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A solid front stage with a good image is one of the most difficult tasks to
achieve in a vehicle. No car has the optimum listening environment. This
makes proper sound staging very difficult to accomplish. Most speakers
tend to be placed where they will fit easily, as opposed to where they can
perform the best. The mounting location of your speakers will have a great
effect on the sound quality of your stereo system. The special care taken to
place the speakers will yield many hours of listening enjoyment in return.
Several important recommendations should be followed.
• Place the speakers where they have a direct path to the listening area.
• For the best integration between the midrange and tweeter, the tweeter
should be placed less than 2" from the midrange (Figure 1).
• If you cannot place the tweeter less than 2"
from the midrange, then place the tweeter
more than 7" from the midrange. Placing the
tweeter 2"-7" from the midrange can cause
destructive interference (frequency response
problems) which will affect the speaker's abil-
ity to reproduce the frequency range around
the crossover frequency of the system.
• Whenever possible, place the tweeter direct-
ly above or below the midrange as this max-
imizes the imaging (point source) capability
of the speakers (Figure 2).
Figure 1
2" or less
Figure 2-A
Figure 2-B
M
OUNTING
L
OCATION
• Sound radiated from a “point source” provides the best stereo imaging
because the separation of the acoustical centers between the midrange
and tweeter for each channel is at the optimum distance. In a closed en-
vironment such as an automobile, horizontal speaker alignment (Figure
2-A) can cause severe amplitude and phase differences which will
degrade not only the imaging, but also the frequency response. This is
due to the path length differences between the midrange and tweeter.
With a vertical alignment (Figure 2-B), the path length difference
