How to get more sound output from your car stereo

apple car play car  stereo

 

Your factory car stereo is made to provide a standard level of car audio in your vehicle. It will have very basic settings and features. If your car is really old, then it will have probably just a CD play facility and radio stations. There are many apple car play upgrade car stereos that you can purchase online from a car audio store. There will be aftermarket ones such as single and double din fitment and also android apple car play stereos as well. The apple car play stereo usually come with all the panels and wiring inside the box. For the most part, they are plug and play, as they should come with a canbus box that allow the vehicle car stereo to communicate with the actual cars electronic system. 

Fitting a car stereo yourself can be a daunting process if you have not fitted a car stereo before or have no knowledge on car vehicle electronics. Its essential that you get your car stereo fitting professionally to ensure all the features work on it correctly and that nothing is damaged during fitment. If you have just installed your apple car play car stereo and you notice that the sound output is not that great, you can start by adjusting the sound settings within the unit. There will be options such as a equaliser that allows you to fine tune the sound, to increase bass and treble.This will work in most cases, however you can also upgrade your cheap factory car speakers to something that produces better clarity. Consider upgrade factory speakers with a quality component set that contains a midrange speaker, a tweeter and a separate crossover. 

If you want to add more bass in your car, you can also add a small car subwoofer in the rear boot. This will add more low end to your overall car audio system. You will feel more impact and boom with your music by installing a car subwoofer.

How To Add Subwoofer To Apple Car Play Car Stereo

If you are looking to add more bass to your car audio system then installing a aftermarket car subwoofer is something that you should consider. There are many different size subwoofers to choose and install from. The bigger the subwoofer generally the bigger the sound, but you will take up possibly valuable boot space, which you may or may not need. Before installing a car subwoofer, you need to upgrade your factory car stereo to a apple car play stereo. This allows you to play your favourite music from Spotify and also use applications such as google maps to help you with driving. 

Once you have purchased your subwoofer, you will need to get a car amplifier wiring kit. This will contain all the parts that you required to install your car subwoofer into your vehicle. Since you have upgraded to a apple car play stereo, you don't need to use any kind of rca converter. You simply insert the RCA plugs into the back of the car stereo and the other end into the car amplifier. This will provide a source signal from the car stereo to the car amplifier. 

The other important part is you need to install the 12 volt red cable. This is the main feed that provides a constant 12 volt power to the car amplifier. Remember to install a fuse near the car battery side, this will protect the vehicle if an electrical short does occur. The blue remote wire will also need connecting to the blue wire on the back of your aftermarket apple car play car stereo. This will provide a signal telling when the car amplifier to turn on and off, this prevent your car battery draining. The ground cable is the most easiest cable to install. You should mount this onto a bolt in the boot area and onto a bear metal surface. The better the car amplifier ground, the better the performance you are going to obtain from your car subwoofer.

Things to consider when considering upgrading your factory car stereo

A factory car stereo only has so much features and if your car is really old, you will have a standard cd player and fm radio combination. If you are thinking about upgrading the car stereo in your vehicle, there are usually two common options. An expensive aftermarket option such as from brands like Sony, Pioneer, Kenwood or a android apple car play car stereo. Both provide great functions and features to suit your exact budget. It really depends on how much you want to spent on your car audio system.

When purchasing a car stereo upgrade, it is important to note if it has all the features you need. Some car stereos come with DAB, which is digital radio. This allows you to get more radio stations and better sound quality to be received. If you're a keen listener to the radio, this is something you should certainly consider. A car headunit having its own GPS is also essential, if your smartphone battery dies or something happens, having an car stereo with its own standalone sat nav is important. 

If your into your car audio systems, then you need to identify how many watts the headunit can provide to each door speaker. The higher the wattage number, the more powerful the car stereo will provide sound to the speakers, this means a louder sound. 50X4 watts is generally my recommendation if you don't fancy installation a car amplifier. Does your aftermarket apple car play car stereo upgrade have an car equaliser? This allows you to fine tune the different frequencies to get the best possible sound out of your factory or aftermarket car speakers. This gives you full control of the bass, midrange and treble.

What is Apple Car Play and how does it work?

