2016 F80 base audio upgrade, the start

[Motown65]

Bmw does logic 7 a little different than how it should be. It’s setup to give a center directly in front of both front seats. With the v twelve I have increased the center channel amplitude to evenly space out the music from left to right so the center speaker location is the true center. Logic 7 also sends out of phase info to the rear speaker locations and both the rear doors and the rear deck speakers are set just loud enough to give the stage more width and depth without shifting it to the rear.

The upfront bass should be fine if you crossover at 80hz with lr4 and keep the eq smooth and not tons of bass

[NealfromNZ]

Have a listen to

. At 2:10 if the drums / bass is right channel and forward then you’ve nailed it. I got close with my previous system but it did appear to be more 3/4 stage. With running front underseat to 50hz it’s getting quite good. At 80 hz xover points the sub is pulling it towards centre. It might sound a bit different with the lexicon 7 algorithm. Same deal with the focal running bass track. ( focal test track cd )

[NealfromNZ]

Originally Posted by Andrew_za

Those look rather pretty! Thanks to your recommendation im going to try get the ESB's from ahifi. Do you have the RTA from the Morel's vs HK?

Good luck

Here's the Morel verse Harman Kardon. Bass tracks higher below 90 hz and a bit easier to blend into sub bass region Should be good through crossover transition point. About 2- 3.5 db up. They are really good with handling power as well. Need to correct the dip at 130 hz , but looking like they will follow target curve with little EQ.

Quite a difference when the volume is pushed between the two. The morels sounding good and Harmans starting to lose composure.

Green Morel , Blue Harman Kardon. Measured using microphone sitting on backseat above driveshaft tunnel. Flat EQ , no filters.

[Gasnor]

Hey Neal a quick Question maybe you can answer it. I currently have a 440i grancoupe with the HK system and I just purchased a Mobridge Amp just like you. I was wondering about when I hook up the new amp to my factory harness would I lose the ability to power my rear most speakers in the rear pillars because theres a total of seven speakers(not including subs) already powered by the factory hk and the mobridge has 6 channels. Are the rear most speakers run mono, or are they a true bonafide left and right channel.Because if thats the case Im going to be one channel short on powering all the speakers unless I combine both the rear speakers in a single channel making it mono. Love What your doing to your car. I bet it sounds awesome.
Gasnor

[NealfromNZ]

Originally Posted by Gasnor

Hey Neal a quick Question maybe you can answer it. I currently have a 440i grancoupe with the HK system and I just purchased a Mobridge Amp just like you. I was wondering about when I hook up the new amp to my factory harness would I lose the ability to power my rear most speakers in the rear pillars because theres a total of seven speakers(not including subs) already powered by the factory hk and the mobridge has 6 channels. Are the rear most speakers run mono, or are they a true bonafide left and right channel.Because if thats the case Im going to be one channel short on powering all the speakers unless I combine both the rear speakers in a single channel making it mono. Love What your doing to your car. I bet it sounds awesome.
Gasnor

With the Morbridge you could either run the rears as mono and run them in bandpass and not to high so they don’t reduce the front sound stage . Or other option would be to get a small amp 1 or two channel amp and use the Mobridge rca out and configure it to run your centre channel by mixing L&R channels into it and reduce its output until it blends. The RCA out is a fully configurable output as with any other channel on the Mobridge channel routing.

Also worth talking to Phaser @ Mobridge about it ( US sales ) Very knowledgeable guy and great to deal with.

[Andrew_za]

Originally Posted by NealfromNZ

Good luck

Here's the Morel verse Harman Kardon. Bass tracks higher below 90 hz and a bit easier to blend into sub bass region Should be good through crossover transition point. About 2- 3.5 db up. They are really good with handling power as well. Need to correct the dip at 130 hz , but looking like they will follow target curve with little EQ.

Quite a difference when the volume is pushed between the two. The morels sounding good and Harmans starting to lose composure.

Green Morel , Blue Harman Kardon. Measured using microphone sitting on backseat above driveshaft tunnel. Flat EQ , no filters.

Very interesting. Im more impressed that the HK follows such a similar response in comparison to the Morel (especially considering the Morel's price!) Nice thing with Morel components is that they always handle decent power

[NealfromNZ]

Originally Posted by Motown65

The upfront bass should be fine if you crossover at 80hz with lr4 and keep the eq smooth and not tons of bass

Running Lr4 on Mids and highs , but Woofer and Sub are Biquad on the Mobridge and then to can do custom Q filters as needed. Have represent curve as BW in the spreadsheet for 8 & Current 10 inch sub.

