I copy this from my earlier post:
What speakers should be fitted to the parcel shelf. The present (inadequate) speakers are Blaupunkt simple paper cone 5 1/4 inch items that were evidently dealer-fitted and mount by 4 screws to the parcel shelf board only. The recesses pressed into the steel underneath the board on either side have provision for a speaker of similar size with three fixing screws only (I have never seen a car speaker with only three screw mounting points). Speaker size is limited by the depth and volume of this recess pressed into the shelf steel, and I don't want to go cutting metal. Has anyone been able to fit a 5 1/4 or 6 inch speaker with a decent size magnet in the stock recess so it clears everything?
the original speakers that go in there are made by Becker, they are 3 screw designs and are absolutely nothing to get excited about in the way of sound quality or clarity by today's standards ;)
I have 6 inch speakers in the rear as a temporary measure, and to mount them properly i think it would be preferable to have spacers under them as there really isn't much room back there.
With a lot of high quality speakers, you will find depth to be the issue. Some manufacturers, such as Focal, offer 5 1/4" coaxials and component speakers with special shallow baskets and magnets. Another alternative is to fit a more substantial 4" speaker with an adaptor.
Generic 5 1/4" speakers will also fit, but you should really confirm the overall depth beforehand.
Tim
Thanx a lot guys. It looks like I go for Pioneer 5 1/4 co-ax speakers that will match my period Pioneer component system. The only remaining problem with that is how do I get the power antenna to go up and down automatically without a separate cable dedicated to the power antenna?
There should be a blue wire to the antenna, that supplies the relay with +12V. The original Hirschmanns had this and it is the same as all modern automatic antennae.
Tim
Quote from: TJ 450 on 01 September 2009, 06:28 AM
There should be a blue wire to the antenna, that supplies the relay with +12V. The original Hirschmanns had this and it is the same as all modern automatic antennae.
And it's active all the time so the antenna goes down when ignition is turned off. Control is from radio on another wire, +12V up, 0V down. My electrical manual shows US cars had a different setup where antenna could be inched up and down, more wires and complication.
koan
Quote from: koan on 01 September 2009, 04:02 PM
Quote from: TJ 450 on 01 September 2009, 06:28 AM
There should be a blue wire to the antenna, that supplies the relay with +12V. The original Hirschmanns had this and it is the same as all modern automatic antennae.
And it's active all the time so the antenna goes down when ignition is turned off. Control is from radio on another wire, +12V up, 0V down. My electrical manual shows US cars had a different setup where antenna could be inched up and down, more wires and complication.
koan
I've got the US version with a center off rocker switch and the fully automatic (power on a wire to run it up, power off to run it down) version of the antenna. Needless to say, it doesn't work too well.
Michael
My 450SLC has the "manual" electric antenna set up - you move it up/down with a console switch. Its not hard to adapt one of the automatic antenna to work with that, I've done it on a couple. As I recall you open up the antenna and remove/bypass the electronic switching bits so you're left with 2 wires to the motor which you connect to the wires from the switch.
half height positioning would be handy for using city carparking complexes with low clearance.
Full height or no radio and all the way down is rather inconvenient in such situations as i do not listen to music at all during the day, that 5 minutes of silence is deafening ;)
I guess its time to upgrade to on window antenna elements, removing the hirschmann & welding up the antenna hole - as if, 70's hirschmanns are cool ;)
Hirschmanns that are part way up (or down) allow water to run down the mast into the works, fully up or fully down they seal and there is no water path.
Always assumed those antennas that have manual control were of a design to prevent this... but maybe not.
Quote from: Patrick Bateman on 05 September 2009, 09:28 PM
70's hirschmanns are cool ;)
They are brilliant inside, like something The PMG's (try Google) department would make.
Conngrats PB on 3000 posts, always to the point and mostly informative and enjoayable.
koan
i got some 5 1/4 inch rockford fosgate speakers the fit snugly but very well and sound absolutely awesome....
the prob i have is getting 4inch for the front that sound even half decent.....
