" primo woofer. It totally blew me away by its exceptional top notch sound quality. It blends with the entire system, hits hard, deep and tight with no boominess/rattles to it and one moment it makes you wonder how low can this thing go without distorting and the other moment you never even know that its there and it's that silent when it doesn't perform. Sounds so tonally balanced and clean and can pickup anything from a bass guitar to a tuba/contrabass clarinet!
Frequency cut off Points:
Woofer: 20 - 80Hz
Midbass: 125 - 400Hz
Midrange: 400 - 5.5KHz
Tweeters: 5.5 - 20KHz
After a decade of want/search I'm finally happy that I got myself a setup that feels like your sitting in the studio with the musician right where the song was recorded and my ears can pick out and hear so many different notes and instruments from songs that i've heard all my life which i never knew existed in those songs before!
Installation:
Many thanks to the boys yuvraj, bhuvanesh, karthik and vijay kumar for helping me out with the installation. They're the most friendliest bunch i've ever worked with. Their attention to detail was incredible and carried out one of the finest workmanship i've ever witnessed in my experience through all these years of my audio journey. A lot of engineering and design has gone into the fabrication of the "A pillar" pods and they're all angled and placed on axis in such a way that the sound stage comes right from the dead centre and reaches every listener's ears at the same time as if you were wearing your earphones but still it's a bit driver oriented and setup in a way where the driver gets the best experience of the lot.
We've put in so much effort and man hours in fine tuning the entire system to eliminate any brightness, white noise, pink noise and distortion and the speakers have been time delayed to perfection with the help of a RTA mic.
For now, I've been running the midbass, the tweeters and the woofer close to flat with just minimal adjustments to the graph and proper eq has been done just for the midranges as the drivers are still in their break in period and from what I've heard these speakers need to play a minimum of 30 - 100 hours of playback to get seasoned, and that's when you could experience its true potential and the sound signature too changes a bit over time. So the plan is to run them in for 100 plus hours and then head for another retune. Can't wait to do that already. I'm pretty sure that they're gonna sound even better by then.
And many thanks to my fellow crazy audiophile brothers rohit and sarabpreet (An audio enthusiast and an expert tuner from whom I've learnt a lot from) Without these guys this project was never possible and they helped me plan this thing to a "T" and that's exactly why I love the brotherhood of the ever growing indian audiophile car community. It's filled with so many good folks like these helping out a total stranger like me whom they just met online, just so that they can put a smile on a fellow audiophile's face by helping them achieve thier dream sound! Cheers to many more years of our friendship and the quest to continue to keep searching for the best sound up until eternity!
I wish you could upload videos directly on this forum so that I could share it with all you audiophiles out here how this system sounds, Cuz youtube keeps giving copyright strikes for my video if I upload it over there.
But anyways thanks for taking the time to read this, until next time lads, Cheers! ✌
