Jaa99pa

Hello everyone, i'm new to the forums. I've enjoyed some of the older threads that i've found regarding the TL sound system, but i haven't found anything actually stating an upgrade, aside from adjusting the audio controls. I have an '05 TL w/navi. I'm not happy with this audio system. It sounds flat and muddy at times, and basically lacks that clean sound that i feel an expensive system/car should have. After calling Crutchfield and Circuit City, i feel as though there isn't much that i can do. According to Acura, the door, rear deck speakers, and sub are 2ohm. Replacements are usually 4ohm, which would cut the power in about half. I already feel the system lacks power as is, so i don't want to consider doing this. The tweeters in the front dash are 4ohm, so it may be ok to replace them.
Has anyone replaced their factory speakers, added an amp, or did any other upgrades to the sound system? Seems as though this is a difficult car to work on.

Would love to hear your input...
John

kyle-wdp

I did, see my sig.

King of Pain

Here you go:

Full details on upgrading sound system.


https://acurazine.com/forums/audio-video-electronics-navigation-22/questions-adding-sub-amp-120614/

This thread is also fun to read. I am in the middle of upgrading mine too. I will post pictures later. I am waiting for the Rockford Fosgate 3sixty processor to come out.

Jaa99pa

I can see why you are the "King of Pain"!
I just read a lot of your post, and yes, it is very interesting reading, to say the least. Also looks like a loooot of work, and quite intimidating. I've installed car stereos and speakers in the past, but not to this extent. Not sure if i want to tackle this myself.
Do all of your controls work as they did from the factory? How do you like your system now, compared to the factory system?
I will continue reading your post later...

Thanks!

King of Pain

Thanks, but that's not mine. Death to Toasters did that install. I am right in the middle of mine. It should be complete soon. I have installed the speakers and amps. Everything is working. Currently I am using the audiocontrol matrix as my preamp. I am waiting for the Rockford Fosgate 3sixty OEM DSP processor to come out. This is similar to the JL audio cleansweep but does more and is 5.1 capable.

xkactetx

It a nice install but I do suggest sound proofing the car. When I had my system upgraded the stereo shop put dynamat in the doors, rear deck, and trunk. The dynamat lowered the road noise significantly and makes the front very active.
https://acurazine.com/forums/car-parts-sale-361/wtb-first-gen-stock-door-speaker-grill-covers-129745/

Jaa99pa

King, i've read a lot of these threads now, but it's very confusing to know exactly how to upgrade the stereo while keeping all factory functions still working. I want to keep the 5.1, dvd audio, XM radio, and Navi voice. Is there a bottom line to doing this, including what factory components have to be retained? Also, i have no idea what your install or what Death to Toasters install costs. Not sure what my budget is at this point, but would like an idea of what it might run me. Also, is the Audiocontrol Matrix something that is needed to maintain functionality of the speaker and sub controls? Is the Rockford Fosgate DSP something that is used in addition to the Audiocontrol Matrix?
Hope you don't mind all the questions, but my head is spinning right now, and i need to get all the info i can!

Jaa99pa

Oh, and i also want to keep Bluetooth, Homelink, and not have engine noise...am i asking for a miracle here?

King of Pain

The Acura audio system is fairly complicated and intergrated. Not something for the first time DIYer. I would also suggest you talk to some audio installers and get some pricing too.

If you want to keep those options then you must keep the head unit and add components around it. You can only upgrade your speakers, amps, and possibly a signal processor. The stock amp is an outboard unit so that is an option to keep or dump. Do you want ipod integration?