It really depends on what your objectives are, but there are some decent 4" speakers available. I have a pair of Soundstream coaxials in there at the moment... they have a nice silk tweeter and a reasonable crossover.
Otherwise, I would try and get the 4" coax version of these to fit! ;)
Link (http://www.focalaustralia.com.au/k2_power.html)
Tim
i had some cheap ones in and they didnt have much sound quality in them.... i replaced them with some kevlar responce speakers and they have great sound reproduction but cant handle very much volume and i have to fade the system to the rear to be able to avoid this.....
I have not looked under the carpet back there, what is the issue with speaker depth? My W114s had about 3 feet of clearance but didn't have the fuel tank or vacuum tank to deal with.
Michael
I have a Pioneer set up with 4ch amp, 4inch splits with the little one on the dash at the front and 6inch sitting on spacers in the rear. The spacers just allow the magnets to sit down in that speaker cavity. I am really dissapointed with the base out of the system, say compared with very standard late model cars at work like Nissans and Mitsubishi and the wifes Pug. I went back to the place who just wanted to sell me a sub, but I don't want that much base (just a fuller sound), or it sitting in the boot and don't know how my gas tank affects it in between. He confirmed my suspicions that the issue is with only having a small box of air behind the rears and no real box at the front with them being in the dash. I don't know if he is right but what he said confirmed what I thought.
So I have delayed my solution, because it sounds ok but I have already removed the original first aid kit rear shelf because it looked a bit daggy and replaced with a piece of mdf and carpeted. I figure I can sit my vac tank in the rear side boot well and then cut a couple of 6 x 9 holes that go into the boot cavity. I think that is strictly illegal in our state to cut metal out of cars, but given the benz is rigid enough to have a plastic tray that is bigger than the speaker in the rear tray, I don't think it is a safety issue and I can't imagine the cops bothering a relatively old man like me about such things.
If I knew I could get a decent base sound out of a speaker that was many times the price but could operate with the small air space behind it, then I would go that way. The hifi guy reckons it wasn't possible and since I was showing him "an open chequebook" I figured he had no reason to mislead me.
But really interested if others have advice.
And I expect the front speakers would perform better if using the air cavity of the door, but I wouldn't dare chop up my lovely period door trims.
I was not bright enough to take pictures of the install in the '76 280C but I'll try to explain what I did.
In the front, I made new kick panels that replaced the existing cardboard and carpet panels. By layering 3 pieces of 3/4" MDF, I got enough depth to mount a set of 2 way components and their crossover. The outer layer was full size and the two inner layers were only an inch or two around the perimeter to get more volume. The whole thing was covered by a fiberglass panel that was covered in acoustically transparent cloth so that they ended up pretty much invisible. I did have to take out a mounting bolt for the parking brake pedal so that it could swing inboard to clear the left hand enclosure.
In the rear, I applied 3 layers of fiberglass over the sound deadening tar stuff to encapsulate it as it was breaking up. I did cut the openings to install 6X9's but from what I understand you may not be able to do that.
I built a 10" deathbox from plans, http://www.decware.com/dbk10.htm I didn't want a window rattler but did want good clean bass.
The four corners were powered by a 45WPC Alpine amp and the sub by a 100W bridged amp.
That car freakin rocked! As it well should, what with the electronics costing $1000 more than I paid for the car.
On another install I tried building rings to mount speakers from the underside. Sort of looked like tunnels from the topside. Sounded so bad I never bothered to listen to it again.
You will never get any bass out of dash mounted speakers unless you can build correctly sized enclosures behind them and that is nearly impossible in an existing car. If the stamped recess in the rear is shallow, you will never get any bass out of the rears either. Speakers have to have the proper amount of enclosed space behind them and the sound waves from the back side can not be allowed back around to the front side. This will cause cancellation and is sort of how Bose noise canceling headphones work.