If you own an iphone, you can benefit from using apple car play when driving. This allows you to use applications on your phone such as google maps or Spotify while driving. Most modern iphones support apple car play car stereos, but you need to identify if the car stereo in your vehicle support it. The best way to do is to contact the vehicle manufacturer or take your car to the dealership for an technician to inform you if your car stereo support apple car play.

If your factory car stereo headunit doesn't support apple car play, there are many aftermarket android radios that you can purchase online and a get a car audio installer to install it to replace the factory car stereo. Make sure you read the specifications clearly on the website to identify if the car stereo radio that you are considering purchasing supports apple car play or not. There are two types of configurations, apple car play wired and apple car play wireless, both provided full apple car play compatibility. Wired means, you will have to use the standard iphone supplied USB cable and attach your phone to the USB port on your apple car play car stereo upgrade radio. This means there will be wires, but the benefit you gain from this is your iphone will always be charging. 

Wireless apple car play on the other hand is more convenient, as there are no wires visible. But your iphone battery will go down very quickly. This is not great if your going on long journeys, so you will have to plug in your phone anyways. If car stereos that support apply car play wireless, you will also be able to connected it through a wired connection. I hope this article helps you understand what apple car play is and also the connection methods.  

How To Make an Underseat Car Subwoofer Louder

If you are limited on space, an performance car parts underseat subwoofer is certainly recommended for you to install, if you are looking to install more bass into your car its highly recommend. Usually, more bass means more space, an underseat car subwoofer will never sound like 2 12 car subwoofers, but it will provide you that extra fill of bass, your overall car audio system is lacking.

Fitting an underseat subwoofer, is generally the same process as fitting an regular subwoofer system with an standalone car amplifier. You have your constant 12 volt power, to ensure its getting its voltage, an remote wire, to turn it on and off with the ignition system of the vehicle and also an ground wire. RCA cables are used to feed the car subwoofer an music signal, you will need to use an rca converter if you are using an factory headunit. Some underseat car subwoofers come with an high to low plug that you can directly add speaker wires onto and tap into the rear speakers from your factory radio.  

If you're not happy with how your underseat car subwoofers sounds, then they are few different options to make it sound louder. The first thing you want to consider is the gain control. As the gain control increases, so does the volume, but there is also distortion that comes into play. Turn this gain control, slowly turning it up with an bassy song and stop until you hear the speaker making mechanical noises.

The low pass filter is another important setting, but before you tune it, you need to understand what it does. The low pass filter blocks vocals or should we say voice going to the subwoofer, so the subwoofer speaker purely focuses on bass. This makes the compare parts subwoofer play more efficient and louder. For an underseat subwoofer, it will have less potential to play low bass like an 12 or 15 inch car subwoofer, its more of an midbass speaker, So i would suggest, setting up the low pass filter to around 120 HZ. This will give you the most potential out of the underseat subwoofer, as setting it too low can hinder sound as it can only produce so much.

How To Improve The Sound From You Car Audio System

An car audio system is an essential piece of kit that is needed to keep you entertained on the go. There are many different elements of an car audio system that you can improve. The first and most important thing is the upgraded all four speakers in your car. In the front, there are usually two speakers in the front doors making component speakers better suited. From the factory, these are made from poor materials usually paper and produce horrible distortion at high volumes. Upgrading them to an component speakers, will help improve the sound as they will contain an dedicated crossover. You can also improve your upgraded car speakers further, by adding an car amplifier onto them. Most people tend to install coaxial style speakers in the rear as they are more affordable.

Upgrading the car stereo from factory to aftermarket can can provide an great improvement on volume, you can improve the quality of sound by adjusting the car equaliser. This can provide you with an great level of treble and bass, as you can adjust the sound of each different parametric frequency. This gives you full control of how the different sounds your car speakers produce. Try look for an car headunit that has 8 or 10 band car equaliser and a built in digital sound processor. Android car stereos are ok if your on an cheap budget, but they have high distortion levels and don't really produce an clean sound. Pioneer, Kenwood and Alpine produce high sound quality and have great sound enhancing features.

