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While dialing in my upgraded stereo setup, I was having a heck of a time getting the bass to sound right to me. Having had aftermarket stereos with DSP in all my recent vehicles, I know how the bass should sound on a lot of my music. My sub is a Hertz MPS 250 S2 mounted in the storage area under the rear in a quality enclosure with the proper air space for the sub. That sub should have no issues handling it's duties, but I had to do some serious tweaking of the sub channel EQs to get the bass sounding more normal.
I, like many others, overlooked something obvious. Sub placement! Normally, I consider that a lot with a build, but given my options with the Maverick, I just put it in the most obvious space. Well, that storage area under the rear seat behind the driver is not conducive to low bass response from the driver's listening position! The bass would be much better(for the driver) with an Ecoboost with the sub mounted on the passenger's side under rear seat. With my sub's mounting position, I'm not really hearing the benefit of cabin gain that you usually get with low bass in a car. The sub will usually have better low end extension when mounted near the edges of the interior space opposite of the listening position, but with the hybrid under the rear seat that isn't the case. The direction the sub is firing also plays a part in this. This is why guys are getting pretty good response with their Kicker Hideaways on the back wall.
Long story short, I had to significantly boost the curve from 20hz ramping it down sharply from 31hz and actually having negative boost at 63 hz. I have attached a picture of my EQ setting for the sub for reference. You'll also notice in the pic how much I started cutting things in the upper bass regions. the upper bass is really accentuated with the sub placement. It doesn't help that the Maverick is rattle prone either. My upgraded door speakers handle down to 80 hz with no issues at all. This is not an EQ curve I'm proud of, because I don't like boosting things that much. I boosted at 50hz while cutting sharply at 63 to keep that solid kick and make it sound more "normal" with kick drums. It is what it is though. The sound is MUCH better from the sub. My response is pretty solid down to about 25 hz from the driver's seat now(passenger seat response is closer to 20hz). Before tweaking things like I did, the response was falling down just under 40-45hz. It was there, but weak. For kicks, I tested response with my mic in the passenger seat and the passenger side in the rear. It's neat how can see the low end ramp up in those positions vs the driver's seat.
If any of you guys that installed a sub in the driver's side storage under the rear seat have been thinking the bass just doesn't sound like you expected... Well, now you have a good idea why. If you're running a setup with DSP, you should be able to tune around it for the most part. If you don't have DSP, you may want to get it, unless you're cool with your bass sounding weird. I hope that helps some folks!
I, like many others, overlooked something obvious. Sub placement! Normally, I consider that a lot with a build, but given my options with the Maverick, I just put it in the most obvious space. Well, that storage area under the rear seat behind the driver is not conducive to low bass response from the driver's listening position! The bass would be much better(for the driver) with an Ecoboost with the sub mounted on the passenger's side under rear seat. With my sub's mounting position, I'm not really hearing the benefit of cabin gain that you usually get with low bass in a car. The sub will usually have better low end extension when mounted near the edges of the interior space opposite of the listening position, but with the hybrid under the rear seat that isn't the case. The direction the sub is firing also plays a part in this. This is why guys are getting pretty good response with their Kicker Hideaways on the back wall.
Long story short, I had to significantly boost the curve from 20hz ramping it down sharply from 31hz and actually having negative boost at 63 hz. I have attached a picture of my EQ setting for the sub for reference. You'll also notice in the pic how much I started cutting things in the upper bass regions. the upper bass is really accentuated with the sub placement. It doesn't help that the Maverick is rattle prone either. My upgraded door speakers handle down to 80 hz with no issues at all. This is not an EQ curve I'm proud of, because I don't like boosting things that much. I boosted at 50hz while cutting sharply at 63 to keep that solid kick and make it sound more "normal" with kick drums. It is what it is though. The sound is MUCH better from the sub. My response is pretty solid down to about 25 hz from the driver's seat now(passenger seat response is closer to 20hz). Before tweaking things like I did, the response was falling down just under 40-45hz. It was there, but weak. For kicks, I tested response with my mic in the passenger seat and the passenger side in the rear. It's neat how can see the low end ramp up in those positions vs the driver's seat.
If any of you guys that installed a sub in the driver's side storage under the rear seat have been thinking the bass just doesn't sound like you expected... Well, now you have a good idea why. If you're running a setup with DSP, you should be able to tune around it for the most part. If you don't have DSP, you may want to get it, unless you're cool with your bass sounding weird. I hope that helps some folks!
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I was not happy, and I'm also working with non-flattened signal coming from the head unit. Your Key dsp flattens the signal first, so you won't see the crazy curves from the head unit on your sweep measurements like I'm seeing. I do have a picture of the dsp calibration for the speakers, but that signal is generated by the dsp and not getting the head unit's "contamination ". Basically, the auto calibration still had to be calibrated manually to adjust for the factory equalization. You can see the dip art 40hz, and the the free fall at 35 hz. I do listen to a lot of stuff with low bass, so i immediately noticed it. I hope that helps.
