View Full Version : Supra ICE Upgrade
Hi all,
I'm thinking seriously about upgrading the standard UK spec MkIV speakers and amp situation to the following:
.Standard head unit
.Alpine MRP-F320 5 channel amp - 4 x 75w + 180 w sub channel: £ 173.32
.2 x 6" Infinity Kappa speakers & 2 tweeters to replace the front - free from my generous brother:D
.2 x Alpine SPS-6939S 6x9" speakers for the back: £ 138.58 the pair.
.Alpine SBR-1241SB R-type 300w RMS sub in a box £ 173.31.
Firstly, d'you reckon that's a decent upgrade?
Secondly, will the 6 x 9's fit in the back spaces? There appears to be enough room.
Thirdly, am I right in saying that the exiting amp is under the passenger seat? And if so, can I just use the wiring from that instead of taking the dash off?
And lastly, will the sub box fit in the boot?
Answers to any of the above would be appreciated.
Ta,
Kaleel.
Matt Harwood
25-06-02, 18:51
Originally posted by Kaleel
Hi all,
I'm thinking seriously about upgrading the standard UK spec MkIV speakers and amp situation to the following:
.Standard head unit
.Alpine MRP-F320 5 channel amp - 4 x 75w + 180 w sub channel: £ 173.32
Not a bad amp and a good price too.
.2 x 6" Infinity Kappa speakers & 2 tweeters to replace the front - free from my generous brother:D
Nice speakers... Can't he let you have them cheaper? ;)
.2 x Alpine SPS-6939S 6x9" speakers for the back: £ 138.58 the pair.
Is this for one pair or two? - At full retail they are supposed to be £99
.Alpine SBR-1241SB R-type 300w RMS sub in a box £ 173.31.
Very nice...
Firstly, d'you reckon that's a decent upgrade?
Very good for the money and well worth ditching the stock stuff as quick as posible if you like your audio :)
Secondly, will the 6 x 9's fit in the back spaces? There appears to be enough room.
Not without some fairly serious modification to the rear panels and mounts
Thirdly, am I right in saying that the exiting amp is under the passenger seat? And if so, can I just use the wiring from that instead of taking the dash off?
Yes the factory amp is under the passenger seat, but, no, you can't use that wiring as the factory amp wiring has nowhere near the current capability that your Alpine amp will require. You'll need to run new cables through-out.
Power supply must come directly from the battery.
And lastly, will the sub box fit in the boot?
Sorry, probably not. The box needs to be very shallow to fit in the boot of a mk4. Especially if you have the boot cover in place. (which you need to hide your investment)
Answers to any of the above would be appreciated.
Anytime :)
Ta,
Kaleel.
will also be a fair bit of work to get 6" to fit in the front.
Na, I just mounted them straight to the door card, but had to get rid of that stoopid bit of plastic that sits behind it.!
I'm gonna have great fun chopping up the rear pods to throw in a pair of 7x10's. :eek:
:baa:
My poor car, he's mutilating it......boo hoo.
JB
Aha, right, excellent. By the way, just to first mention the 6" in the front - mine appears to have 6" speakers in the front anyway, so I could easily swap them. More the back speakers I was worried about.
Seems like these are decent prices I've got. they're from MCS Direct online: http://www.mcs-direct.co.uk P&P is an extra £12.50 per whole order, so not bad, and yes, the price above is for the pair of 6x9 speakers.
I had a look at the back speaker mounts and they currently have 6" drivers in there at the moment. Oddly enough, the mounts look capable of taking a much larger speaker - hence the 6x9 idea, although there's a metal bracket that the 6" sits on that I'd guess I'd have to take out. I don't mind gouging a bit of the plastic out beause it looks like the standard grille covers would still cover a 6x9 speaker. Well I think so anyway. Has anyone put such a speaker in the back, or should I try and save my hair and just use 6" drivers all round?
I'm disappointed the sub box won't fit in the boot. Arse! I suppose I could have an acoustic shelf made, but I wanted to keep away from that if possible. Can anyone suggest another sub box that has a good 12" sub in it that would fit in the MkIV boot? I'd really love a 12" sub as I used to have that on my last celica and the bass is much deeper than the 10" subs I've heard. But it has to fit in the boot, obviously... I wonder whether I could make one out of MDF, as I do like the idea of Alpine's R-series subs. Thing is, sub boxes are a bit of a black art, aren't they...? If I was to make one, what would I need to consider - overall volume, shape, porting? Mmmm...