Jaa99pa

I don't have an Ipod or plans to get one...
My ideal plan would be to keep the car stock apprearing. Don't want to change the head unit. Just want the damn thing to sound like my last car. Every time i get in, i totally hate the sound. Upgrading the amps and speakers are a must. Can i upgrade the sub in the stock location and get decent response? I've read some threads where you really need a box in the trunk for best results. I don't want that though.
My last car (94 Cultlass Supreme) had Polk 6x9's in the back with Infinity 5.5 inch drivers in the door, and matching component tweeters in the dash powered by a 4 channel 40w Kenwood amp. Head unit was a Sony CD w/changer controls. That system sounded so good, anybody who rode in the car loved it. Had great bass response in the back, even without a sub. I'm trying to accomplish something similar with the TL.
Are there 2 seperate factory amps in the TL? If so, can i accomplish what i want with just one particular amp, or do i need 2? Can i put new amps in the stock locations, or would i want to have them mounted under the rear shelf? What does the sound processor acomplish, and where would it be mounted?
I plan on calling a local shop that i've dealt with before, but i don't know if they know as much about the TL's complicated system as much as you guys do on here! I'm reading a lot and trying to gather info each day though.
Bottom line is that i don't want to lose any of the stock TL features. Just want to improve the power and sound.

King of Pain

There is only one amp powering the speaker system.

Here is a picture of it.



[IMG][/IMG]




It measures about 7 X 5.5 X 1.75. About the size of a book and is located on the right side of front passenger side footwell. Pretty small.

Here is a pix of the entire speaker system and amp. 4 - 6.25 mids, 1- 8" sub, 1 -3.5" center and 2 - tweeters in the dash and the amp. The sub is alright but it is a free air sub and not in sealed box. People have tried to seal the area but it's too hard. Instead of a box in the trunk I plan to have a fiberglass enclosure built into the left side of trunk:




[IMG][/IMG]

Here is a preview of my install, still a work in progress:




[IMG][/IMG]





[IMG][/IMG]



The headunit has built in equalization that make ups for bad spakers and car acoutics. It bends the upper and lower part of the audio portion as the volume changes. I have found two devices that can correct this and give the TL audio system a flat reponse curve similar to what you will find aftermarket head units. In essence it will sound like a aftermaket head unit. The JL Audio Cleansweep and the Rockford Fosgate 3sixty are DSP devices which can plug into the audio system and give the TL sound system a real bang. The cleansweep device is out right now and is made for 4 channels. The 3sixty is a true 5.1 channel and will be out in the beginning of march.

The signal coming from the OEM headunit is very weak and can be processed by an amp but you would need to set your gains pretty high. The matrix is a preamp that boasts the signal to a more acceptable signal before it gets to the amp. The 3sixty is a DSP processor and preamp combine.

Here is a link to a more detailed explanation of the head unit and the cleansweep.


https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...ght=cleansweep

Jaa99pa

What kind of speakers are in the last photo?
Where are you mounting the 3sixty when you get it, and if i were to upgrade my system before March, would it be difficult to add the 3sixty at a later time?

King of Pain

My goal is also to improve the overall sound be keep the OEM head unit. I'm going for SQ, not SPL. I have a musical family, I play guitar, one son plays drums and the other plays sax. I think I have a good idea of what music should sound like.

The speakers are CDT-EF61CF. They are 6.5" carbon fiber mids, cast not stamped frames, the tweeters are 1" silk dome. The crossovers are located where the stock amp use to be. The big amp is a JL Audio e6450 (45x6). The smaller amp is a JL Audio e2150 (150x1) bridged for the sub. It's not alot of power compared to other systems out there but it sounds good to me. I currently have the Audiocontrol Matrix located in the trunk above the smaller JL amp. The amps are low profile and lay down across the back of the trunk perfectly. When it's done I plan to still have access to the pass-through hatch.

When the 3sixty comes out I can pullout the matrix and install the 3sixty in it's place. I have been talking to Rockford Fosgate and my local installer, Al and Eds Autosound, about the 3sixty. According to both the install into my system should be fairly easy. The setup and tuning will easy too.