Add an car subwoofer is always good if you don't have issues with taking up space in your trunk. Ideally, you can also install an small car underseat subwoofer, if space is an concern. An subwoofer comes in 10, 12 and 15 inches in size, there are two types of main enclosures in the car audio world. The ported enclosure is the best for gaining the most loudness from your car subwoofer, but the trade off is that the enclosure is twice the size as an sealed box. Sealed subwoofer boxes tend to provide an flat frequency response and more of an punch sound, with better sound quality. Sealed enclosures are also more compact and small making the ideal if you want to keep as much boot space as possible.

How To Fix Car Stereo Not Powering On

If your performance car parts stereo is not powering that means no music and long boring journey to your destination. There are a few couple of simple steps that you can follow to get your car stereo working again. Most of the time, it is something simple that is causing your car stereo not to power on. The first thing, i always do when customers come to the car audio shop is inspect the fuses that are responsible for supplying to the car stereo. There will be an standard blade fuse or micro blade fuse that is fitted in line with the supply of power to the car stereo from the car battery, if this is faulty or blown, then it will break the circuit going to the car stereo. The most common place for an car fuse box is around the glove box area or near the engine bay. Sometimes, you may have to pop the glove box down by pressing the two squeeze tabs.

Location of the car radio fuse can be tricky to find, on some cars there is an paper insert found when you remove the fuse box cover, this shows you what the different fuses are for. Each fuse will be numbered so it will help you identify the correct fuse. You can find the fuse box diagrams online as well if you do an quick search online with the make and model of your car / year.

Once you have located the radio fuse, use an pair of needle nose pliers to pull the fuse out. Once the compare parts radio fuse has been removed, hold the fuse up in an well lighted location. There will be an middle wire inside it, if it looks snapped or has burn marks around it, chances are the fuse has gone. This can happen due to an expected power surge from the car stereo, simply replace blown car radio fuse with an same type of fuse. Ensure the amp rating of the fuse is the correct fuse to ensure it doesn't blow again and provides the right level of protection to the car stereo and the 12 volt circuit. 

Sometimes, there is also an separate fuse that is placed into the back of the radio. I can't confirm if your radio has this, but its something you should check if the main fuse is checked and working in the fuse box. You will find plenty of videos to help you learn how to remove your radio from your car. Also the fuse can also be hidden behind the quadlock connector that plugs into the back of the unit, so be sure to remove that as well.

How To Make 6X9 Car Speakers More Louder

If you are after some more vocals, then adding 6x9 car speakers into the rear parcel shelf of your vehicle is the best method for improving overall sound. 6X9 car speakers are great because they provide all level of sounds, they have a three way configuration. They can play bass, midrange and high end treble if your on an car audio budget. In the centre, there are several tweeters to play high frequency sounds and because the 6x9 car speaker cone has an large diameter, it can have potential to play decent bass too around 50 to 60 HZ. One 6x9 has the cone area to equivalent to an 8 inch compare parts subwoofer. JBL make loud and clear 6x9 car speakers, kicker is also an good option. If you are on an budget, boss audio and kenwood make ones that are entry level. To get the most out any pair of 6x9 car speakers, you will need to give them the power they are rated at. Each speaker will be rated at its own RMS ratting, ignore max or peak ratings on any speaker specification as these are unrealistic figures of its power handling.

For example, if your 6x9 car speaker is rated at 90 RMS, then you ideally you want to find an two channel car stereo amplifier than can provide the same amount of power or close to this number. You can wire your 6x9 performance car parts speakers to the rear channels on your car stereo, however the headunit won't have enough power to drive there to there full potential. This may cause your 6x9 car speakers to sound weak at high volumes and also to distort early. 

You can also add an separate graphic equaliser to boost the sound. This will provide you with the ability to have full control of the different frequencies that are going to the 6x9 car speakers. This allows you to increase and decrease bass and treble. Kenwood 5 band equaliser is very good from my experience, allows pure crips and clear highs, however this product is discontinued and no longer in product. You will be able to find an used car equaliser on ebay.

You can also place your 6x9 car speakers into individual speaker boxes that are readily available from ebay. The enclosure will allow your 6x9 car speakers to have more bass and punch. It will make the overall sound more stronger, if compared to them floating around in the parcel shelf in open space. Make sure you get 6x9 car speakers that are constructed from MDF to ensure you get an quality sound.

