Tweeter placement clarification

I've done a lot of searching before making this thread, so I already know that most people like to keep the tweeter close to the woofer as opposed to using the OEM tweeter location.

 

What I'm wondering though, is why. Sure, there is the phasing issue, and yes maybe the tweeter will be more audible, but that can be corrected by attenuating the tweeter on the crossovers. My main concern with mounting the tweeter near the woofer is that that create a VERY low soundstage and it would also mean the tweeter (which are very directional creatures) would be easily muffled by my legs.

 

What about using the factory tweeter locations, but aiming the tweeter at the windshield?

Tweeters are unlike the woofer in that they are very directional. You want them point right at where your sound stage is. The more highs bounce off of things the worse it sounds. Now the reason most people keep the tweeters near the woofers is the timing issue. If you mount your tweeters closer to you than the woofers you will have the highs and lows hitting you at two different times. This amount of time difference can vary but it’s normally small. Most true audio freaks will be driven up the wall by this but most people can’t hear or don’t know what the difference is. Now you can buy x over and equalizers that can fix that timing issue but they generally cost a decent amount. It’s all about what you’re used to and what you can live with. If your not going super high end stuff and dont notice the difference than put them in the stock locations. One of ym favorite things to do is to just tape the tweeters at different spots and listen untill me (or the person who owns the car) is happy.

Yes, I understand the time delay issues associated with placing the tweeters and woofers far apart, but isn't that better than placing the tweeter near the floor where your legs will prevent the highs from ever reaching your ears?

I am 6'8"... all legs. My wife is 5'10". There are plenty of legs in my cars. I would never mount my tweeters anywhere but the kickpanels or coaxial with the woofer. I have beautiful, wide, high soundstages in both of my cars.

 

You drive your car, put them where you want.

 

You drive your car, put them where you want.

 

+1. It seems like once a month someone is trying to justify mounting thier tweeters up high and away from the mids. Take a look at the top sound quality (SQ) competition cars in autosound and see where the speakers are mounted. If you want your tweeters in the stock locations, then go for it.

I made this thread to try to gain a better understanding of tweeter placement, not to justify mounting the tweeters high. I'm sorry if it comes across that way.

 

I am 6'8"... all legs. My wife is 5'10". There are plenty of legs in my cars. I would never mount my tweeters anywhere but the kickpanels or coaxial with the woofer. I have beautiful, wide, high soundstages in both of my cars.

 

I would really appreciate an explanation of how that works. We all know that highs are very directional, so wouldn't legs in the path of the tweeter to the ear interfere? If not, then why? And again, since highs are so directional, wouldn't it be easy to localize the tweeters to how low they are, thus bringing down the soundstage? Again, I'm not promoting the stock tweeter location, I'm just looking to improve my understanding of the topic.

 

You drive your car, put them where you want.

 

That's great advice of course. I'm not new to modifying cars, and I can tell you that I have a very disciplined approach whenever I modify a car. I try to be as thorough as I can with research, knowledge, and planning before I buy anything. I try to find the best possible setup possible with a given budget, and I try to answer all the questions, at least the basic ones, before moving ahead. That's what I'm doing right now.

 

I know it's easy for you guys to make a post stating, "put the tweeter near the woofer," but I'd really appreciate if someone can go above and beyond that, and answer my questions about low sound stage and legs blocking the highs.

i have them in the stock locations, i consider myself an audio freak too.

 

i know its not the "optimal" location, mostly they come off as slightly bright. IF i had the time i think a great location to place the tweeters would be in the kick panels.

 

It's a pretty stealthy spot and imo it seems it would create a decent soundstage. When i upgrade my speakers im going to play with that spot. (currently have Alpines seperates in the doors)

 

 

I would really appreciate an explanation of how that works. We all know that highs are very directional, so wouldn't legs in the path of the tweeter to the ear interfere? If not, then why? And again, since highs are so directional, wouldn't it be easy to localize the tweeters to how low they are, thus bringing down the soundstage? Again, I'm not promoting the stock tweeter location, I'm just looking to improve my understanding of the topic.

 

From what i understand the reason to do this is to lengthen the distance from the tweeter to the ear so that they are more even from side to side. If you have them in the stock location then the Drivers side one is ~2ft to your ear while the passengers is 5ft. With then down in the kicks the path is lengthened for the drivers side and is much closer to the same length as the passengers side.

From what i understand the reason to do this is to lengthen the distance from the tweeter to the ear so that they are more even from side to side. If you have them in the stock location then the Drivers side one is ~2ft to your ear while the passengers is 5ft. With then down in the kicks the path is lengthened for the drivers side and is much closer to the same length as the passengers side.

Yes, I understand the time delay issues associated with placing the tweeters and woofers far apart, but isn't that better than placing the tweeter near the floor where your legs will prevent the highs from ever reaching your ears?

I believe the best way is to mount the tweeters low next to the woofer, and get a set of "image enhancement" tweeters and put those on the dash. Or I have had luck placing tweeters on the dash too. The issue with timing is related to the distance away from the ear. On the dash makes the distance roughly the same. Plus your legs won't block some of the really high freq from being down so low. Stock location isn't very good at all, with an expensive crossover the issue can be fixed, but you might as well place them correctly for free.

I would really appreciate an explanation of how that works. We all know that highs are very directional, so wouldn't legs in the path of the tweeter to the ear interfere? If not, then why? And again, since highs are so directional, wouldn't it be easy to localize the tweeters to how low they are, thus bringing down the soundstage? Again, I'm not promoting the stock tweeter location, I'm just looking to improve my understanding of the topic.

