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After sitting in a fellow s2ki-er's car, I decided that I want to add rear speakers to my '02 before adding (if still needed) a subwoofer. I want to use my OEM radio, and I've been looking at the various Kenwood speakers at Lucid's site. At first I thought that I should go w/ the 3-ways, but I'm starting to wonder if that would be overkill, considering the placement of the rear speakers. I slide my seat all the way back, and I usually don't recline at all, i.e., the seat back is as forward as it will go. With this arrangement, it looks like the rears will be firing straight into my seat, so why get too involved w/ the higher-end of the sound spectrum w/ 3-ways? No, I really want to know. Is there still a benefit w/ 3-ways in this arrangement? If not, I could go w/ the $174.25 Kenwood option, and still get down to 40 Hz. What do you think? Anybody have either of these speakers behind their seats? Or any other 3-ways?

thanks,
gil

ricosuave

you'll probably get some modest gains in terms of bass. i wouldn't judge speakers just because they rate them down to 40Hz. if they're not sufficiently powered they'll just distort which makes the overall sound worse. as for the three-ways, they're nice but a little overkill for me. you want your highs coming from in front of you for your soundstage. i have the rears but mainly use them for "rear fill." if you do get rears, consider getting an amp.

lucid

The Kenwood 3-way model is the only 3-way that will fit the rear speaker system. I've tried all sorts of brands. The tweeter won't be of much benefit because of its size - 3/8". The Midrange driver is 1/2". Now on the 2-way versions you'll have a 1/2" tweeter. You'd be better off having a dedicated midrange working that spectrum of sound vs. the tweeter of the same size.

If you're setting up a sound stage with a strong bias toward the front a 4" speaker like the Polk DX4 would be ideal for rear fill. It has a lower sensitivity which can give you more accurate acousitcal reproductions (note that most premium brands have sub 90dB sensitivities).

If you're keeping your stock radio, and you still can't decide, its pointless to waste the rear channels. Both the DX4 and a limitied supply of Sub $100 sets of EX402 are in stock and a complete kit for your car with new harness, panels, speakers would run around $150.

NYCS2

I just went for a set of 5 1/4 rockfords two-ways in the rear and it fills the cabin very nice. I don't think 3-ways would be much better, but I might be wrong I never had them, but I would choose something better than Kenwood. I hear Alpine got a new line of speakers out I think they're called Type-R series(I saw them in the new crutchfield cat.)

bash

Lucid, I, too, am looking for a bit more noticeable punch, presence and bottom fill with a stock 2002 system and don't want overkill. Would the Polk EX402s provide that and marry up nicely to the power output of the stock audio system? My upgrades are going to be few and far between for a while so I want to make sure whatever setup I purchase gets a pop music listener (I have no need for house quaking sub bass or wake-the-neighbors volume) at least 90% of the way to that goal. Would this system be your pick based on the above requirements or would you recomend a different speaker system from your product line?

s2k330

I installed Lucids 3-way 5 1/4 inch Kenwoods and like the way they sound. I also sit with my seat almost all the way back and the sound is probably twice as good as when I just had the fronts. I have no idea about how a 2-way would sound. With the fade control on the radio, I run a plus 1 bias on the fronts for balance. I am very glad I put in the rear 3-ways. The only problem is that the sound is so much better, with the rears,..... I am thinking about a further 100% jump with a new head unit and better door speakers. Will it never end!

F20C_S2k

just a question....i dont know anything about audio electronics.....so what is the difference b/t 2 and 3 way speakers....?

bash

Speaker components are separated along the lines of sound spectrum; sub woofers reproduce very low bass sounds, woofers handle bass to mid-range, mids handle mid-range audio and tweeters generate mid-range to high frequency audio. Greater clarity for the listener is achieved when a speaker system contains components to separately generate these sound frequency ranges. A 2-way contains only a woofer with a tweeter overlayed, with each designed to *meet in the middle*. The speaker components are selected (hopefully) to present the broadest soundscape with just two speaker components per speaker (we're just talking about a single speaker here, not a pair of left/right). A 3-way adds a third mid-range optimized speaker to the woofer/tweeter combo so that each is then generating a narrower frequency range more efficiently and combine to reproduce the whole (or at least a wider) frequency soundscape. That's my simplistic explanation. There's a lot more science to sound than just how many components are contained in a speaker system but that's a good start in understanding the mechanics of audio reproduction.