How To Stop an Car Amplifier For Overheating

An car amplifier needs proper ventilation for it to perform correctly. If your performance car parts amplifier overheats, it will randomly go into protect mode. This will shut down the car amplifier from operation until it has cooled down. The best solution is to stop your car amplifier overheating in the first place, as the last thing you want is your music not playing in busy traffic. There are many ways to consider cooling your car amplifier down. The most easiest is to get an PC 120mm fan and attach it directly onto the metal heatsink. This will allow cool fresh air to directly be blown onto it. The more fans you add the better the cooling will be, I usually recommend at least two. If your not too bothered about your car amplifier looking pretty, then the best solution is to drill the screws holes directly into the metal heatsink. Then apply an screw into each corner of the PC fan to mount it in place. 

In terms of powering the fans, you want an 12 volt source that is switched, it is possible to run the cooling fans from the blue remote wire. However, this will only provide 5 volts which is not enough to run the computer fans to there maximum potential. The best way is to use an fuse tap and find an switched fuse circuit in the fuse box, verify this use an test light. You can use the ground of the amplifier for the negative wires from the fans so thats ok. 

If you don't fancy make modifications to your car amplifier, then you perhaps consider were you have mounted the car amplifier? Has it been mounted under the seat? Is it stuffed behind the box with lots of rubbish in the boot? The key to keeping the compare parts amplifier cool and not overheating is to ensure its getting a lot ventilation around it. The best place to mount an car amplifier is directly on the back of the seat and leave at least 5 CM between the enclosure and the amplifier. This will provide enough airflow around the car amp to prevent it getting damaged.

How To Tune a Car Amplifier For The Best Sound & Peformance

If you have purchased the correct wiring kit for your compare parts amplifier and it is installed correctly, then you car amplifier will be getting its full potential. Its important the car amplifier wiring kit is the correct gauge size to ensure that your car amp is getting the most power. This is to prevent voltage drop going to the car amplifier, as if this happens the bass performance will be reduced. If you are not happy with the way your car amplifier is sounding, then you may need to tune the settings on the car amplifier. Usually, there will be switches and dials to adjust, but before you make any changes, it is important to understand what they do.

The 'GAIN' is what controls how much input signal is received into the car amplifier. This is often mistaken for an volume knob on car amplifier but it is totally different. The best way to tune the again is to use your ears. Play an song of your choice that has good amount of bass, crank it all the way on the headunit to your desired listening level, just before any distortion can be heard from the door car speakers and slowly turn the gain up and stop until you hear any level of distortion. There are many fancy tools that you could use to tune the car amp gain settings, however they tend to be expensive and no better than tuning it the old school way.

The 'LPF' or 'LOW PASS FILTER' is also an important part of getting your bass to sound good in your car. This is responsible to how deep or boomy your bass sounds, as it cuts of what bass frequencies are being sent to your car subwoofer. Usually, 80 HZ is the recommended setting for an low pass filter option on your bass amp. This is because around this number, this is were bass plays, you could turn the LPF to 60HZ to cut some of the boomyness from your car subwoofer. 

The 'BASS BOOST' is often mentioned not to be used when tuning an performance car parts audio amplifier. However, i believe it can be used in correct situations. If you have an aftermarket radio, then you don't need to use this feature at all. However, if you are using an factory radio and an lineout converter, then bass boost can often provide an strong signal to your subwoofer. Bass boost on your car amplifier is an preset equaliser setting, often around 50HZ and when you increase this, it will provide more boom and sound to you car subwoofer. Play around with this setting to see if you get an increased amount of output from your car audio system.

How To Improve The Sound Of an Car Speaker

If you want to improve the sound of your performance car parts audio speaker, increase the level of bass and treble, today you will find out how to do so. The first thing you need to consider upgrading the headunit. If your car is not so modern, you will be able to remove the current radio and upgrade it, either with an aftermarket double din or single din unit. Newer, cars that are made from 2015 onwards, tend to not have many headunit upgrade options, as the unit itself is built into the vehicle's dashboard. This is what makes having an old car fun, you can customise it without having any restrictions. Factory headunits don't really have much options when it comes to fine tuning sound. They don't have any equaliser options, they also have an poor internal amplifier which will distort at high volume levels. For this reason, I recommend Pioneer or Alpine as car audio brands to go for when purchasing an brand new headunit because they currently make the best headunits for the price you pay. Try stay away from android cheap china ebay car stereos as they provide poor and cheap sound quality.

