Hi all,

If you were going to take, say, an EX-P, and wanted to improve midrange strength and clarity in the "cleanest" possible fashion, what would you do?

The stock stereo is passable, but vocal tracks seem too distant as compared to my home stereo (granted, a much better system), previous vehicle, etc.

--J.

You could replace the front speakers with a nice set of components. It helped. What i would really recommend is a new Head unit. Thats what will REALLY make a difference. imo.


-jp

Jared, I know what you mean. When I had my stock system I felt the same thing.

Unfortunately there is not midrange magic bullet. The weakness in the mids is systematic. I do think JP is right on with his advice, though.

I worked closely with 1mrdad improving his system because he, too, was dissatisfied with the midrange. If Mike is reading this, maybe he'd like to comment. In his case, we did three things:

(1) We replaced the deck. I do think the factory unit is weak here. I would recommend Eclipse as they are the warmest sounding car stereo I know. Nothing against Pioneer, Alpine, Kenwood, et.al, but Eclipse really works on their midrange tone. It is their thing. You would lose your factory XM. A satellite radio tuner could be added to the aftermarket deck. Eclipse supports Sirius, not XM, and their Sirius tuner runs $99.

(2) We replaced the front speakers. I would recommend replacing the components and maybe leaving your factory tweeters hooked up, too. In Mike's car we used a pair of Kicker RS components because, again, I like their midrange. I find most factory component speakers bright, too bright for my taste. The tweeter used with the Kicker RS components is unusually mellow. We mounted the tweeter on the factory door grill, right above the woofer. This images the best. I also find the factory grills block a lot of highs. This is not Honda's fault; they never meant for tweeters to go behind them.

We did end up leaving the factory tweeters hooked up, attenuating them down 6 dB. That raised the image above the dash. The resistors necessary for this are easily hid behind the A pillar covers. Here is a thread (http://www.elementownersclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19585) covering that attenuation.

(1) and (2) should take care of most of your problems, but if you want to improve your system further, there is a third step. It would allow you to get rid of the factory amp, which I especially hate. It is a piece of horse pitute. Its 270 watts is a joke. It is probably about 20 watts continuous to the woofer and maybe 10 to each of the speakers. As we say in the car stereo industry, it is rated at 270 watts ILS. ILS stands for If Lightning Strikes. :D

That last paragraph implies something you should know explicitly: I am a stereo salesman. I own a store that sells these brands although I strongly recommend you buy them from your local dealer, not me. You should just know my bias.

If you eliminated the factory amp, you could do:

(3) Mike's Mod (http://www.elementownersclub.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20999). Named after 1mrdad, this was our little invention. Basically, you add a four channel amp to the system, hooking up two of the channels to drive the factory subwoofer and two of the channels to drive the front component speakers. This dramatically improves the system. You get real power where you need it the most. You end up driving the factory rear speakers with deck power. I'm one who doesn't give a sh!t about rear speakers so this is OK by me. Mike, and others, have upgraded the rear speakers, too. Your choice. I have linked the thread to Mike's Mod above. There is a new variation on this mod, done by your first respondent, jpeaslee, where the factory woofer is also upgraded, but that was instigated by him doing his job for rock 'n' roll and blowing up the factory woofer. Good work, JP. :D If you get that far, I'll let JP take the lead in showing you his work.

What I like about Mike's Mod is that it is cheap. The Alpine MRP-F250 (http://www.alpine-usa.com/en/products/product.php?model=MRP-F250) amp, which sells for $200 and would easily fit under the driver's seat, would be a great choice. You need some cables and parts, so maybe your total investment in parts is $250, but this is still cheap.

Let's go over the cost:

New deck -- $250-350 with parts (kit, harness, antenna adapter) but not necessarily satellite radio
New front speakers -- $180-300
New 4 channel amp with parts -- $250

If you are handy and wanted to do the work yourself, this isn't tough. You can find the info by searching the forum. If you want to have it professionally installed, it would probably run you about $250-300 to get this all installed. It would take a shop the better part of a day.

Total cost: $1,000-1,200 to do it all. Of course you can do it in stages.

I hope this helps. :)

I wish there was a midrange magic bullet. It would be a lot cheaper. :D

Jared, I know what you mean. When I had my stock system I felt the same thing.

Unfortunately there is not midrange magic bullet. The weakness in the mids is systematic. I do think JP is right on with his advice, though.

I worked closely with 1mrdad improving his system because he, too, was dissatisfied with the midrange. If Mike is reading this, maybe he'd like to comment. In his case, we did three things: :D

Wow - thanks for the terrific information. If you were in South Florida, I'd hire you in in a heartbeat.

This is a great "working plan"; I'll see what I can do about implementing it.

--J.

Outpost,
when you nstalled the Kicker tweeters in the door speaker covers, did you angle them upward or are they flat? The thought has passed my mind to remove my Focal tn-52's from the factory tweeter local, and move them lower, but the focals sit flush and flat. I could use the angle adapters, but the tweeter would stick out about an inch and my big fat knee would break it, I already know it.

If you tel me that they can go flat, I will look into another set for the factory location, possibly a more tame soft dome tweeter.

My tweeters are flat. :) I can't remember if we had to cut out any of the door panel behind the tweeter to do this. My recollection is we didn't and that all we did was mount the tweeters into the factory grill. In any case, there's plenty of depth before you hit metal.