Aftermarket amp placement.

[9Hooker]

Have a non-Bose CX-7. I'm looking for an out of the way place to mount a simple 4 channel amp. It MUST be out of the way.

Options I'm looking into:

Under front seats (non power seats)
Behind and below left rear seat. If you flip up the hard spare tire cover from the back there is a little niche that the factory Bose amp goes into. It is just a hair too small for the amp I would like to put in there.

Any other suggestions?

 

[CX7nCali]

Simple: get another amp that fits the space.

It'll be worth any extra cost between selling yours and buying another.

 

[9Hooker]

Go look, it's not that big of a space. I had to take the end caps off my Rockford amp and it was still rubbing when folding the rear seat up.

 

[CJS525]

just a heads up--
if you do end up putting the amp under the back seats, be careful of heat. i've blown 2 amps that under the seats in a toyota matrix, both wrecked from too much heat.
so just be careful!
Good Luck!

 

[CX7nCali]

I think the Arc Audio amps will fit because they are only 8" wide. And yes, it's adviseable to include a fan and air flow when hiding an amp. The Bose amp has large fins to keep it cool, and it's a low wattage amp.

Do you want to amplify all four doors, and or sub/s?

 

[9Hooker]

I prefer my sound to be clean, period. This would be for the 4 main speakers (to be replaced at a later date). I hope JL comes up with those stealth boxes like they did for my 03 VW golf because I would love an 8 or a 10 sitting in the spare tire well WITH the tire!!!

which series of arc amps are you talking about?

 

[CX7nCali]

If you want a clean setup, then let me design a fully active system for ya.

If you want to make the stock setup sound better, then we'll keep it simple.... and less money.

Alpine PDX 4ch is 10"x8"x2.5"
Arc Audio 4150CXL or 4150XXK is 8"x17"

There's a shorter Arc 4050CXL or 4050XXK that you can find around.

The 4150 will run $250-$400 used. The 4050 will be around $150-$200 used.

The Alpine amp packs more power per size and is more efficient. See if you can find a good deal on one of those. ALPINE PDX-4.150 is around $420 or so, new on eBay.

Check out this site for amp visuals and most list dimensions to see what will fit. Then check eBay to see what they are selling for.

http://realmofexcursion.com/ampguts

 

[9Hooker]

Cars at one point in time were my lifeblood. I would have spent a lot of money on the ride. Now, I just want it to sound nice.

Here's what I have so far:
Alpine CDA-9652 w/sirius and ipod hookups (2v preouts, grumble grumble)
Rockford 500x (50x4 rms)

What I intend to pickup:
some nice 5 1/4" 2/3 ways

That's all I really need... unless you can convince me otherwise...

 

[CX7nCali]

I downloaded your manual for the 500x:

2.4" x 9.8" x 13.35"
62w x 4ch

The crossover is not usable, but the amp should easily fit. I just went out and measured mine. You'll probably have to take that one black wire loop out that is against the rear seat bottom cushion. That's ok, there are others. I personally wouldn't worry about a fan, there's a lot of room in that space, but that's your call.

Ideally, you'd have an amp with HP crossovers reaching lower than 120Hz. Your amp does AP, 80Hz LP, or 120Hz HP. You can either get another amp, buy an electronic crossover for pre-amp, or use a passive capacitor to set at 80Hz HP, which is the cheapest route.

* Stock OEM HU
* Navone 4ch LOC I posted in the other thread
* Your 4ch Rockford 500x
* 4 capacitors at 400 Microfarads (fd) each to HP your speakers at 100Hz at a 1st order 6dB slope. It will cutoff 100Hz and below to each speaker at a shallow slope. You can do 80Hz at a steeper slope, but it gets more complicated: http://www.the12volt.com/caraudio/crosscalc.asp
* Now for speakers:

1) You can do 6.5" in the rear, and up to 9" shallow speakers in the front.
(5.25" is too small and will not provide enough midbass, especially if you don't have a sub)

2) You do NOT want 3, 4, or 5-way speakers! They are crap because they divide the upper frequencies by using multiple crappy tweeters and no decent crossovers.

