[simplicityinsound]

Sometime i loo at the cars that we work on with regularity, and realize that there seems to be some peculiarity with the selection. Namely, there are a lot of very popular platforms that we hardly ever see...cars such as civics, camrys, audis, are few and far in between. The Honda fit, is just such an example..this spacious econohatch runs amok here in norcal, yet we have never ever worked on one before.

So it was actually quite exciting for me to book a new, 3rd generation Fit for a full on SQ build.

The customer had a previous system installed and he was looking for more, so he gathered up some very high end gear and brought it all to us for the build. Everything other than the Mosconi mini controller was supplied by the customer.

goals:

1. achieve a high level of sound quality utilizing customer supplied equipment

2. integrate the midrange and rather large tweeter into the A pillar window

3. integrate the Mosconi AMAS HD BT streaming device and the Mosconi controller into the interior

4. maintain a fully stealth and usable hatch area capable of supporting a lot of weight that the customer will be loading on a daily basis due to work

lets get started...first up the car. I kinda dig the third generation fit, kinda sporty looking in a futuristic way, a bit more smooth than the 2nd gen and less boring than the first:

the previous isntall was completed removed other than some speaker wires and of course the original sound proofing. I performed most of the build while Jesse did the mosconi dsp controller mount.

speaking of which, here is the mosconi RC-mini integrated into the pocket behind the shifter. Jesse has really gotten good at doing small detailed fab work like this, and he did imo a great job with this one as well. it puts the controls and preset changing at the finger tips of the customer:

a coupla build pics of the controller mount, which is 100 percent acrylic. it consists of a top plate that is meticulously sanded, backfilled and shaped to fit the opening, and several pieces of acrylic tabs that are bonded together, they interlock into each other with bolts and inturn bolts into the mosconi controller. the top was painted black to match the interior:

this piece was then secured to the car using more little bolts, and then the entire console was put back into the car:

For the front stage, the customer supplied me with a full 3 way set of Audison Thesis component set...naturally, the only place to mount them was the A pillar windows. At first, this seemed like plenty of space, but after taking the pillars off, i realized that with the sheer size of the Thesis tweeter, and the fact that the top of the pillar protrudes out more than the bottom, there was basically only one way to do the speakers that still allow the pods to go into the drivers side dash. (due to the protruding driver side dash AC vents). this isnt the most ideal angle to me, but i was confident i can tune around it. so this is what i ended up with.

the 3" thesis mid is back and at the top corner of the window, with the oversized tweeter towards the front of the car and aimed more back. each is recessed and flush mounted, showcasing the trade mark audison grille. the pod itself is finished in graphite vinyl to match the dash, and the out side surface is also vinyled as you will see in later pics so you dont see any raw fiberglass from the outside of the car.

if you look at the driver side dash vents, you will see what i mean about doing it this way to ensure that the pods can still fit into the windows and it can all go back into the car...even with this it was quite a struggle

here are some build pods. first, the areas of the window were tapped off and 3 layers of fiberglass laid down:

when they cured, they were popped out, trimmed, and some CLD damper were laid on the inside:

then, after literally spending an hour trying to figure out how i can arrange the drivers and still be able to get them into the window, i aimed and secured the mounting rings:

then mold cloth was pulled, resin applied, allowed to cure, and then a milkshake of filler and resin was poured into the pods to reinforce them from the inside:

then a few layers of filler and sanding got them to be smooth and ready for upholstery:

an d finally, they were wrapped in graphite/black vinyl. the backside of the pods were also smoothed out and wrapped in the same vinyl to present a clean surface from the outside of the car:

these were then secured to the factory a pillar with 6-32 machine screws and nuts:

the Thesis mid was then secured, while the tweeter will need to go on after to allow wire routing:

moving onto the Thesis midbass located in the stock lower door location. the door had already been sound proofed from the earlier installation:

we basically added a layer of metra ballstic foam barrier to the entire door to separate the plastic from the CLD:

and then also covered the door card with more CLD damper:

the same procedure was done to the passenger side:

and that completes the front stage.

next are a series of pics that show the new wiring bundle as it travesl down the sides of the to the rear, ziptied and secured every few inches:

 

[simplicityinsound]

Re: Big Sound in a Small Package - 2014 Honda Fit Re-install - Audison, Hertz, Moscon

moving onto the hatch area. as mentioned, the goal was to be simple, stealthy, and most importantly, to be sturdy and support a lot of weight.