Here's a link to a discussion on the 3sixty. It's a pretty amazing little box, on paper anyway.


http://www.carsound.com/cgi-bin/UBB_...8;t=010916;p=0

Jaa99pa

King, how much would you say it cost to do your upgrade, and did you do all of the work, or have some of it done professionally? Are you happy with the sound?

A SiQ TL

King of Pain,
Are you going with the 3sixty 1 or 2? Also did you keep put your tweeters in the stock location?

Chita79

does anyone else notice that the XM radio cant get loud like the CD player does? (i turn the XM to 40 with my JL Audio system and its still not ttttthat loud like i would expect from my system)... anyone else with me on this one?

Jaa99pa

When you say Jl Audio system, what components are you talking about? If you added an amp, you should have more power to XM unless you bypassed it, i would think. I'm still gathering info, but haven't made any changes yet. There are other people on here who have though.

King of Pain

I will probably go with the 3sixty 1 (budget).

The CDT tweeters swivel in their mountings so I was able to aim them toward the driver and avoid bouncing them sound off the glass. This improved imaging and kept the soundstage high.

Chita79

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2184473

Here is my system....and for some reason my XM radio cant bump anywhere as loud as my cd changer (perhaps its amp settings?) i have no idea anymore... all i know is that it should definately be way louder on level 40 than it is now!

Jaa99pa

Looks like you have yourself a very nice (and expensive) system. I've heard on here that the XM radio isn't that loud, but i'd think it should be louder if it's amped. You should check with your installer (if you didn't do the system yourself) and see what they say about it.

King, you are talking about your front tweeters swiveling, right? Where are you mounting your rear tweeters? Are you happy with the sound of the CDT speakers? I wish i could hear these and the Diamond Audio, but nobody in my area has them.

King of Pain

Yes, my front dash tweeters swivel so I can aim them towards driver seat.

I don't know where I will mount the back tweeters yet. My first thought will be to mount the new back tweeters on the deck and angle them into the cabin. Maybe spray paint them to match the color of the deck.

Not having listened to other speakers I cannot compare the CDTs to others.

I would suggest going to some of the car audio forums for camparisions between Focal, Diamond, DLS and CDTs.

Jaa99pa

Feel free to post any links for car audio forums that you are familiar with...

King of Pain

Here you go:

http://www.caraudioforum.com/vbb3/index.php?


http://www.carstereo.com/forum/index.cfm


http://forum.sounddomain.com/

Dr.Murdock

ive changed my speakers out and also added a sub and have no problems at all - no noise, bluetooth works fine, and the sound is so clear and high.

Dr.Murdock

ive changed my speakers out and also added a sub and have no problems at all - no noise, bluetooth works fine, and the sound is so clear and high, but i only changed 4 speakers at the 4 doors.

with my system i also notice that xm is a bit lower in volume and requires me to turn it up a bit, but i never usualy go past volume 12 unless i want ot suffer permanent damage to my ear drum. after that it feels like water is flowing through ur ear drums.

Chita79

something is wrong with my amp settings then... becuase when i listen to XM radio at volume 40... its not really very loud (and im using JL XR 650's all around and a 300/4 for my speakers and a 250/1 for my 12" eclipse sub.) how can u explain this?! What should my amps be set to?

Jaa99pa

What kind of speakers and sub did you add? Did you add an amp? When you say 4 speakers at the doors, are you refering to a car other then a TL? The 05 TL that i have has speakers in the front doors and tweeters in the dash, along with a center channel, rear deck speakers and a sub.

A SiQ TL

King, could you please post pics of this, I'm interested to see how it turned out(does it look stock,etc...)I was told that the stock location was to far from the door speaker and would make my separates (MB Quarts) sound "funny".