Upgrading the speakers will also do wonders. Factory car speakers are made from cheap materials and are poorly constructed. They are designed to play an basic level of sound, you will notice that factory speakers don't produce alot of bass. This is because the material is paper which the cone is made out from and the  surround is made from cheap brittle rubber. If you want good sound that is loud and clear, upgrading the front factory door speakers to an component speaker setup is the best bet. This will contain an speaker and tweeter along with an crossover box to increase clarity and bass response. You can also upgrade the rear speakers if you wish to coaxial style speakers, these are easier to install as the tweeter is placed into the middle of the speaker. JBL make good car speakers if you are on an car audio budget, however if you have more money to spend on an car audio system, then JL audio is the brand for you.

Adding an car audio amplifier is also an great idea to improve the clarity of an compare parts audio speaker. However, installing an car audio amplifier can be an challenge task if you have not done it before. More power means louder volume and because an car amplifier is larger in size, it has more electrical components inside to produce an distortion free sound at higher volume levels. You will require new speaker wire to be ran down the car doors and you also need to purchase an correct car amp wiring kit as well. This will allow you to setup your car amplifier in your trunk and achieve amazing sound quality and clarity.

Sound deadening material is often overlooked, however it is very important. It will help get the most performance out of your car audio front door speakers. This is because it stops vibrations rattles that may occur when the bass drops from your music. This will provide an tighter more impactful sound that is loud and clear. It is easy to apply and usually sticks onto the surfaces. You can also apply it around the speakers and onto any holes or gaps you find within the door card. This will make the inner part of the door more sealed, to make it act as an mini speaker enclosure, to improve the frequency response of your car speaker.

Are Cheap Android Units From Ebay Worth The Money?

android head unit

Over the years, android car headunits have been massively popular in the UK. We have fitted more of these than branded headunits from kenwood, pioneer, alpine and JVC. The main reason being price, android headunits are much cheaper to purchase and are all over Ebay and Amazon. You can get an decent android headunit for around £120 that supports wireless apple car play and has google maps, that supports bluetooth music playback. However, on the other hand an more expensive branded headunit will cost you around £300 or more with similar features. Today, I am going to help you make the decisions between an cheap Chinese unit and branded unit. 

Firstly, android units are cheap for an reason. The parts that they are made from are not long lasting, you be lucky to get an couple of years from an android radio without running into problems. I have seen android units randomly give up after an few years, from restarting to not booting up. The touchscreen on them is very slow and laggy. The overall quality and feel seems cheap, but they do get the job done and provide you with the features you need. They have sat nav, dab radio, you can download applications onto them use Spotify and waze with apple car play. In terms of good value for money, you can't really complain if you're on an cheap budget for an headunit upgrade.

Sometimes fitment can be slightly off with cheap android car stereos because when they cut the plastic from the factory it is not always finished off the right size. In my opinion, android headunits are ok for the price, but one thing to note is the sound quality is very poor and distorts very easily at high volumes. The have cheap internal amplifier chips inside and they are not very powerful. If you are serious about an car audio sound system, android headunits are not going to provide you with quality sound output. Even if you add an car amplifier to an android headunit, the output signal from the RCA outs are going to be weak and have lots of interference. 

If you have that extra cash, then save up for an branded unit. There are several makes that have an good reputation of providing good quality car audio products. Kenwood, Pioneer, Alpine, JVC and Sony provide the best sounding headunits in the market right now. They also provide an real warranty, so if anything does go wrong there is no hassle or worry about getting an replacement unit or to get it repaired directly by the manufacturer. Also they have much better sound quality, they have better DAC chips on the circuit board and well built amplifier to make your factory speakers sound better and high output RCA to provide an clean signal to multiple car amplifiers. Fitment is much better too and the screen responsiveness is very quick and not laggy.

