Stereos: What you guys Get/Got?... & Recommendations...

[whitehatspecial]

Just got an old skool Audiovox mini fm converter. Works as crappy as they ever did. But it's better than AM all the time.

[472 R/T SE]

My deck is nothing special, they told me to spend the money on the amp/crossover.  My Focal highs (tweeters) are up in the dash.  One of the advantages of the 3 speaker dash.  You'll have a hard time getting a high quality speaker in the kick panels, if it's any good the magnet's gonna be too big to fit.  They built me wrap around's for the corner of the cab for my Focal mid's which is better for sound versus in the doors or kick panels. 
In the trunk I have a 300w Eclipse pushing the mids and tweeters and a 240w pushing the 10" subwoofer.  The Eclipse is a crossover as well.  I have a little 500 song capacity MP3 player, no more CD changing.
I'm real happy with the sound.  It's too loud before it distorts.  I think the sound I had in my Peterbuilt was better tho.  You could watch the exterior walls of the sleeper bounce, pretty intense.

[Manfred318]

2 watt Music Master AM raido with a Spark-o-matic FM converter and stock front/rear speakers.

Hay I have that same FM converter around somewhere...  it was mounted in my car when I got it!

I wish mine was in my car when I bought it. I had to buy mine on Ebay last year. I paid somewheres around $60 for it, which wasnt too bad considering what some of 'em go for.

[2Gunz]

I installed The audio system in my car.

And If you live in Socal I can help you with yours.

Im not a "professional Audio" Installer.

Which basically means I actually do quality work and dont take shortcuts.

My install goals where....

1. Look like it belongs.

2. Sound Quality

3. Price


I pretty much wrote the book on how it would not work in an effort to not "pimp my ride".

Lots of stuff I have done is against the rules of car audio. But listen to a few songs in my car,

and you will change your mind.


Head unit - 8 year old Alpine thats been in the car forever. I like it and it stayed.

Front doors - Polk Audio Plated 5 and a 1/4's   Covered with 71 Porche grills to give it that old school look.

    - As noted in an earlier post Kick panels are better. However I hate the look.

Rear deck -  top of the line Alpine 6 x 9's  - I ditched the Ricer grills and used some old school Vega covers.

    -  Also noted before the rears are not ideal for car audio, but the holes where already cut out.

Subs -   2 10 Inch Solo Baric's  In 2 very small boxs that "shouldnt" sound as good as they do.
                They are tucked up on top of the rear wheel well area and are pretty stealth.

      -  I could get alot more boom and grunt out of bigger boxs/ speakers. But that wasnt the goal.
         I wanted something as hidden as possible with no huge cabinet in the trunk area.

          And really it pounds pretty hard as it is. It rattles the garage door at 1/2  volume. And sitting in
          it with the bass cranked for a bit would prolly result in hearing loss as it is.


Amps....


Front and rear -   Audio Bahn 4 channel. Audio Bahn seems to have alot of haters in the Car audio world.
                          But I tried out 3 amps and the Audio Bahn was the clear winner for the price.


Subs -     Power Accousitic 2000 Watt amp.  Once again alot of mixed reviews about this amp.
               But trying to find a Class D amp for decent price is hard.  I wouldnt say Im in love of the amp.
               However because of its low power usage and price its a winner.



4 Farad Capacitor -  Its way overkill for the system. But basically I got it for 10 bucks more than a 1 Farad.




Heres a post of mine with some pictures on the doors and speakers.


http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,21757.0.html


I have alot of pictures and alot of interesting stuff I have done that I need to post about.

I also found an alternator that need almost nothing done to it to make it fit on a 440.

It comes with a V belt, and requires no special plugs.  120 Amps, externally regulated.

And an in stock of the shelf part..........


Anyway good luck on your audio hunt.

And once again if you live in socal, look me up.

[Plumcrazy]

Sony CDX-GT710 receiver
Alpine SPS-080A speakers up front
Pioneer TS-A5713 speakers in the rear
JVC CS-BB2 subwoofer under the passengers seat

[Brock Samson]

www.charger.com rocks don't it?.. 