King of Pain

Here's some more pixs of my tweeters and my revised upgrade. They are CDT-TW24 1" silk dome tweeters. I wanted to keep the dash appearance stock but ended up cutting the plastic stock tweeter mounts and inserting the new tweeters. I purchased a second set of stock tweeters and mountings from the dealer in case I want to try something else later. They don't look too bad and blend with the rest of the dash


[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]


I still need to finish the trunk. The amps, crossovers and distribution blocks are all laid out and bolted down. The sub sits on a tray and can be mounted facing the cabin, firing straight up or toward the back just by flipping it around. It can be pulled out, moved to the side if needed and I can still use my trap door. The wood board will get finished in carpet and plexiglass. A beauty board will be built to cover everything and windows will be cut out. I lost about 3 inchs of the trunk floor.

Again, excuse the mess. It's still a work in progress.



[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]


These are the mids I used. They are CDT-EF61CF. Carbon Fiber cones and cast baskets. I cut the doors and deck to make them fit and added dynamat around the holes. These were also used on the rear deck. I will adding tweeters and crossovers to the rear this weekend.



[IMG][/IMG]

[IMG][/IMG]

These little boxes are the heart of the system. They are Navone Engineering Line output converters. These LOCs are competition quality designed to connect the speaker level outputs of a factory amp into the pre-amp level inputs of an aftermarket equalizer, electronic crossover, or power amplifier. They turn the sound of the stock HU into something quite astounding. They sound so good I not sure if the Rockford Fosgate 3sixty will improve it that much.

[IMG][/IMG]




I will post more pixs next week when hopefully I will be done with this project and can move onto my suspension upgrade.

A SiQ TL

King, thanks for the pics. It's looking reeaaallll good Looking forward to seeing finished pics. Any thoughts on what I was told about having the tweet that far from the 6.5 in the door? I like a lot of highs ( which the stock system really lacks) so I'm not sure if having them in the dash makes it sound that way or if they would just sound overpowering over the rest of the mids, etc. thanks

King of Pain

A SiQ TL

First let me say I am in no way a professional at this. Most of what I learned is by trial and error. I like doing things myself and read as much as I can before starting a project.

I've been lurking around the car audio forums and hear the same thing. Experiment with different placement of the tweeters before you actually mount them. I ran my tweeters next to the door mids for about a week. I taped them down to the carpet and ran the exposed speaker wires to the crossovers. They sounded balanced but I felt the soundstage was too low for my taste.

If you like highs I suggest you go with metal down tweeters. These types tend to be very bright on the highs. Silk dome tweeters tend to be smoother.

JMLAudio

Just a few ideas for the 2005 TL. This was one of my favorite projects so far. Feel free to e-mail any questions. Good luck to all of you. Let the creativity begin.

Battery Upgrade

New Audiophile Source unit and sub contrl

Sirius Satellite Radio control/display

Door speakers and sound dampening

tweeter mounts

trunk layout in stealth mode

trunk layout in show mode

trunk layout at night

Adamo0926

King of Pain....would you be willing to answer some questions over the phone if I provided you with my cell number ? If you might be willing/able to do that please email me at Umie79@aol.com and I will email you my cell number. I think some things are just to complicated/involved to get answers on a bulletin board. I'd really appreciate it....thanks.

Gary

Black_05_TL_6SP

If interested in keeping the 5.1 and not having to have several amps, Audiobahn offers a great solution. The A5100T is a true 5.1 amp, it has a front, rear, sub and center output. I am personally running this amp. All the speakers in the car have been replaced, although this could be used on your factory speakers. The speakers in the car ar not bad speakers, they are just really under powered. The tweeters in the dash are a little to pingey for me, I like the silk dome style myself. The Sub really needs to be put into a box, as free air is not a great way to go for bass response. I myself work at circuit city in the car stereo department, so I have spent some time working with stereo equipment. There are only a few true 5.1 amps out at this time, so my choices where limited and I didn't want to go with 3 amps. Takes up to much room for me. I have done systems in the past that took up the back seat and the trunk, and didn't want to do that again. I fiberglassed in 2 8's in the side and mounted the amp in the tire well. Here is a link to the subbox. Jason

Subbox

gqchicago

Jason - Can you elaborate a little on which Infinity speakers you used? Reason being, I'm looking at the Kappa vs the Reference speakers, as not super expensive replacements to the stock ones. I don't yet want to do the amps, just replace some speakers for now, next Dynamat, then finally perhaps an amp and sub replacement.