How To Stop Subwoofer Box Moving AROUND in the trunk

An car subwoofer can be added into the trunk of your vehicle. This can provide you with more bass on the go, as factory speakers usually fail to deliver serious bass. It is important to ensure that your car subwoofer box is mounted securely down to prevent it sliding around. This will prevent the speaker wire getting pulled from the speaker terminal cup on the back of the subwoofer. I have seen in many instances that an car subwoofer is damaged from sliding around. Either the front of the cone gets damaged and breaks from impact or the speaker terminal gets pulled and damaged. If you have invested alot of money in your car audio system, its important to protect your equipment to keep the longevity.

The first most important thing is to mount the car amplifier before anything else. There are an couple of places for this. The most common behind mounted directly into the back of the subwoofer box or screwed down onto the back seat. The benefit you get when you screw your car amplifier down to the back seat is that you can remove the subwoofer in and out of the car without taking all the power cables off the amp. Simply remove the positive and negative speaker wire that goes into the terminal cup into the back of the speaker box and remove your subwoofer

In terms of securing down an car subwoofer box to stop it moving around in the boot. The best method is to use velcro tape to secure it down. You simply purchase an roll of velcro tape cheaply from eBay or amazon cut it to length and place it underneath the subwoofer box. Try to cover all areas underneath the box to form an square shape of the box. If you have purchased 3M strong velcro, this will provide you with lots of strength and grip. This in my opinion is the best method to secure an car subwoofer box down because it looks clean and professional. Some people use metal brackets and bits of rope to secure the subwoofer down but this is not very aesthetically pleasing to look at when showing off your car audio system to your friends of family.

How To Wire Up Your Car Amplifier For The First Time

Without an car amplifier, the car subwoofer will simply not perform to its best ability. The factory car stereo doesn't have enough power to make an car subwoofer function. Car subwoofers have bigger voice coils than traditional car speakers, so they tend to require an huge amount of power to get them moving. You need to find an car amplifier that matches the rms wattage rating of your car subwoofer. You also need an suitable car amp that support the lowest ohm configuration your car subwoofer can handle. For example if your car subwoofer is an 2ohm magnet, you need an amplifier that can be wired down to 2ohms. If you wire an 1ohm speaker to an 4ohm only car amplifier, you will damage the car amp or it will go into protect mode. 

Once you have obtained your car amplifier, you need to obtain an relevant wiring kit. You can get an brand new car amp wiring kit from ebay. This will contains all your cables and parts. The red wire will need to be connected to the 12 constant positive feed from the car battery. The ground wire will be the shorter black cable that goes to an bolt in the trunk area. The blue remote wire will connect to an switched 12 volt source, or if you have an aftermarket headunit directly to the blue wire behind the car radio. The RCA cables will connect from the preouts on the back of the headunit into the inputs on the car amplifier. If you are using an factory headunit, you will need to wire an RCA converter, make sure you use an quality one as cheap ones are prone to make buzzing sounds and engine interference. 

Depending on your car amplifier, you can also bridge the terminals on your car amplifier for more power, if it is an two channel stereo amplifier. To bridge an car amplifier is easy, get some speaker wire and attach to positive on channel one, on channel two attach the other end of the speaker wire to negative. Then insert the other end of the speaker wire into the terminal posts on the car subwoofer enclosure matching the red and black colours. There are two common places to mount your car amplifier. The most common being directly on the back of the subwoofer box, this is an great idea if you are after an simple installation. You can also use an drill to mount it directly onto the back seat, this is more of an job to do but the results are certainly worth it.

How To Improve My Car Audio System To Sound Better

 

An factory car audio system is very basic, you will have cheap speakers and an standard radio. Unless, you paid extra to get the Bose or Harman Kardon system, chances are the sound quality and loudness will be poor. If this is the case, there are certain upgraded that you can do to improve the performance and clarity of your sound system.

Swap your factory cheap paper cone speakers for quality aftermarket ones. Factory speakers are made from cheap materials, paper being the most common. If your car is used, chances are the rubber surround on the factory speaker is degraded which can happen overtime, this is normal. Car audio people tend to spend the most money on upgrading the front speakers. This is followed by getting an component speaker upgrade with an dedicated tweeter and crossover network for sound separation. Usually in the back, coaxial speakers are fitted as they are more convenient to install as well. 