If you stay with a coaxially mounted speaker, then you'll want a good 2-way with a really good 1" tweeter and possibly an external crossover. Overall these are better speakers in many ways.

The other option is to go with separate components, but now you'd have to mount the tweeter.

I always build a high stage with the mids and/or tweeters in the a-pillars or dash, but that is a lot more work than you need to do with a simple system.

You might even consider a 5x7, 6x8, or 6x9.
5x7 in the rear doors, and 6x9 up front ??
I know other guys have 5x7 all around in the CX-7

Ideas:

Alpine Type R 2-way 6x9
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=14756

Alpine Type R 2-way 5x7
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=14758

Alp 6.5
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=14757

Diamond 6x9
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=12438

The list goes on and on. See if you can find a good component set that allows you to keep the tweeter with the woofer or be separate (convertible).

If you don't mind a separate tweeter, then the options really open up:

I still have these Oz 6.5 components available
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=15332

Alpine Type X
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=14469

Kicker 6.75"
http://www.onlinecarstereo.com/CarAudio/ProductDetail.aspx?ProductID=14417

Polk MMC570 5x7 is pretty decent and cheap on eBay

Kicker has an 8" shallow
Morel has 8" and 9" shallow
Renaissance Audio has 8" shallow
DLS has 8" shallow

Those are some options for ya.

 

[9Hooker]

I will look those over for sure... you are def. knowledgeable... I will hit you up if I have ANY questions...

 

[Byrnie]

Will the center speaker still work with this new amp? Just curious...

 

[cx-7heaven]

If it were a 5 channel, it could be hooked up that way Byrnie.

 

[cx-7heaven]

9Hooker: Put it in the spare well, you have 3/36 of roadside asst. from mazda. Also, you can maybe get the right amp for your speaks based on quality, not just size.

 

[CX7nCali]

Byrnie, don't bother replacing the Bose system unless you are ready to go all out and replace the complete system. Plus, you don't need the center speaker because of the deep dash and speaker placements. The left and right dash speakers work well. The only reason to use the center speaker is if you want to set up a 5.1 surround.

I know car audio and have built many systems. I am living with the Bose system for now. Here are some active stereo ideas I have for the CX-7 down the road:

Source options:
Pioneer 8800 with 6ch DSP
Alpine W200 plus H701 processor for 8ch DSP (can be used for 5.1 as well)
Clarion DRZ9255 all in one 8ch DSP

Amp options:
Arc Audio 4150XXK 4ch for tweeters and rear fill or sub
Arc Audio 2500XXK 2ch for midbass
DLS Ultimate A4 4ch
DLS Ultimae A3 2ch dual mono
cheaper:
Elemental Designs Nine.4
Elemental Designs Nine.2x
Alpine amps

Speakers options for active:
2-way front:
Morel Supremo Piccolo tweeters for the dash
Morel Supremo or Elate 9" shallow woofers for the front doors
cheaper:
Seas 27TBFC/G tweeters
Dayton Reference RS225-4 8" woofers

3-way front:
Hybrid Audio 3" midrange Legatia L3 in the dash with the L1 tweeter
or Seas Lotus 4" if it will fit up there
plus a kickin' midbass in the front doors 8" to 10"

 

[Dklozik]

I said screw it and pulled out the spare tire. You have to keep the trays on each side as it supports the rear deck. I laid dynamat on the floor, cut a piece of fiberboard, mounted it on top of the spare tire hole, and then mounted all 3 amps to the board. Then, it is easily covered by the deck floor. If you have a really large system and start generating some heat, the floor lets you open just the very back section to let in some air and i still have the rest of the floor to support the speaker box. I will try to post some pics if anyone is interested.

 

[PuroMexicano]

PICS please!!!