It just proves in real life how important time alignment really is. Lower positions help the high freq path travel to your ears w/o reflection, as opposed to dash/door locations where they're most often pointed directly at a pane of glass.

 

...but I'd really appreciate if someone can go above and beyond that, and answer my questions about low sound stage and legs blocking the highs.

I don't set-up my own systems, rather I let a trusted tuner install and tweak my systems for high SQ. I don't have all of your answers in word form. What I do know, the first system we designed together, the length of my legs and the low position of the tweeters seemed very counter intuitive to me. I was wrong, the system sounded great as promised and that same design philosophy has been carried through into all my successive installations.

I totally understand you issues, and like you are probably looking for a different answer then what you have gotten.

 

I used to be a sound quality judge in IASCA and consider myself reasonably knowledgeable. I know there are a select few on the board here that know more then I do. But................

 

My wife sits in the passenger spot and does all sorts of stuff, like puts a bag in front of the speakers, covers herself with a blanket and covers the speaker opening. Also, in the winter I find that big heavy coats just wreck a low tweeter placement's sound.

 

If I was competing again it would go low. Since I am not and I am driving my car everyday under my circumstances I put them in the factory location, although I spent some time aiming them.

 

At first I tried Alpine's Type-X speakers. I really did not like the speakers, but really liked the X-over. It has numerous settings to adjust on-off Axis response, phase, and of course level.

 

I then tried Focals:wub: seperates, but I kept the Alpine X-overs. It took a fair bit of fiddling (hours!) but I was able to regain about 60% of the soundstage I would have had with a low tweeter placement. It really was not all that expensive.

 

Take it for what-its-worth, but even obsessive SQ freaks don't always like low placements.

Sigh, ok, well I guess no really has a good answer for me, but I will try mounting the tweeter down low. If it doesn't work out, I can move it up later.

 

Perhaps I'll even go to a 2ch setup so that I can use the 3 way active on my deck and have perfect timing no matter where the tweeters are.

Sigh, ok, well I guess no really has a good answer for me,

Not sure what you're looking for in terms of an answer, but perhaps a car audio forum as opposed to a subaru legacy forum might be a good place to start. www.carsound.com

Sigh, ok, well I guess no really has a good answer for me, but I will try mounting the tweeter down low. If it doesn't work out, I can move it up later.

 

Perhaps I'll even go to a 2ch setup so that I can use the 3 way active on my deck and have perfect timing no matter where the tweeters are.

 

if you want an opinion more experienced than even me and specific to your car, read all threads started by 'msmith'. He's forgotten more than I remember about car audio and he's got intimate experience with setting up things the 'right' way for our cars.

I had the localization effect when I mounted some CDT Braxials. Even though I had improved the soundstage, the localization annoyed me. I add the upstage kit utlizing the factory tweeter locations. I'm still messing with the aim and settings, but the localization is gone and the stage is up high. I'm still trying to get the stage to move forward, as the factory location is not ideal for this, but it still helps...

if you want an opinion more experienced than even me and specific to your car, read all threads started by 'msmith'.

Heh, I've been reading his posts, along with everyone elses for the past couple months before making this thread. As I said, I try to be thorough.

From another post -

 

Generally speaking, 2 or 3-way setups will sound best when in the same plane (obviously) and when VC's are spaced no further than the wavelength distance of the crossover frequency. The reason for this is the frequency overlap at the X-over points. If the roll-off was vertical & there was no overlap you could put 'em anywhere you wanted with no ill effects.

 

Since that ain't possible, what happens is a time delay mismatch at the crossover points, meaning that each driver is reproducing the same frequencies at different distances from your ear. The net result is an incoherent sound that's more obvious to some listeners than others.

 

For some reason the effect is less noticeable at the lowest frequences (probably b/c of the wavelength size) & doesn't affect the sub lows.

 

The reason why dash-tweeter placements sometimes work is the reflection off the glass, delaying the tweeter's output to your ear. We didn't get that lucky with the Subie.

 

Soundstage location isn't necessarily about speaker location as much as its about dispersion & flat frequency response. You need a pretty big whopping calf to block off the stock driver location. So keep the mother-in-law out of your passenger seat. Otherwise it seems to work out fine.

back from the dead!!!

 

anyway, since i've been checking up on getting some new speakers for my 05 LGT and i really wasnt happy with teh setup i had in my 99 legacy. tweets way to far away from the mids. i'm wondering if going with a nice set of 2-way or even 3-way speakers would be a better option. anyone go this route over a tweeter/mid setup?

pu the tweets in the kick panel

but why?

but why?

 

to minimize PLD

 

http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61377

to minimize PLD

 

http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php?t=61377

 

psssssst.... it was a joke.......

Does anyone have any pics of tweeters mounted in the kicks?

 

I have about 3/4 of my stereo project at my house waiting for installation but I'm still a little on the fence with the tweeters. I have no problem just mounting them in the stock kickpanel, but unfortunately I'm fairly positive that my tweeters dont have a swivel ability. Will this kill my soundstage if they are theoretically firing straight rather than angled upward?

 

Heres the gear I'm using...

RF 3Sixty.2

Elemental Designs 6500 components

Elemental Designs 13Ov.2 Subwoofer

Elemental Designs Nine.5 amp

Raammat Deadening

 

OH BABY.

psssssst.... it was a joke.......

 

really? fooled me!