You also want to ask yourself, do you want more volume and less distortion? If so, then you have two choices you can go down the easy route and swap out the factory stereo or you can add an aftermarket stereo as well. If you are unable to upgrade the factory radio as its built in as part of the cars dashboard, you can purchase an RCA converter to provide RCA outputs to any factory amplifier of your choice.

Furthermore, you can also add sound deadening material and apply it onto the insides of your car doors and behind the car door card. This will allow you to stop vibrations and unwanted noises that may occur, it will also stop road noise too. This can increase the amount of bass response from any car door speakers that you fit because it seals up any gaps and sort of helps the inside of the door become like an small enclosure.

If you want to add more bass, then add an car subwoofer if you got space. A 12 inch car subwoofer in an sealed box is generally compact and works in most situations. It is loud enough and blends in nicely with your car door speakers. If you want something over powering, then any subwoofer fitted into an ported enclosure tuned to 35HZ on around 500 rms or more should shake your rear view mirror. Alpine make some nice subwoofers.

Do I need a Car Equalizer? Waste of money and time?

An car audio equaliser used to be an 90s thing. This is because headunits of that generation usually had two main settings bass and treble, thats it. You could either turn the bass or treble up or down. This is why you could purchase an standalone car equaliser either an 5 band or an 11 band eq to be fitted in the dash. They even made some that fitted in an spare din slot with an visual spectrum. They have sliders that look cool that allow you to adjust the each frequency. This allows more control and better sound adjustments to help you get the sound you want out of your car audio system. They are an hassle to fit personally and its not always straight forward to find an space on your cars dash. 

So the car audio forum question today is, do you need an car audio equaliser? The answer is no. If you have an modern generation car headunit, it will have an built in parametric equaliser built into the software of it. Pioneer, JVC, Kenwood and Alpine have an built in car equaliser as an mandatory requirement. This will allow you to adjust the sound digitally. The concept is the same as having a eq built into the headunit or not and you are not going to gain better sound if you have an separate car eq installed. An kenwood car equaliser is more of an retro piece now. Yes they look cool, but in 2023 you don't really need one. 

How To Make Car Speakers Very Loud Be Heard Miles Away

If you want your car audio system to play more clear and sound louder, then you have come to the right place. This car audio blog will help you learn more about the car audio journey. Factory car speakers are limited in terms of power handling and how much effort goes into research and design. This is because unless its an factory upgrade sound package that focuses on sound improvement such as bose or harman kardon, the standard car speakers will be made from poor materials. Paper is generally used for the cone and the rubber surround easily degrades overtime. 

If you want loud and more clarity, install an 6.5 inch car speaker component setup in the front doors and discard the back rear car speakers. This will provide better sound stage. Adding an separate two channel stereo car amplifier is also recommended. Match the rms of each speaker to an appropriate rms channel on an car amp brand of your choice. Use quality RCA cables to prevent buzzing noises being picked up by the speaker wire. Upgrading car speakers and adding an car amplifier is the best and two most important factors.

You can also upgrade the headunit, something more aftermarket will provide you with more sound adjustments. Some high end pioneer headunits have an built in equaliser which allows you full control of what frequencies your car speakers play. You can also get foam rings that go around the car speaker. What this does is trap the sound between the car speaker and door card so all the sound goes out of the grill. You can get these cheap from ebay. Also you can apply sound deadening material onto metal parts of the door frame, this allows less rattling to occur and chances of better bass response from the car speakers in the door 

How To Make an Car Subwoofer Stop Vibrating The Car

If your car subwoofer is playing really deep and low, the vibrations will transfer across the car. The metal panels will rattle inline when the bass from the car subwoofer drops. This can be slightly embarrassing if heard outside the vehicle and at times can also be heard inside the car. If your running lets say an 8 or 10 inch car subwoofer, in an sealed box you wouldn't have to worry about this kind of issue. But if you have multiple car subwoofers that have an cone area of 12 or 15 inches in an custom ported box, lets say an 1000 rms each, your whole car is going to flex.              

