Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Audio Placement: Rear Doors vs. Rear Deck??

So, I am not impressed with the speaker placement in the Contour. My main concern is not the front speakers right now. My questions will be for the rear channels. I have always experienced a "hole" in the music that seems to come from the passenger rear seat. I have played with balance levels and even attempted a crude rear fill crossover (Deck high pass set to 200 hz - amp low pass set to around 3 khz. Nothing seemed to help.

UNTIL, I experimented with speaker placement! I took some old coaxs and made crude encolsures for them out of cardboard and duct tape (Homer: Mmmmm, Duct Tape!). I opend the fold down rear seats enough to squeeze the boxes in there so they would sit level with the rear deck; as if they were in the rear deck. I thought it sounded much better. And actually went to the stereo shop to buy JL Audio XR650-CX coaxs with seperate crossovers. Told the dealer that this what Iwas doing and he said don't do it. That the factory locations are "optimized for imaging". I actually told him he was full of it because the rear door grills don't even cover the rear speakers and the front door speakers are in the middle of the door. "Well, that's my opinion with 10 years of car audio experience!" he says and walks away.

What are your thoughts?

dealers! i hate um!

if they were optimized..the majority of the cars would have kick panels..do what sounds good to you in your car, listen to other peoples cars and go from there.

i found that kickpanels in the front and no rears had the best results in my car..

yup im building kick panels now to! i love fiber glass you can do all sorts of neat stuff with it..

Go with what sounds best to you. Personally, I don't like locatable music coming from behind me. My ears face forward. But, your ears might be different.

The guy doesn't know crap.

I actually prefer either no rear speakers or low volume on rear speakers cut at 3K-4K. It helps to anchor the soundstage up front. Just imagine it like you're sitting at a concert listening to a band. Do you really want it to sound like they're playing behind you?

Bass is a whole other story as it becomes omni-directional (no point source) below 80Hz or so.

Anyways, if coaxials in the rear deck is what you prefer, go for it. They're your ears. Gotta make 'em happy.

In my opinion the answer to this is "it depends". Facinating analysis eh? For the most part in a "true audiophile" type set up, rear speakers are frowned upon. Personally I think they can be of benefit if done in moderation.

First, I recomend the rear shelf over the rear door. The rear driver's side door speaker is actually closer to my ear than the front door one. This is a bad way to go unless you really are not concerned at all with any kind of accurate music reproduction. Even using the rear shelf, I think if you really want to maximize your chances of doing it well, you should do several things;
1. Use a mid range driver back there, NOT a coaxial with a tweeter in it, or a "full" component set.
2. If you're using an outboard amp on them,give the amp a "mono" signal on the inputs for the rear speakers by using Y-cords, or selecting a L+R input mode on the amp if it's offered. [this is NOT the same as "bridged mono" btw.]
3. Adjust the fader control to your liking.
A good rule of thumb is that the rears won't draw too much attention usually, but you notice when they're "gone".
There's more, but it depends on the complexity of the system,crossover points, equalization, delay circuits etc.etc.etc.

As always, personal preference plays a big part here. Some people care more about the extra output possible by more and more speakers without much regard to quality, and thats fine. This stuff only has to please one person in the end...you.

Scooby, you rock! My HU has seperate front and rear volume controls, not a fader. So, when I was experimenting with the rear deck speaks I found that the best sound came from turning the rear volume up one notch above 0db, or 'Off'. Without any rears, soundstage sounds like its on the dash, not in my ears. I am in the same boat, I have to have the seat all the way back so I AM actually closer to the drivers rear speaker. I use to have a Sony amp that had a seperate gain control for each channel, not just front and rear. I would have the the rear left channel turned down about half of what the others were.

I'll keep you guys aprise dof what I come up with.

-Joe