Thanks for the replies everyone.

Especially snowy - great detail (as usual).

As above, I've got a 106. Does sound deadening improve the sound inside, too? Or is it only to stop sound leaking and pissing everyone off? I will be buying some, for sure. What would you recommend for the job? I've read good things about dynamat, but it seems quite expensive and just looks like tin-foil.

I've been looking at the links you posted snowy, and both those amps are a bit too pricey for me at the moment. eBay doesn't seem to be finding any available second hand at the moment, either. eBay does throw up this (clicky) though. Is it cheap and nasty?

I also took a look at those subs. Both look very promising, but what about the box? I gather that the box is very important, so what should I be looking for?

Unfortunately, components are out. My car came with coaxials, and I don't fancy that much of a project.
- how about these (clicky)

As Oke says, yes - but then in equal measures no.

For a speaker-company, JBL's electronics have been doing an amazing job of late, (despite me not linking to any of their amps in my suggestions) - mostly born out of their family relationship with Crown (interstellar quality PA amps)

Speaker wise, there are certainly brands to look for if you're looking for something with a little more finesse (CDT, MB Quart & Hertz for example) but you'll find they are in the ever-so-slight-next price bracket up - and require suitable (again slightly more expensive) partnering electronics to really shine.... but at the price range Manny is looking it's a tough job to do better than JBL - and I would always favour the speaker-company over the "we do everything" brands like Pioneer/Alpine/Kenwood who are all pretty much similar.... and the "new" kids on scene like Fusion and Vibe are heavily tuned/geared towards the less diserable end of the buyer-market (note, their "styling" as a good indicator of what I mean)

We are a good bunch aren't we!? And it's my pleasure as always dude...

I'll let Oke champion the benefits of deadening in detail, but in brief it's meant to both reduce cabin rattle & noise considerably.

Well Sas has already mentioned amps spare, as to did Veato - so I see no harm in mentioning I have two amps I could part with for less than those... although I've not got a mono-channel to offer alas.
No that's a fine amp - but I'd personally steer clear of the bay of fleas for car audio - purely because it's rife with stolen and/or raped gear.

Three letters: DIY.

That's a pity, but if you're resolute about it - then yes, look to coax's with directional centres at the very least....

Oh and what I've found so far (can't link, it's a 50 post minimum classifieds section)

MB QUART D CD116 6.5" Co-axial Speakers
£40 delivered
(lush)

Alpine 5.25" 13cm components SXE-1350s
going for £25 inc. postage
(these have little egg-cup mounts for the tweeters so you needn't worry about getting all dremel on your a-pillars)

Alpine MRV-T303 V12 Amp
£30 + post
(quite an old model - but from the days when Alpine were true leaders in ICE)




Sorry I'd keep looking but I'm cooking.

I'll go and write a PM.



I didn't bid on that amp I linked to, but it went for 30 quid including postage. A fair price you think? It seems quite cheap to me. It's a good point about stolen gear. I don't really want to be the guy making it worth-wile for the crooks to go and steal people's gear. I'm surprised you say raped though. I thought it was quite a job to damage an amp? Is it usually done by over-heating, bad wiring, or something else?



I'm all but set on those JBL GTO528s now. They're a pretty nice price and they'll be juicy enough at 45W. I'll do a little hunt around the internet for reviews, but unless that puts me off I shall be buying those.

So far as boxes go, is a box a box?? I know you have to make sure you've got the right volume inside, but other than that are they all pretty much the same? It's just that if I see a bargain, then I'd rather get that unless I know that spending the time doing it myself is going to be worth it in terms of sound quality.

Boxes depend on budget (and space). A basic sub box will sound fine for thump & weight but a properly tuned box will always sound better although you'll pay £200 or so for a good box (my 306 molded stealth boxes cost me £200 each).

How much boot are you willing to lose?

I'm suprised your not even consideringt 6x9s! They're great value and will deliver a lot of bass for way less money than a reasonable sub and amp. They also don't get fitted in doors, so you don't need deadening. And perhaps a little peversely for purists, they raise the soundstage. The OE positions in a 106 are very low down.