From my experience, japan cars are the worst when it comes to preventing car subwoofer rattles. This is because the metals used on an japan car is constructed from cheap and brittle materials. German cars have much more solid outer metal body parts. The first thing you should consider is positioning of the car subwoofer. Facing the speaker cones towards opening of the trunk is going to make the trunk more prone to vibrations. Try facing the car subwoofers, so that the speaker cones pointing towards the inside of the car.      

Sound deadening material works wonders if applied correctly. This material is usually shiny like foil and is thick, the job of car audio sound deadening material is to absorb any kind of vibrations from bass. It is easy to apply, you just need an sharp scissors. Simply cut it to the shape you want, remove the paper from behind to expose the glue and stick it down. Use an roller of some kind to press it directly onto the metal panel. If your going to use your hands to pat it down, make sure you use gloves as the material when handled can be sharp. Areas to cover are the trunk floor and trunk lid, you can double up on layers to add more padding to avoid subwoofer rattle. You can also remove the rear number plate and stick some behind it followed by remounting it to stop it shaking too.

How To Fix An Car Amplifier That Wont Turn OFF

The last thing anybody wants is an dead battery. An car amplifier requires 12 volts constant and also an remote wire that provides an signal to turn on and off. If the remote wire is incorrectly connected, then it may cause your car amplifier to always be powered on. This can cause an unexpected drain on your car battery. If your car amplifier has an Power status LED that is always in the ON position, then you need to correct the wiring before it drains your car battery. 

There are two methods to wire an remote wire on your car amplifier. The first method is to wire it to an fuse that is ignition switched with the key, this is common if you are using the factory car stereo and rca converter combination. You can obtain an fuse tap, that will split the existing circuit in the fuse box into two parts, it will retain an original circuit while also adding separate circuit dedicated for the remote wire on your car amplifier. I recommend using an 5 amp fuse for the remote wire and remove the existing fuse from the fuse box and add it into the fuse tap. 

To test which fuse location is ignition switched, an multi meter would be required. Place the black probe onto some metal of the vehicle and place the red probe onto a fuse that you want to test. Turn the ignition on, does it read 12 volts with the key or is it always reading 12 volts. If it is always reading 12 volts, then this means it is an constant fuse. You don't want to use this as this will provide power all the time to the remote wire all the time, making your car amplifier always stay on. You want to find an fuse that provides 12 volts on and off with the car ignition.

If you have an aftermarket headunit, either an branded one such as an pioneer, alpine, jvc or sony or an android Chinese radio, if you look in the back of the ISO wiring loom, you will see an blue and white wire or blue, usually labelled as amp turn on and amplifier. This is an circuit within the headunit that will provide an on an off ignition to your car amplifier. This is the official way to do it. Get an long blue remote wire and attach it to this using solder and heat shrink or PVC insulation tape. Run the blue remote wire all the way to the back of car trunk and insert it into the remote terminal on the car amplifier.

How To Fix Pushed in Subwoofer Dustcap Kid Pressed it in

 

The centre of the car speaker is were the voice coil is located. This contains an small or large copper coil depending on the size of the car speaker. The purpose behind attaching an dust cap onto the middle part of any speaker or subwoofer is to prevent dust and dirt getting in. Dust particles can make there way into the car speaker mechanical parts and blow the voice coil. It is very easy for an voice coil to get misaligned, if this is the case, then this can cause poor speaker performance and strange noises to be heard such as rattling or scraping. Often kids when they see an car speaker, they gain pleasure from pushing in an car speaker dust cap, thinking they are in an arcade centre. Although this doesn't affect the performance of the car speaker, unless its actually torn and letting potential dust in, it can not be so pleasant to look at. 

There are many different ways to fix an car speaker that has been pushed in. The best effective method without damaging the car speaker is to use an hoover. Ensure you place the hoover on the lowest setting possible, so it doesn't damage the plastic or paper that it is made out from. Use the nozzle to suck out the car speaker dust cap, use you initiative to carry out the repair. You can also try using PVC insulation tape stick it directly onto the dented area of the dust cap. Once you have done this, slowly peel back the tape, the dust cap will depress itself.  

I hope this guide has helped you repair your broken car speaker.