Lastly, with the standard amp under the seat, I had a look and presumably I'd need to unplug it and use the wiring that comes from the head unit into the amp. Are there any wiring diagrams for the connector blocks / wire colours on the standard amp / head unit? All I can see on it is that it says "Fujitsu", but that doesn't mean much. If I knew what all the wires were, I could either splice them all or try and find a new connector to use for the new amp. And I think the alpine amp would sit under the seat in place of the standard amp.
Thanks for the help so far guys. I'd like to get this sorted out before Billing I reckon, so I can start early deafness on its merry way and take the camp site with me. Marvellous.
Oh, by the way, for decent gear like this, what sort of wiring should I be using for the speakers? Would standard oxygen-free hi-fi wire be ok? And presumably I'd need an inline fuse to the battery feed.
Cheers,
I made my own sub box from 19mm MDF, its aprox 1 cu ft. which is slightly small for my 12' sub but sounds ok.
7 x 15x 24 inches and it still leaves you with "some" boot space.
Kaleel, tell me you didn't buy Branners car...
Its falling to bits!
The Cavailer that is, the Supra rocks!
;)
Yes, I see what you mean - I've just been out and measured that in the boot and it would sit behind the rear seats, lengthways. Wouldn't be a bad size really, as I'd still be able to get my brief case and all the other crap I usually have in there and if I needed more space, I'd just put the seats down.
I'd only worry that it was a bit shallow for the really deep notes, but as you say, it sounds good in your car. D'you have any problems with it getting the really low notes, or producing distortion or any flapping?
Cheers,
Originally posted by Bradb
Kaleel, tell me you didn't buy Branners car...
Its falling to bits!
The Cavailer that is, the Supra rocks!
;)
He he no, thankfully I still have my gorgeous Supe.:cool:
Cheers,
Originally posted by Bradb
Kaleel, tell me you didn't buy Branners car...
Its falling to bits!
The Cavailer that is, the Supra rocks!
;)
I was talking about Bazza pulling my old Supra to pieces to load it up with pointless heavy ICE....lord knows where the Cav went to, but I nicked the tax disc before it went....ho ho.
I get no distortion and it sounds fine to me, but I have it more for reinforceing the bass than running around with the windows down like the lax power boys. Gets plenty low enough. you can make it upto about 29 inches long which would make about 1.3cu ft.
John K,
If you want to get round the problem of having a slightly smaller box than you would have liked, you can put some foam in it.
My box is also quite small but if it sounds naff, due to repositioning it I now have the option of doubling its size.!
:baa:
Right, I think I will build my own box and as you say, I could fil it with foam. Actually that brings up a point I mentioned on the email list a few months back about filling enclosures with bags of activated carbon. Apperently provides exellent deadening. If I can find enough carbon, I might give it a go. Found the article in New Scientist magazine a while ago.
I think I'll just order the sub and make the damned thing fit!
Cheers,
If you build a sealed box then you can make it smaller than a ported one, and it's not so critical if it is not exactly the right size. Ported ones are much more complicated to get sounding right but are more efficient.
AFAIK it's only the total volume of a sealed box that determines how low it will go, so it doesn't matter how shallow it is (as long as the sub will fit in it :rolleyes: ) You just need to know the selaed box volume for your sub (including the displacement of the driver) and get the calculator out to work out the box dimensions.
Some subs need much bigger boxes than others of the same size, so it's worth finding one that's happy in a small box.
I built a small box for a 10" Infinity Kappa, see here (http://www.indidist.co.uk/images/images/SimonB2.jpg), but I'm a quality not quantity man :)
Are you sure you've got 6"s in the front ? The grilles look way bigger than the actual speakers when you take the door cards off.
I'd say there's no point in putting 6x9s in the back. You don't need anything in the back really with a sub and decent fronts imho. They're only any use for passengers in the back and somehow I think any passengers in the back of a supe are likely to have their ears blocked by their knees anyway...
You've definitely got some interesting points there. I'll check the diameter of the speakers in the front and will price up some 6" ones for the back too.
I think I will build a non-ported sub box as you're the second person that's told me that it's the ported boxes that are the buggers to get right. I'll probably go for something like what you've got there although still with the 12". I just love that 12" rumble. Maybe I should go for a 15"! Although I don't know whether the amp will be enough..I think it's about 120w RMS for the sub channel, although an independent test has it as belting out more like 145 w RMS. Is that enough for a 500w RMS 15" sub? Is it even enough for a 300W RMS 12" R type alpine?