Sound deadening is incredibly important. My current car was done professionally, but I've personally deadened both my previous MK3 Golfs. What it does, is lower the resonant frequency of the panels it's attached to. This works in two ways. Firstly, it makes proper enclosures out of your doors. This is especially important for solidity of LF and you will really hear the difference. Secondly, it reduces ambient noise and vibrations, such as tyre noise; exhaust noise; and general background. In your case, the most useful aspect will be using it on your doors. It doesn't have to be loads, but even a little around where you mount your speakers will make them sound far cleaner and will allow louder volumes without distortion (especially with your music). It's hard work and requires patience and elbow grease, but it's always overlooked and even with stock speakers it makes a dramatic improvement. Here's a pic of my last MK3


I think with your budget in mind, I would be tempted to run 6x9s and 13s off your HU with some deadening for now. Allow this system to breathe, high pass the fronts at around 100hz and maybe 63-80 for the rears and it'll be a vast improvement on stock for relatively little money. You can then add an amp/sub combo at a later date.

Sub boxes are very important and getting a cheap one will not do you any favours. Trust me, been there

As Snowy says, KISS.

Would I be right in thinking the OP wants to spend as little money as possible whilst being able to listen to bass loud enough in a little 106 to make his ears fall off? If thats the case I wouldnt get overly concerned with deadening and terms like soundstage. Its just my opinion but I get the feeling what Nick really wants is a sub driven by an amp to go low, some cheap fronts (possibly on the amp too) and a sunny day with his arm hanging out of the window

I'm not serious into audio but I inherited some of my brothers old stuff. It was a simple setup of front components (Alpine), rear coaxials (Infinity) on a 4ch amp (Alpine V12) and a 2ch bridged in mono mode (Kenwood something or other) on a sub (10 or 12 I cant remember) in a tatty little homemade box. All in a 106. It wasnt pretty. It wasnt a pro install. It would never win a sound-off. But when the mood took me there it went loud and was fun! In such a tiny little car just one sub in that box seemed plentiful.

I would imagine so, but even to do that cheaply will cost a couple of hundred quid, by the time you include amp wiring kit etc.

6x9s and 13s off the HU will be pretty loud, he'll just need to filter the LF at a sensible point to avoid distortion.

You've got me thinking now about 6x9s. Because of a little 'un on the way I could never put the ICE back in the new car. I did upgrade the HU for a USB one and front components and replaced the rear paper coned factory fit things. Its not loud by any means but the quality improvement was noticable. The rears are rattling a bit now though and I wonder if they've popped! Maybe a reinforced parcel shelf and a pair of 6x9s will be a nice trade off between keeping the boot space and improving the audio.

I also never got around to installing the crossovers for the front components (nowhere to mount them!) so am using the inline ones already in the cars wiring. I really ought to do something about that too!

Depends on how new-2nd hand it was, it only sold for about £50-60 new IIRC.
In a home environment you're right - amps are often the hardiest piece of the equation - but then they (should) have a nice clean continuous supply of house mains, but in cars it's obviously different. Speakers are the first to go still - but more because of the failing of the amp rather than through abuse (their usual death in the home) - it's all too easy to be tempted to set your HU output & your amp gains to the max - but you endanger your equipment with clipped (ie. over-driven distrortion) signals, speakers over-excurt & do themselves a mischief (either tearing the cone or surround; melting the voicecoils or breaking the spider and backplate) - and amps will overheat & fry... 12V gear also doesn't like getting shortfed voltage (11V is the absolute minimum) so if you run your stereo engine off, you will need to upgrade your car battery otherwise your amp will constantly force itself into "protect" - which for obvious reasons isn't safe practice to keep doing.... I could go on, but I think you get the picture.

Be wary of basing purchases on power handling, for starters speakers don't make that output (that's the amps job) - and "handling" is pretty much just that.... personally I look first at sensitivity (the *dB rating) before power-handling (the higher the better) as this generally shows what you'll get for each watt coming from your amp/HU.


Er no. It's a mysterious dark art and one I find particularly interesting - despite not having funds or resources enough to pursue experimentation.
When I get home I'll post some bookmarked links I have to some very good online guides to what's what....

Unless you've two fists of thumbs I really would encourage you to consider DIY. You will be one lucky so-and-so to find a generic pre-made box that will suit any one sub. You can spend money on manufacturer-made ones, but these are obviously pricier (to pay for the badge) and are often built with the same cheap chipboard as the generic types. But in truth you really should only consider either paying someone (who knows what they're doing) to make you one - or make one tourself. The rewards speak for themselves.
I'll do some hunting for some build threads as well, just to show you how easy it can be....


I would agree - deadening should definately be considered an incremental upgrade perk for later days

I've been itching to say this - sod the 6x9"s!


