Sensitivity: 88.5db low s/n ratio. I'm sure the amps will help the mid-bass drivers low efficiency.

 

Cool write install but I dont see any sound proofing. With the sub mounted like that I can imagine there will be a lot of rattles. Even without any system I hear rattle on the freeway before sound proofing the entire car.

 

This is kind of off-topic for an install thread, but I'll bite.

It depends on what you are comparing them to. You have to make sure you are comparing apples to apples, or in this case, 4 ohm speakers to 4 ohm speakers. If you compare 4 ohm speaker sensitivity to 2 ohm speaker sensitivity, you can be fooled.

For example, when I was deciding on speakers, another option I considered was going with Infinity reference series for the doors (6030cs and 6032cf) and kappa 120.9W for the sub. Let's compare the mid-bass drivers.

NVX VSP65kit: 4 ohms impedance, 88.5 db sensitivity, 70W rated RMS power
Infinity 6030cs: 2 ohms impedance, 93 db sensitivity, 90W rated RMS power

Sensitivity is measured at 2.83V because home audio speakers normally are 8 ohms, and 2.83V through 8 ohms takes 1W of power. To get 88.5 db from the NVX speaker, you consume 2W of power. The Infinity speaker takes 4W of power (twice as much) to produce about twice the loudness. If you only put 2W of power into the Infinity speaker, you would get about 90 db of sound. So, on a loudness per Watt basis, the speakers are nearly identical. It's a matter of physics. With current technology, nearly every manufacturer's speakers at a particular price point are going to produce similar loudness per unit of power.

Looking at the subwoofers, we see the same physics at work. While neither company specifies at what impedance the sensitivity measurement is taken, since lower impedance gives a higher sensitivity number, it's reasonable to assume that they used the lowest impedance possible, to get the highest possible sensitivity to publish. The NVX has dual 4 ohm voice coils, which gives 2 ohms when wired in parallel. The Infinity has an impedance selector switch which has a 2 ohm position. We assume that both speakers were measured in their 2 ohm configurations. And, no surprise, their listed sensitivities are 90 and 91 db, nearly identical.

 

No sound proofing or deadening yet. I'm keeping my eyes open for an economical, lightweight method that provides substantial results.

No rattles yet. Rattles usually come from something that's loose enough to vibrate. If you push on the cargo cover supports, you'll find that they have a little give to them. My deck is sized so it is a tight slip fit, with no play at all. It started too tight, and I had to remove material to get it to fit. I'm a bit worried that when I wrap the wood with fabric, the it will be too tight again.

Also, I'm used to driving crappy cars with lots of strange noises. I just turn up the volume until I can't hear them anymore...

 

You are most welcome! Glad it helped you and others! I agree there are dimishing returns when tuning a car stereo. I tuned mine with the windows closed. I think it sounds amazingly better than stock. That was my end goal, and reasonably priced for under a grand.

 

Now that I've lived with it for a week, I can say that I love the full sound. But... Some of those dollars spent definitely gave more improvement than others.

To others considering upgrading their audio, here is the order in which I'd spend your money: (starting from an LX model, like mine)
1: Replace the front door speakers with a component set. This immediately extends both the high and low end of the sound. If you are driving from the stock radio, get a set that presents a 4 ohm load, so you don't overheat the head unit. As it is, it gets very hot when operating. A huge improvement for the money.
2: Replace the rear speakers. The front speakers have a much greater effect on the sound for the front seat occupants, but getting matching speakers for the rear will help fill in the sound. Also, with decent speakers, you have twice as many cones generating midbass. With the package deal I got, adding the rear speakers cost less than half of the front set. Good bang for the buck.
3: Add a 4 channel amp to drive the door speakers. The cost comes in at just under the cost of the 4 speakers. The head unit is so underpowered that it really can't drive upgraded speakers properly. Even with the stock speakers, you have to turn the volume setting near the top to get "loud" sound. An off-board amp lets you keep the head unit volume down lower, where there will be less distortion, and lets it run cooler. The off board amp is doing the real power driving of the speakers.
4: The subwoofer and amp should come last. Nothing beats the thumping of powerful low bass, but there are a lot of people who listen to a lot of music without even realizing the deep bass they are missing. This addition costs about as much as everything else added together. You are paying a LOT of money for something most people can easily live without.
4a: If you don't want to spend a ton of money on a subwoofer and amp, you could spend about a fifth as much and get a bass restoration processor. The LX (don't know about the EX) head unit has a built-in bass rolloff that protects the crappy stock speakers. When you swap in better speakers, you can restore the bass and at least get all the bass from your new speakers they are capable of producing. An added subwoofer theoretically can compensate for this bass missing from the mains, but it could be easily argued that a bass restoration processor will give better overall sound even with the addition of a subwoofer.

 

Added the missing 4 pins to the harness, and now the steering wheel controls are working again. I have to retrain myself not to reach over to the radio to adjust the volume and change presets.

I attempted to remove the pins from the new harness using the soldering iron destructive technique, but had no luck. Just about destroyed the first pin I tried. After that I just cut open the connector housing to remove the pins.

BTW, you want to do this on the bench, before the wiring is installed, if possible. Working in your dashboard with a soldering iron is no fun. Too much risk of accidentally damaging the interior with dripping solder, or accidental touches by the hot iron.

 

So awesome, wish this was something I felt comfortable doing on my own.

 

I looked around for a subwoofer grill that might match my Triple Helix theme, but couldn't find anything. The coolest thing I came across was a discontinued grill designed by Fishman. I took inspiration from that one to design my own.

Mine is made of CNC milled lexan. Here are the legs on the milling machine.

.



Here are the parts after deburring, before drilling and tapping the holes in the legs.




I assembled the parts with stainless socket head cap screws, and mounted the grill to the subwoofer deck. Here's what it looks like with the hatch closed.




And with the hatch open.




Inside view from the rear door.




And a closeup view.

 

that's pretty damn cool

 

Hey man, came out perfect! So perfect that I am attempting to copy your cargo tray design, but inverted to allow a larger custom dual 12" sub woofer enclosure to sit below. I know I'm seeing this thread very late but I was wondering if you could post up a few key measurements to emulate the "cargo tray" that I could use as a guide to cut my own. Don't worry about the actual enclosure specs, I'm just looking for the tray.