I notice that the alpine box with the same sub I'm thinking about quotes a 27L box, so if I can get the volume the same as that, that'll probably be fine.
The only thing I'm not sure about now is how to tell what wires are what. I intend interceopting the wiring that comes from the head unit and into the passenger seat amp. I'm going to rip that out and put the new amp in the same place, but I'll need to know the wiring. I could use the speaker level inputs, but I'd rather not - for quality reasons.
Any ideas? I can't find any references on the net to the wiring colours anywhere.
Cheers,
Matt Harwood
26-06-02, 15:30
Forget the amp wiring under the seat and run new o/f speaker cables. Use RCA inputs, earth to the floor and power to the battery.
a ported enclosure is far easier and far less crucial for a sub. The way to calculate a box's internal volume is L x H x W then divide to total by 1728. this gives you the total cu.ft. - Remember the measurements MUST be INTERNAL. If I remember rightly, there's 26 litres to 1 cu.ft. (Stand to be corrected here).
The Alpine 10" R-type needs 0.6 cu.ft and the 12" needs 1.1 cu.ft. and the 15" needs 1.8!! - All sealed.
As for if 145watts is enough, Forget power ratings, look at the sensitivity of the driver. The larger Alpine subs have higher sensitivity so you'll get more response from the amp. Although the more power you give it the better it will be controlled.
Ah right, getting closer then. The reason I mention the amp is that I don't want to mess about behind the dash. I f I can get at the signal level outputs from the head unit that are going into the existing amp before they go into the amp, I can get rid of the amp and wire up the new one in place. Does that make sense, or am I missing something there? I obviously don't want speaker level outputs, but I'm p[resuming that the existing head unit is sending signal level outputs to the existing amp. Is that right? And if so, how do I find out what wires are what? Or should I be taking the dash off to try and find the proper outputs directly out of the back of the head unit?
Again, if so, ho on earth do I get the dash off!
With the sub box, it looks like th 27L for the apline box they quote is the 1.1 cu ft thing. Are you saying I should port it then? I wasn't sure what you meant about the ported / sealed comments. If I port it, how wide shoud the port be, in what position and do I need to flange it with a tube or something?
Thanks for the advice so far. I'm getting there!
Cheers,
Matt Harwood
26-06-02, 15:53
Sorry, that was a bit unclear wasn't it.
Sealed, keep it sealed. Angles do not matter at all. As Barry says, if you can't get the box size you require get some rockwool or similar and that will make the sub "see" a larger enclosure.
Are you intending to run this lot from the stock radio unit?
Ah right, I may have a problem. I checked the actual diameter of the front speakers adn they're 4.5" with a separate tweeter. It took quite a bit to persuade the cover off and even though I've undone the three retaining screws on the driver, I can't get it out of the hole. How d'you do that? Is it glued maybe?
If I ever get the thing out, am I going to be able to put 6" speakers in the same holes? There doesn't seem to be a huge amount of room.
Maybe I should get someone to fit the stuff. Do you do fitting Matt? Or anyone else on here? I bet you're miles away though: I'm in Newcastle.
Cheers,
Hi Matt,
Sorry I'm answering this out of sync.
I'll keep the sub box sealed then.
I'm going to run the lot off a new amp: Alpine MRP-F320 5 channel amp. 4 x 40w RMS + 120w RMS sub.
Cheers,
Matt Harwood
26-06-02, 16:02
Ahhh.... You're not supposed to take off the grille:eek:
You're supposed to remove the whole door card!.
If you do a search on here, you'll find loads of info on fitting front speakers.
Personally, I've mounted mine to the door card with a wooden fillet behind the speaker. It's certainly not the best way but it is the easiest. - I don't get much time to play with my car :(
Yes we can do fitting here... But I'm in Maidstone, Kent. Bit more than a 5 minute trip away;)
Matt Harwood
26-06-02, 16:03
Originally posted by Kaleel
Hi Matt,
Sorry I'm answering this out of sync.
I'll keep the sub box sealed then.
I'm going to run the lot off a new amp: Alpine MRP-F320 5 channel amp. 4 x 40w RMS + 120w RMS sub.
Cheers,
What head unit are you going to use?
Originally posted by Matt Harwood
Ahhh.... You're not supposed to take off the grille:eek:
You're supposed to remove the whole door card!.
If you do a search on here, you'll find loads of info on fitting front speakers.
