Sound system build progress thread (warning: will be slooooow)

ashmostro · 2025-12-14T13:17:26-0800

Yo.

So I hate the SQ of the factory ELS system. It sounds muddy, unbalanced through the frequency range, the imaging sucks butt (even in Neural Surround mode), blah blah blah.

Things I wanna do, not necessarily all at the same time:

Sound deaden the doors, door cards, trunk floor, and inside of the OE subwoofer enclosure
Integrate a DSP amp in, likely an Audiotec-Fischer MATCH UP 10 DSP. I will have to build my own T harness for the amp since none exist on the market. The amp will likely mount under the passenger seat, given the dash location of the factory amp.
Upgrade the front door and center channel speakers, the rear C-pillar speakers, and the subwoofer. The MATCH amp will drive all these speakers. I have not yet determined if the front door/A pillar speakers are all on their own channels or running off a passive crossover network (if you know, please respond here!)
I will disconnect the front roof speakers and rear door speakers. They are over complicating the sound quality.

My current top choices for the replacement speakers are:

Front door woofers: Hertz C 165L 6.5" cone, chosen for optimal Qts and dispersion up to a 900Hz lowpass point
Front door midranges: Dayton Audio CF50N-4 2" dome, chosen for excellent dispersion up to a 2.8kHz crossover point
Front A pillar tweeters: Dayton Audio CF18N-4 3/4" dome, chosen for excellent dispersion
Front center channel: Dayton Audio CF50N-4 2" dome (bandpass 900 to 2.8kHz)
Rear C-pillar midranges: Dayton Audio CF50N-4 2" dome (bandpass 900 to 2.8kHz)
Rear subwoofer: Rockford P3SD4-8 (already proven to work well in the stock enclosure)

As implied, the crossover points are:

Sub: infrasonic to 80Hz
Woofers: 80Hz to 900Hz
Midranges: 900Hz to 2.8kHz
Tweeters: 2.8kHz to ultrasonic

Whether I use passive crossovers (which I will build and have already designed) or active depends on the factory wiring of the front door and A pillar speakers. If they are each their own channel (which they probably aren't) then I will go full active, which is my preference. Heck, I might even run my own wiring if they aren't, given the HUGE advantage that time delaying such a setup affords.

Any fellow SQ-heads in here? Thoughts?

-Ash