I have heard of folks putting a sub in the trunk, "venting" the floor of the first aid compartment and propping the lid open a smidgen.
Michael
Forgot this link, http://www.crutchfield.com/c_3/Car-Audio-Video.html
They may not ship overseas but they do a good job with providing specs including mounting depth.
Quote from: craigb on 14 September 2009, 10:35 PM
I am really dissapointed with the base out of the system ... my suspicions that the issue is with only having a small box of air behind the rears.
The panel that separates the fuel tank area and boot space comes out pretty easily from memory, how about temporarily removing it and seeing if it has any effect on the bass?
koan
Indeed, you can only ever hope to get fake bass from the front 4" speakers. What I usually do is place a high pass filter on them, at around 100Hz, that makes them louder, more efficient and allows them to dissipate more power.
The Jaycar Response speakers are quite OK... I have the 12" Polycone sub from back in the day. ;)
Tim
the kevlar response speakers from jay car are the 4" i have in the front and they have great clarity only prob is when the volume is too high they crackle alot and i think hat has to do with the space they are in and distortion cus i have heard them perform better in other vehicles.... as far as rear goes you cant go i have 51/4 rockford fosgate as i have said b4 and i have a 12"sub in the boot... have not yet ported a hole for the sub but atm i have the back seat out with no matting there either and the bass is increased greatly.... atm my system sounds absolutely awesome and you would think i spent more than i did..... i will be replacing the back seat and porting a hole through the parcel shelf and first aid kit well soon....
Koan, that panel is removed on mine, mainly because when sprinting they want to be able to access the valve on the LPG tank, and I can't be bothered putting it back in between. By what people are saying though, with a sub there is an issue with the fixed steel panel behind the seats more than having a great lump of an LPG tank in the way and allowing some sort of open channel to the cabin is the way to get around this.
My conclusion from what is here though is that the standard rear enclosures are a problem and cutting new holes into the rear shelf that utilise the boot is the best answer for me. I had removed my plastic first aid box to ensure the lpg tank clearance, so to go the sub road the best answer there could be to remove the bit of steel I put in place of the box and replace it with a mesh sheet that would hold the open weave carpet I have level and look normal (except when the base would be moving it!) and yet allow good passage for the sound.
Quote from: craigb on 16 September 2009, 11:24 PM
Koan, that panel is removed on mine,
I think I might have missed something, got the idea the only thing between backs of rear speakers and boot is the vertical panel, the one I suggested removing but by the sound of it that's wrong, there is a metal panel below the speakers that forms an enclosure for the speakers. Is that the way it is?
koan
There is indeed another panel beneath the rear speakers and in a way it does form an enclosure.
Tim
Yep that's right Koan and it is a very small enclosure. Actually I am not exactly sure why it is there. Will investigate but maybe I can just hole saw a big hole in them?
just removed the first aid kit well and cut a hole in my parcel shelf (not original one dont worry and coverd the hole with a speaker grille to allow the sub to pass through into the cabina and damn the increase in quality of sound is awesome......
My previous 280SEL had a good setup that worked well and went along like this with advice from the Stratfields installer off Thomas Road in Perth:
Split system speakers in the front, they were Kickers and the sound was good, due to the windshield/dash set up in the Merc the splits were close to the listener and could be a bit tinny but experimentation with the treble will fix that.
The rears were JBLs 5 & 1/4 inch as they had the shallowest depth and cleared the vacuum tank and the sound from them is good. The installer said not to put in spacers to maximize choice of speakers as he said it will give poor sound quality from his experience. He had worked on Mercs before.
Also the installer had the same headset as mine, an Alpine, so he pretty much fitted the best speakers in his opinion for the application and headset and i was very happy with the sound quality. :)
With the Becker Tape system in the 450 starting to slow down i have made the decision to install the Alpine and look around for a speaker set up similar to before. Hope to have this done before the next West Aust group meet which is planned for a nice sunny day soon?
JG