I was concerned about the Infinity Kappa 3.5" inch being 2ohm versus the stock 4ohm, and the effect that may have on the filter frequency... what do you think?

Black_05_TL_6SP

Well to be honest, the Kappa with a amp will sound better, BUT, without it you will be wasting money at this point. They really require alot of power and with out it you will distort them and the will go bad. I am using the reference for now, as they where real cheap for me. I am going to be changing them out to the polk SR 6" componets. The factory amp was meant to be used with 2ohm speakers, if you dont you will drop alot of power, also it is not a very strong amp. I only did the infinitys up front, I have Polk MOMO 6 3/4" in the back and reference center. The factory is not really crossed over, so no real effect from that.

Jason

gqchicago

But what about the frequency effect? So I saw you used Reference speakers, which are 4ohm (same as the center channel, but the tweeters are different... stocks are 2ohm...references are 4 ohm.). The Kappa line is 4ohm...


Someone commented that, for instance, a 6 ohm speaker may filter frequencies at 6khz..a 4 ohm at ..say..8=9khz...and a 2 ohm..and 18khz? I'm not a true audio geek...but would this mean your center channel speaker would only emit super high level frequencies and therefore suck?

Assuming I went with the 2ohm Infinity Kappa series vs the 4ohm Reference series for the center channel?

I know it would be somewhat of a waste at this point, but would it be that bad to change out just the center channel, then do the amp later? Would the frequency shift kill me? Should I use a reference series so it's a matched 4ohm speaker or would the Kappa 2 ohm be ok?

Jaa99pa

The Factory tweeters and center channel speaker are 4ohm. The sub, doors, and rear deck are 2ohm. If you replace the center channel with a 2ohm speaker, theoretically it woud be a bit louder, but i'm not sure because i haven't tried it. But if you really want to improve the factory system, i feel you have to amp it along with a line driver of some sort. The factory speakers aren't bad really, they are just weak. (20watts)
I'm waiting for the Diamond Audio 65.2 surround amp to come off of backorder and the Rockford 3sixty to finally be shipped before i do anything. Not sure which speakers to use though.
Hey Black, how do those Polks sound? ever heard them in a car, or just at the store? Also, did you remove your factory amp from the system, and if so, what did you do with the amp mute wire? King of Pain, what did you do with that wire when you first removed your factory amp? I know you said you put the amp back in though...

Acura-Too-Loud

JMLAudio - do you have any close up pictures of the trunk? From the pictures that you provided the carpet in the trunk looks to be an exact match to the factory color. Could you post some specifics for the color and type of carpet that you used, as well as where you got it? Thanks.


-Kris

Black_05_TL_6SP

The impedance of the speaker has no effect on the filtering. The 2 or 4 ohm's are just resistances while the speaker is at rest. The speaker impedance changes as the speaker moves. To do any type of filtering you would need a crossover of some kind. The capacitors that come with a set of tweeters are considered crossovers. They are a 1st order 6db per octave, a capacitor and a coil are a 2nd order 12 db per octave. The more you add to it the steeper the crossover point is. This means in a high pass filter, only the frequencies above a certain point will pass through at a certain impendence. Even though the impedance may be the say doesn't mean you will get the same amount of sound out of it either. The larger a magnet structure is on any speaker will also make it harder for it to move. The factory speakers in the TL are neodymium, which offer a high magnetic flux for its size. So if you replace the speakers in the car with something else that is of higher quality, you may loose sound, if you do not replace the factory amp. Also by changing from 2 to 4 ohm, you will cut the factory amps power by almost half. (Less sound).

Jason