[Shakey]

I just sent my AM radio to a place in MN that will convert it to AM/FM and also include an auxilary port for my mp3 player.  My car only had the single speaker in the dash so they sent me two speakers that mount in place of the single 4x10 up front.  I should get the radio back sometime this summer.

I dig the stock look.

I've got a photo of the speaker somewhere.....

[RoscoePColtrain]

I've seen some really good stuff from SoundStream here at a local shop.  What really got me interested is the fact that the deck was only $399 CDN, had a USB mini on the front face, and an SD card slot on the top.  Its got a black face and a 3.5" LCD screen.  It doesn't have too many colors like Panasonic has, its simple and looks great.

I remember friends that were in car audio competition saying that there was a place in Toronto that custom makes kick panels for all makes of newer cars.  At the time is was about $250-350 for a pair.

[Lowprofile]

Well, no stereo in the car yet, but I got a pretty nice set-up in my big truck!

Alpine CDA-9825 AM/FM/CD Player
Delphi SkyFi XM Satellite Reciever
Clarion SRR1022 4in Coaxial Speakers  [front]
Boston Acoustics 797 6x9 Tri-Axial Speakers  [front]
Infinity 6in Coaxial Speakers [rear]
Kenwood KFC-6903ie  6x9 Tri-Axial Speakers [rear]

Turn it up! 

[472 R/T SE]

Right-on Lowprofile.  Under my bed was nothing but the box that housed 2-12" JBL subwoofers.  I had JBL mids in the cab behind your ears on both sides behind seats and tweeters up above facing ya'.  2 big amps and a crossover box to mix the music and a 10 disc player in one of the closets.  Go in back and load up the player for a day of travel, I kinda miss it nowadays.
The mechanics would run to my truck when I pulled in our yard to see if I was due for servicing.  They wanted to cruise the lot with the tunes cranked. 

Sorry for the 'jack Brock.

[plum500]

I just sent my AM radio to a place in MN that will convert it to AM/FM and also include an auxilary port for my mp3 player.  My car only had the single speaker in the dash so they sent me two speakers that mount in place of the single 4x10 up front.  I should get the radio back sometime this summer.

I dig the stock look.

I've got a photo of the speaker somewhere.....

I think that 2x speaker idea is brilliant. Thanks for posting.

[2Gunz]

The dual speaker thing looks great.

I just wish they would have used better speakers 

[runningman]

I am retrofitted an older kenwood head unit into my stock am radio, not totally finished with it yet but it's looks cool and stock.  I bought some used old school RF amps and am going to get a couple of 10's for the back.  Going with components for the rear and front.  I have been thinking of trying to mount the mids into the kick panels and thought of trying to mount the highs (tweeters) into the front stock speaker location but make up a bracket that would have each speaker pointed to the driver/pass sides.  I am tbinking the sound may reflect off the windshield making them sound like they are mounted more towards the a-pillars.....Do you audio guys think this may work or should I try something different.  Sorry to hijack but thought this would be a good post ask..........thanks  matt

[chargerrt]

Here's some knowledge I attained from doing my stereo last fall...

1.  6"x9" speakers do not fit in the speaker holes on the package tray.  5"x7" are closer to the mark.  The only way you're gonna get 6"x9" is by cutting the original metal

2.  you can put a 6" round speaker in the hole in the bottom of the door behind the door panel, but if the speaker is going to come through the door panel, you won't be able to roll up  the windows if you have manuel roll-up windows

3.  cutting a repro dash radio bezel to fit a new cd player looks pretty cool in my opinion...thats why I did it

4.  screw trying to make an awesome stereo system for this 37 year old car by myself.  I'll have a professional shop do it when I fix up the entire car (thought to myself)


hope my  helps...

[defiance]

I don't know the pre-71 rear deck myself, but there are very few cars that won't fit 6x9's without cutting --- You just have to underhang the speakers