In regard to the oringinal poster's question, he is wondering (as am I) why one would need a 3-way (with it's enhanced tweeter) when a speaker positioned snugly behind the seat would most likely have all it's upper frequency energy absorbed by the seat and never reach the listeners ears. Rear speakers in cars (to my limited knowledge) are generally more bass oriented to add presence and bottom end and keep the soundstage direction in front of the listener. Bass frequencies are far less directional (i.e., the listener isn't able to pinpoint the source). So, wouldn't a less expensive 2-way be sufficient to achieve the desired result?

modifry

I thought I'd add my $.02, but got carried away, so here's my $.57 :

In actuality, the "perfect" speaker would have only one driver, but because no one has built it yet, we are stuck with trying to optimize drivers for a specific frequency range in order to improve performance (at least in that frequency range). So we end up with speaker systems with multiple drivers.

While there is no doubt that drivers tailored to a specific frequency range can produce "better" sound, the application of multiple drivers brings with it different problems. Every time you add another cross-over point, you add distortion in the form of phase shifts and uneven response near the crossover point. Added to that is the problem of multiple sound sources, which introduce more phase shifts as well as time-delay problems. So in some respects you are often better off with as few drivers as you can live with. I must point out here that some people like the sound of multiple sound sources and the phase shifts and time delays they provide. (aka Bose).

The real question is not that if a 3-way is better than a 2-way, but rather "Is this 3-way better than this other 2-way? Only listening to both or some serious sound tests will tell.

* * * Danger - opinions ahead * * * opinions are blue

I think the idea of a 3/8" tweeter and a 1/2" midrange is absurd, especially when used as part of a 5.25" speaker. Think about it, if a 1" tweeter works in a $5,000 home speaker, why do we need two drivers to do the same in a car?

The reason tweeters are small is to make the moving parts very light weight (so they can move quickly to reproduce higher frequencies) and to improve dispersion which is a measure of how "wide" the sound is dispersed from the front of the speaker. If you use a big speaker to reproduce high frequencies, they end up being projected straight out from the speaker in a narrow cone, and if you are not directly in front of the speaker, you will notice a significant decrease in high frequencies.

You might ask "why not use small speakers for low frequencies too?" We don't because low frequencies have less energy than high frequencies, so to make the sound have the same volume, the sound waves must be made larger, which is accomplished by increasing the size of the speaker cone and how far it travels in and out. Moving a larger, heavier cone more distance requires more electrical power, which is why woofers require more power than tweeters. So we are stuck with different size drivers for different frequency ranges.

What determines what size a speaker has to be for "best" dispersion? More or less, if the diameter of the cone (cone, not the speaker) is the same size or smaller than the wavelength of the highest frequency you are reproducing, you will have good dispersion. You can calcualte the wavelength by dividing the speed of sound (1100 ft/sec) by the frequency (in cycles/sec) and you end up with the number of ft/cycle. 100 Hz has a wavelength of 11 feet (1100/100), so any driver smaller than 11 feet will have good dispersion for low bass. This is one reason why you hear people saying that sub-woofer placement is not very important, the speaker sound waves disperse well in every direction, partly because the driver size is small compared to the wavelength.

Now change the frequency to 10,000 (1100/10,000) and you get .11 feet, or 1.32 inches. Now you know why 1 inch tweeters are so common. They provide excellent dispersion of high frequencies.

So, back to the 1/2" midrange idea. A 5.25" speaker typically has a cone of about 4", and can successfully disperse frequencies up to about 3,000 Hz, which makes it a good mid-range. But you obviously need a tweeter for frequencies above that, and 3,000 Hz is a common cross-over point for tweeters, so I can understand a 2-way 5.25" speaker.

So why would a company add an extra 1/2" driver as a mid-range when the existing driver (4") is about as good a mid-range as you need? So they can sell you something extra. In actuality, their 3-way may be a good speaker, but it's not because of the extra driver. I would bet you could remove either the 3/8" tweeter or the 1/2" mid-range, and not notice a significant difference in speaker output.

Many companies, in designs like this, use a common cross-over for both the mid and tweeter. That's a clue as to just how important it is to have that extra driver. Or they do something silly like coss over the mid at 3,000 and the tweeter at 10,000. In that case, you'd be really hard pressed to hear any difference at all if you just whacked the tweeter alltogether.

Now consider just how important it is to have good dispersion in a speaker behind the seat of your S2000. While you want to hear the high frequencies, the speaker's dispersion will not have much to do with it, because of the physical barriers and sound absorbing materials in all directions. You are probably better off cranking up the treble a little than spending more money for a speaker. I would think, particularly in an S without a sub-woofer, you would want as much low end volume as you can get, so the bigger the driver the better, and who cares if it's got an extra 1/2" mid-range.

Bear in mind I do not have rear speakers in my S, and I have no experience with any of these particular speakers.

Maybe on second thought, this was more like $12.57 worth.