so here is the view with everything covered up and the cargo mat in place, for a 100 percent oem look:

take off the cargo mat and you see a new floor panel that covers most of the space over the spare tire well. with a center large cutout:

pop off the breathable grille from the cutout and you see a simple layout showing a Thesis 10" subwoofer and a Audison Voce 5.1k. all trimmed int he same graphite vinyl as the pods. again, nothing fancy but functional and clean:

now some of you may wonder why the sub is recessed so much. well actually, it is barely recessed enough i wanted to maintain the cosmetic look of the audison grilles from the front stage, so i made sure the sub grille is in place. what is deceiving is just how far the center of the sub grille rises. here you can see it is barely even 1/4" below the opening of the cutout

so lets go on to the build pics.

again, spare tire well was already fully sound proofed from the previous install. so i tapped off the area i wanted the sub enclosure to be, and laid down 5 layers of fiberglass mat:

when that cured, i popped the mold out, trimmed it, and molded in a front and top board to form the enclosure. i then attached a spacer board over where the sub will be. as i needed the depth around the sub to mount other things:

i then installed a single 1/4" rivet nut to the floor of the well, and after wiring the subbox and painting the top baffle black so no raw wood would show through, i bolted the enclosure to the floor with a 1/4-20 bolt:

by now, astute readers will realize that a single audison AV5.1k is not enough to drive the entire system fully active. thats where the customer supplied mosconi zero 3 came in. it is located in its own rack,secured to the subbox and the side walls using bolts and rivetnuts. to ensure that everything is very strong and can withstand a lot of weight, all the supports in this car were done with double 3/4" supports. here is the zero3 in its rack, pre-wired:

the amprack was then secured to the well and wired up:

this is the top rack that houses the AV5.1k, the dsp and various other gadgets, before it is secured to the car:

and finally, after about 6 hours of wiring. everything is now fully secured and hooked up. the mosconi 6to8v8 dsp, loaded with the AMAS BT streaming hardware is on the passenger side, while all the distribution and barrier strips is to the left of the sub. the customer supplied me with a cross flow fan, which i wired in to the left of the 5.1K as well. pretty darn crowded if you ask me

and to ensure that i can access the gain control on the zero 3, i had a slot cutout above it that is reachable with a longer screw driver without having to disturb the 5.1k above it:

here is the main trim panel before and after vinyl, note the tall flush mount walls around the sub to clear the grille:

and here it is secured to the car:

here are the top two pieces, before and after carpet, and i also dyed them slightly to better match the oem honda carpet:

so thats it...lets talk about how it sounds. but before that. a quick gander at the oem signal that i was working with.

so here is the stock oem signal, unprocessed. you can see it is fairly flat, but the major thing to note is what appears to be a filter at the bottom end of the frequency below 45-50hz range. this i am fairly sure is a highpass, as boosting those frequencies with the mosconi input eq did virtually nothing to the signal. so i think maybe a bass restoration circuit of some type will help with that:

here is the same signal at hi, mid, and low volumes kn the stock headunit, and as you can see, not a whole ton of dynamic equalization:

and here is the signal after i went through it with the mosconi input eq. didnt take a whole lot of work, but again, couldnt do much about the high passed filter:

so...how does it sound.

i have to say i am very impressed with the entire thesis setup.

the relatively odd mounting position of the front stage require me to do play with the left and right gains of the tweeter a bit to get a solid center image. surprisingly, tonality wasnt too bad on the left side both with rta measurements and by ear.

once i got the center imaging for the tweeter dialed in, it was very solid and anchored. stage width is pillar to pillar, with good depth and height.

the thesis tweeter and midrange was able to convey a lot of detail without being harsh, and created a very airy feeling when listening, especially with the AMAS. a lot of great resolution yet it was never offensive, even at high volumes.

but the thesis midbass REALLY impressed me. going off a recomendation by an audison expert, they were high passed fairly low at around 55hz. they were able to dish out a ton of clean impactful midbass without any hint of distortion. they also naturally extended down with any struggle. truly impressive for sure...and could be one of the most impressive 6.5" midbasses i have ever heard. bravo!

the sub also is very excellent. it is very transparent and just dissapeared into the music. and unlike some other sq specific subs, it was also to dish out a lot of output and extension when pushed.

again, i would characterize the entire thesis set as very refined yet muscular...they can do the delicate stuff very well but if you just get up and push them, they seem to be able to absorb a lot of power with virtually no distortion. easily the most impressive audison/hertz speakers i have ever heard...and its shame they are no longer available for sale.

on AMAS compared to the stock source, everything just sounds a bit more open and airy, but by far the biggest difference in sound is on the sub. as mentioned above, the stock signal seems to have a drastic high pass below 45hz, this translated to plenty of upper range bass but a definite depreciation in the ultra low stuff. hwere as the AMAS signal is flat all the way down, and truly allowed the sub to do its thing. the difference is very noticible on songs with big, low bass notes...and it is perhaps even more dramatic on the rta, playing the same pink noise, sub channel on only:

on a lot of songs, this difference isnt audible, but yeah on big bass notes, the amas really shines.

so thats it for this...just happy that the customer got a car that he is really happy with to listen to on a daily basis, and opened my eyes to some high end equipment that i normally dont get to play with.

