Talk Audio – The Definitive Car Audio Resource

I’ve had a slice of life already this morning! Off to go get the car serviced and get there to see big tough mechanics in tears. Some lowlife burglar had broken into the garage in Croxley (ex home to the famous Croxley Script paper mill) and stolen all their tools as well as the obvious cashbox pilferage. Stealing tools from tradesmen is right up there with stealing kids’ Christmas presents. Lowlifes.
Then, I had a little meeting with my chum from Acoustic Wood. These are the folks who make the best woodwork stands for car electronics. Not massive multi-unit displays, but craftsman like units with actual musical abilities where enclosures are used for speaker drivers. In fact they also do a nice line in home cinema panel work with integrally designed loudspeaker enclosures, which is utterly unique in custom installation as far as I know. I am going to get rid of my rag tag of cheapie carpeted enclosures using banana plug socketry and upgrade to rounded edges, Neutrik gastight Speakon connectors that cannot short together, a bit of internal damping foam and best of all, they will match! I’m getting two pairs of boxes with a set of three separate baffles each, in 100mm, 130mm and 170mm sizes. Also a nice sealed median-sized (as in middle-spec) enclosure, for each of eight, ten, twelve and fifteen. I will keep the Area 51 built rough-hewn six by nine boxes as I’m a bit attached to them and have heard around fifty different sets of speakers in them down the Turbo Nutter Bastard magazine years. (Proud to have been Ice editor for Max for four years and then Fast Car for seven – still do stuff in FC from time to time.) Which means I will be offloading the old woodwork. If you don’t object to cat-pilled and peeled carpet, there could be some real lucky finds for a few of you!
We have the DLS RW10 subwoofer review up, as well as the Kenwood KDC-BT8044U head unit and the fabby AVX77 from JVC is in the test rig right now. (What I really need is a set of five Y leads for the signal RCAs on the back of my Pioneer LX81 home AVR and an extra RCA to feed the sub section and I could compare a car unit with a top dollar Harman Kardon DVD deck in the Home Cinema Choice reference system in my living room!) This is one hell of a machine and is a True Genre Creator, every bit as important as the first screen-on-single-DIN deck they made was. The whole front is one touch screen but made to fit a normal size car radio. They had to have the size made specially, I’d imagine.
I have some big plans. ONE; I want to do some real world huge-o tests with my new boxes. So I’m going to do a Coax Lunacy. Not comps, just coaxes and single-speaker-wire connections. Normal stuff, just LOTS. I’m going to ask for ten sets each of the three round sizes. TWO; Subwoofer Death Test. We get a stump-mungerously powerful amp, say the Hertz SPL Monster and use it at a weedy 12V and 4 Ohms, so it makes but ‘only’ three pukka kilowatts. Then we use it, with a field-clamp meter to drive 200 to 300W – odd ten inch woofers harder and harder until they die of it. Then I want to cut out their very entrails and show them to the camera. We’ll make Subwoofer Snuff Films! Bwaa HA HA! And burn their cones with lighter fluid like Hendrix did with his guitar in the ancient videos. (Easy Adam, Guru)
We’ll find out a whole load about true power ratings and have an absolute hoot of a time. I called ENTEC Sound & Light and it seems likely that we can once again go and use their old fridge in the ex-dairy warehouse. They are the UK’s oldest production company and have some awesome credits. I’ve known them so long that last time I did this, it was for Fast Car and  was with a dude called Matthew Robins who was the UK marketing genius for Fusion, just before it all took off.
So onwards and upwards.
Adam Rayner – Online Editor
This week’s strap line by BassJunkie83 (Was horribly close to the prize, too!)