Personally, I've mounted mine to the door card with a wooden fillet behind the speaker. It's certainly not the best way but it is the easiest. - I don't get much time to play with my car :(
Yes we can do fitting here... But I'm in Maidstone, Kent. Bit more than a 5 minute trip away;)
Oops... I'll have a look for info on that.
Maybe a local fitter would be better!
Originally posted by Matt Harwood
What head unit are you going to use?
Just the standard UK spec one. You know, the double height thingy? I can't afford to upgrade that yet. Presumably it's of ok quality as long as I get the signal out of it before it gets amplified?
Thinking about it, I do have a good quality Sony mini disc head that I could put in, but that would mean a few problems:
1. I'd have to lose tape functionality.
2. I prefer the way the current one is pretty much un-nickable because it's behind the dash
3. I'd need to blank off one of the bays
4. I'd definitely have to get behind the dash in order to fit it!
Cheers,
I've just worked the dimensions of a sub box based on the inner volume of 27L. Actually, I've just worked out that a cubic foot of air is 28.32 L. Now then, I don't know exactly how much volume the 12" R-type needs, but the alpine box itself is 27L.
Based on 27L (0.9535 cubic feet) I've drawn up a sloping topped box thats inner dimensions would be 48.5cm (19.1") wide, 32.75cm (12.9") front to back, 19cm (7.5") high at the back and 15cm (5.9") high at the front. The top face is 33cm (13") to mount the speaker into.
That sound any good?
What thickness of MDF would you recommend? 15mm? More?
Cheers,
Matt Harwood
26-06-02, 19:17
Originally posted by Kaleel
Thinking about it, I do have a good quality Sony mini disc head that I could put in, but that would mean a few problems:
1. I'd have to lose tape functionality.
2. I prefer the way the current one is pretty much un-nickable because it's behind the dash
3. I'd need to blank off one of the bays
4. I'd definitely have to get behind the dash in order to fit it!
Cheers,
1. You still use tape!?!?!?
2. The sony would be mounted behind the dash too - Who would want to steal the stock unit?!?!?
3. You need a din size pocket. Toyota do one and you can get universal ones for less than £10
4. It's not as difficult as it sounds. I think TRL performance has a good description of the dash removal process.
Yes the box size sounds ok, if you can make it just slightly bigger in one direction you'll be nearer Alpines recommended size of 1.1 cu.ft.
15mm is ok but 19mm is better. The less flex the box has the better bass response you'll get.
Hi Matt,
1. He he, only for audio books on long journeys! I have a 6 disc changer too.
2. The main bit of the Sony would be mounted behind, but the detachable cover wouldn't be. I've never really liked detachable covers. I never have anywhere to put them! And I once forgot take it out of the car: once only and some fucker broke into the car and nicked it! Cost £ 150 just to get a new detachable facia. I'm sure the Sony is better quality, but I don't know whether I can be bothered with the hassle. If I can afford it in the future, I'd like to get a full head unit upgrade with a flip facia.
ony
3. Sounds easy enough.
4. I remember that page now, I'll have a look on Pete's site. Thanks for that.
I'll re-adjust the box size to 1.1 cubic feet although I wonder why Alpine made their 12" sub boxes for their own subs less than a cubic foot??:conf: Have a butchers at their own description: http://www.alpine-europe.com/2002/products2002/gb/sbr_1241sb.htm . I don't understand it really, 27L is definitely a fair bit smaller than a cubic foot as I make 1.1 cubic feet equal to 31.2 L. Theirs is only 87% of their own recommended size! Mmmm.
Cheers,
If you want to be completely anal about it (like me ;) ), you should take account of the volume of the bit of the sub that sits inside the box and make the box slightly bigger to compensate. Some manufacturers factor this in to their recommended enclosure sizes and some don't (they call it driver displacement).
Let's face it though, it's not going to make much difference...
Oh, and don't do what I did and design a lovely box with the right volume only to find the sub was too deep to fit in it because of
the angle of the top. Luckily I realised before spending ages building it. :stupid:
He he, yes I planned to get hold of the sub first and then build the box afterwards.
You're right about the drvier displacement. I thought about it but for some reason dismissed it. I wonder if that's why the alpine boxes are quoted as have a smaller volume than they recommend. Perhaps they've already taken out the volume the driver take up. I dunno, but I'l certainly do that.NB I'm thinking of going larger with the amp and getting a separate sub amp. Not sure yet, but I'm a little worried that the sub will be underpowered by the amp.
Cheers,
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