Here's the rational for the the target curve (JBL ) . Also trying to achieve underseat woofer impact.

[NealfromNZ]

Originally Posted by Andrew_za

Very interesting. Im more impressed that the HK follows such a similar response in comparison to the Morel (especially considering the Morel's price!) Nice thing with Morel components is that they always handle decent power

Cheers, the reality is that these options are still around an 8 inch woofer with similar cone travel to the HK so only a few DB's in it. But the Morel has a noticeable audio difference in the 50 - 60 hz range over the HK which what I was after.

Obviously an Earthquake will go lower again. But I've seen 3 different specs on those with a QTS values of 0.66 to 1.02 on their European site. Suggests boomy as and I'm running to 150hz which isn't their sweet spot. But people like them and speakers a quite a personal choice.

[Motown65]

jbl curve should be fine. Im not sure if its any different than the audiofrog curve. I dont really know anything about biquads but i feel the sub having 12db slopes is messing with phase also the crossover overlaps. with me i do lr4 at 80hz to keep phase coherent and then adjust eq to match target without adding. Have you reviewed the audiofrog faqs. Honestly Andy knows it so I follow his teachings lol

[NealfromNZ]

The AF site does provide good context and learnings on tuning. With the sub I’ll try 0 and 180 degrees and measure . It’s also running a passive radiator so there’s a 360 degree change at its hits FS. Main idea is to get the underseat to be the prominent driver on the sub bass to mid bass transition. Don’t get the same high volume of bass as with the sub covering the curve. But liking the detail.

Treble part of the curve will be interesting. Realised that 30 plus years of running subs and DJing when younger have taken its toll. Can’t hear anything above 11khz and may need to run that flat.

[Motown65]

Originally Posted by NealfromNZ

Have a listen to

. At 2:10 if the drums / bass is right channel and forward then you’ve nailed it. I got close with my previous system but it did appear to be more 3/4 stage. With running front underseat to 50hz it’s getting quite good. At 80 hz xover points the sub is pulling it towards centre. It might sound a bit different with the lexicon 7 algorithm. Same deal with the focal running bass track. ( focal test track cd )

At around the same time is there supposed to be a bass line lol. The sun is definitely making a beat but I can hear some stuff in that spot. I used the audiofrog test track with the drum beats spaced out when tuning

[NealfromNZ]

Cool and thanks. On my home hifi lounge rig ( 2.0 system ) that section of music is well defined coming from the right.

[Motown65]

Originally Posted by NealfromNZ

Cool and thanks. On my home hifi lounge rig ( 2.0 system ) that section of music is well defined coming from the right.

You measure to see what frequency it’s at?

[NealfromNZ]

Originally Posted by Motown65

You measure to see what frequency it’s at?

I’ll come back to it.

[NealfromNZ]

Subwoofer

Re-using my Boston SPG555 and Passive radiator and box from my e46 M3 system. With that setup I design the box to sit up against the backseat and fire through the ski pass / rear armrest. To date this was the best setup for sub that I’d had. Very little car rattle with almost no sound treatment.

For the F80 I shaved the sizes back a bit. The f80 is also on more of an angle due to trunk carpet that raises above the fuse box area. So a bit more area between backseat and sub. One benefit of the wide box is the it sits firmly between the metal structures on either side. I also added 6mm of MDF to
bottom so it sits snugly at the top. It’s also just deep enough to allow the Bostons deep motor structure yet the hinged trunk floor
still opens for the storage area

Also added some metal plates to the inside of the sub box to anchor the box and make it safer in an accident. I modded a section of a sound bar metal mounting brackets. These anchor to the rear trunk tie down points. Used M8 hardware. The sub can come out reasonably easily. Used a Speakon 4 pole connector system for quick disconnect.


The Boston subwoofer was design back in the early 2000s . It’s probably classed as SQL these days as it’s reasonably accurate with a QTS of 0.63, but can produce very high SPLs if it’s in a ported box and fed 1000 rms. The has a linear Xmax of 22 mm which is ironically less than a sws earthquake.