Oh and further searches in the classifieds to show what 2nd hand can get you 2x 12" JBL GT3's w/ box = £40!!!!

Okay, this
has had me wanting to post (this post) for a while - because although I'm sure Simon's fibreglassed stealthy boxes would have been nice - £200 for an enclosure is waaaaay too high a figure to be throwing around in thread like this - you can do it much much cheaper!

So as promised some (more) reading for you - specifically:
Speaker enclosure type & design:
http://www.danmarx.org/audioinnovation/theories.html
http://www.caraudiohelp.com/custom_car_ ... _boxes.htm

Speaker building (a general guide):
http://www.speakerplans.com/index.php?id=guide

Correct you can do it cheaper but I was giving an example of how much these things can cost. (sorry fot the underline but I couldn't think of a way to emphesise can). These boxes were molded to my boot so I lost minimal space whilst still fitting in 2x 12" subs.
What Nick needs to do really is get you to build the box as your last ones were just plain awesome.

Cheers for the links snowy. Having read those, and a couple of other sources last night, I'm glad to see that the most suitable box is also the most simple to make (bog standard, sealed and air-tight)!



Yeah, I found the model up from that on CAS (which I know you don't like, but I didn't see it anywhere else) for 60 (url=http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/1180.html]clicky[/url]).



I read an interesting article last night about "tuning" the amp and head unit. IIRC it basically went something like turn the HU up as high as it will go without distortion, then turn your amp up as much as it will go without distortion at that HU setting. I've got it bookmarked, but the site is down for maintenance at the moment.



Hmmm, how do you know that the amp is switching to protect? Is there a light on it, or does it simply cut out? I don't really want to replace my battery - it's got a lot of life left in it yet lol. I assume that just keeping the volume down will mean it's okay?? Or not necessarily?



I chose them primarily because they have directional tweeters, and also because both you and Okenobi recommended JBL as a brand. Are these not a good purchase? The dB rating seems quite good at 91. Most others are lower, although I have seen some in my price bracket at 93dB. These don't have directional tweeters though.

The only thing that doesn't seem so good about them is the response range: 65Hz - 21KHz. I don't know exactly where the low pass filter will be set, but I would imagine it's going to be significantly higher than 65Hz so that doesn't really bother me. But should I be looking for something that goes a little higher? I've seen options that go to 25KHz, but I don't know what difference that will make in the real world (ie whether it's noticeable).



I do plan to get some deadening, as a bit of respect for innocent by-standers should I (or my passengers) get a bit carried away in town (I'm assuming it makes the sounds significantly quieter from outside), and to hopefully improve sound as a by-product.



Excellent. I see that you are using Dynamat. I've taken a look and it's pretty expensive. How does the competition compare? If this is the only stuff really worth buying then I'll just get a couple of sheets and literally do just around and behind the speakers. I've seen some guides on a 106 website, and none of them have used as much of it as you have!!



Yeah, I'm definitely going to build my own now. I've only got a hand-saw though, so I'll have to get the materials cut in-store. If I cut something a little wonky, it would piss me off every time I opened the boot and looked at it!!


As little as possible really. I've decided on a sealed box now because they're the easiest to make for one thing, but also because they're the smallest and apparently sound pretty good too (although I've read ported sounds better done right - everyone seems to say it sounds awful done wrong, so I'm not going to take the risk).



Pretty much spot-on!

Except at first, I was trying to avoid a sub. Everyone I spoke to told me I was nuts and I would never get anything rewarding without one. Well, unless I got some 6x9s that is. But that was never going to happen (sorry okenobi ). I think they look terrible. I'm not sure if tacky is the right word - but when I walk past a car (usually a clapped out Mondeo with crap alloys) with a shelf full of 6x9s and wires everywhere, I just think it looks awful. All the setups I've heard that use them sound pretty crap too.

Also, sound-stage is worth considering too. That's one of the things I hate about 6x9s (although I know okenobi was only suggesting them for low-down) - having the high stuff coming from behind you just isn't right. It changes the music completely, and not usually for the better. Components aren't an option in my car, but the directional co-axials I've chosen seem to be quite a good compromise.

I've seen some progress threads on a 106 site where people make similar stuff using fibreglass. I assume that's what yours was?

It's impressive, but looks pretty specialist. I don't think I'd want to have a go, put it that way!

Clicky for the guys who made mine