It’s paired with a passive radiator which is a cone where you can tune the enclosure frequency response by adding or subtracting weighted washers. Basically you get the benefits of a ported enclosure but can run roughly half
the box size. I’m running the pair
In a 1 cubic foot box and have it tuned for 35 hz. Only downside of passive radiator is that group delay rises substantially at its resonance frequency. The phase goes a bit haywire as well. But the frequency is so low I’m not concerned.

[NealfromNZ]

Well, changing from the 10 inch Boston sub to the Boston Spg555 has been interesting.
Had to knock down the sub bass by 6db . Forgot how much bass this thing produces. Downside it’s it’s bringing every rattle out of the F80. There’s a lot to sort mainly in the trunk region and under the car. Was hoping I’d get away without sound deader in the trunk area but clearly it need it. Some kind of rear bumper area. Something sounds loose.

Started working on re-tunning. Have two DSP maps at the moment. One for sub on and one with sub off and the Morels running to 30hz -175hz. Really impressed with the quality of these drivers. Feed them plenty of power and they are up for it. Had a big grin on my face. Well worth the money over the HKs. Cavet is have plenty of power on tap to get the best out of them.

Going back to the sub, with the Mobridge delivering 400 rms + it absolutely slams. Just need to tame the rattles even at lower listening levels.

[NealfromNZ]

Working with the DSP I wanted to have the Time Alignment of each speaker entered.
One of the DSP maps will be for a driver centric setup as most of the time I have no passengers. This is known as a single seat tune.

From a listening point of view the idea is to make the drivers seat the middle of the sound stage. This is achieved by delaying the sound digitally to the closet speakers so from a timing point of view that sound arrives at the listener in time with the sound from the furthest speaker.

To do this I setup up my microphone on the drivers set at roughly ear level and mid headrest width. Gives a good point to measure to. These measurements at set from my setting position, I'm roughly 173 Cm ( 5.9 ) and have a high seating position. I'm not running rear parcel shelf speakers.

So if you're looking to do time alignment all the DSP speaker offsets are determined from the furthest speaker from the listening position. (Could be trunk corner sub or rear parcel shelf speaker) The Furthest speaker has no offset applied.

[NealfromNZ]

Here's a table for a dual front seat listening time alignment. Haven't tried it yet , but this is centered at ear level over the center console.

Note that these may need tweaking to you sitting position and tastes, but can be used as a starting point. Note with this one the Subwoofer is now the speaker that's furthest position away so ends up with zero offset.

Note, I've included door tweeter measurements. I'm running active front tweeters so will put the values in. But if you are running passive crossovers on your components then use the Midbass values only. I will do this on the rear doors as these components have passive crossovers.

[jmciver]

When taking your measurements, you should either point your mic straight up or directly forward (like you see in the pic from my car). Then make sure you are using the corresponding mic calibration file that comes with your mic (the 90 degree cal file is for the mic pointing straight up). This way you will get the most accurate measurements for your tune.

Also, I learned a neat trick to easily get the mic in the right spot for time alignment. Sit in your preferred driving/listening position, then place the mic on the tip of your nose, facing up. The Audiotec tuning software has an auto time align feature and I thought this method with mic placement worked very well when compared to the tape measure method…

[NealfromNZ]

Thanks jmciver . The mic position was more to get a reference point to use with tape measure to speakers. I didn’t have a helper so felt like a contortionist as I moved around the car. The single seat settings are working well. Image is quite good. But have yet to do target curve.
Will check out that TA feature 😀
Was looking into software routing with use of USB mic with Impluse with Rew . But hadn’t got to the bottom of if o could get a stable clocking process.

For measuring RTAs I normally have the Mic at 90 degrees. Mic point is roughly at where my nose would be. But also thinking of using the holding mic technique with running small circles and lots of RTAs around the ears to get a better average.

Just have more work to do on sub bass and treat the trunk area like you’ve done. Too much shake at this stage to get clean RTA below 40 hz. I think the rear number plate will detach it’s self at this rate.

[jmciver]

For your sound treatment, don’t forget the gas cap door. I put some thin foam strips on the door, where it touches the body when closed….

[Motown65]

if you use 1/6 octave, i believe, the single mic position will look the same as averaging around the head. Andy explains it in a post or faq on his website. Also according to Andy you dont need any time alignment for a two seat tune. I myself thought youd at least ta pair to pair but he says otherwise My rattles were all in the rear deck. I used window foam seal tape and also tesa tape on every spot where materials touched