Cheers,

Bing

 

[mrpeabody]

Re: Big Sound in a Small Package - 2014 Honda Fit Re-install - Audison, Hertz, Moscon

Love the car and the equipment.

I agree with the comments on the Thesis 6.5's. They really blew me away. Not that the three and tweet are lacking, but the 6 is just fantastic.

 

[CoLd_FuSiOn]

Re: Big Sound in a Small Package - 2014 Honda Fit Re-install - Audison, Hertz, Moscon

Another amazing install like always.I happen to own a honda city idsi which is a fit aria and I love what you've done with the pillars. Kudos!


and having heard the voce set, yes they do have very good power handling capabilities. Wish to have auditioned the thesis though.

 

[Notloudenuf]

Re: Big Sound in a Small Package - 2014 Honda Fit Re-install - Audison, Hertz, Moscon

I really like the looks of those A-pillar window pods. Those are really nice looking.

This almost makes me want a fit......(almost)

 

[payluder]

I want to add my review and thoughts to the whole process with Bing and his crew. Its been a little over a week now since I picked up my car and I'm still amazed from the sound quality I'm hearing. I had my car for almost a year now it was suppose to be a commute car but I barely drive the car and it still only 6k miles and most of it was from driving to audio shops and having work done. I have had 3 other shops work on this car from basic install to the last shop with full hertz mille and audison amps and bit one. The sound and build quality wasn't very good and I was so disappointed that I continue to look around for someone that can give me what I wanted and lucky for me I found Bing from some of his build logs in DIYMA and I'm glad I did because I finally got what I always wanted which is loud sound quality and clean install that would support heavy weight. Its like Bing knew what I wanted and build it.

There is a lot of things to say about Bings work that is already said many times before so I feel that I don't need to mention those but I want to point out some things that I only found out after looking at his build log. When I first reach out to Bing and told him my story that I had a full system installed and went over the detail of what needed to be done and also that I don't need wiring and sound proofing and agreed on a budget, so I drop the car off. But after looking at his build that he actually went above and beyond what was quoted and not once did he try to hit me up for more money like the other shops. When Bing open up my door panel I'm very sure other shops would look and see that its already sound proofed and move on not Bing, he added a layer of sound proof. He also upgraded my power and ground wire to 2gauge and most of the speaker wires and also ran new wires in the trunk, which also wasn't even mentioned in the quote. I actually ask Bing before my scheduled appointment hat since everything I bought to him was Audison except for the Mosconi zero3 and with the trunk space being limited to just stack the amp and hide the Mosconi under the Audison amp. But in the back of my mind since I drop off the car until now was, what if I ever need to adjust the gains for the Mosconi how would I ever do that but Bing planned this ahead of time and made a cut out so if I ever do need to play with gain I can easily. I hope you continue what you do so I can still bring my next car to you.

 

[Babs]

Of course that install is off the chain. Bing's Magic strikes again.

That said its also a sharp little ride!


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[Babs]

Big Sound in a Small Package - 2015 Honda Fit Re-install - Audison, Hertz, Mo...

Makes me motivated to see if I can place 20lbs of potatoes in a 10lb bag myself. Hehehe

Depends on if there's any relief space behind that top portion of the pillar. My luck.. No. Never even pulled the pillars so I dunno.

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[payluder]

Someone on the other forum fitfreak asked me about the window blind spot being covered. To be honest even before this build those windows were useless and I still almost hit someone crossing the crossway lucky my wife AKA backseat driver yelled out stop before I hit the gas harder. Since then I dont relay on those window and learn to drive like a chicken head bobbing left and right to clear the pillar blind spots so the that small window being covered made no difference for me.

 

[lashlee]

Another great build! I miss my old GD Fit!

 

[Darth SQ]

Another great build! I miss my old GD Fit!

I'm trying to find a 2nd one myself.


Bret
PPI-ART COLLECTOR

 

[Babs]

Someone on the other forum fitfreak asked me about the window blind spot being covered. To be honest even before this build those windows were useless and I still almost hit someone crossing the crossway lucky my wife AKA backseat driver yelled out stop before I hit the gas harder. Since then I dont relay on those window and learn to drive like a chicken head bobbing left and right to clear the pillar blind spots so the that small window being covered made no difference for me.

I've seen enough 8th Civic sedan pillars filled in to realize for the most part in these cars you can fill them in no problem without worry of visibility obstruction. If anything, the pillar itself is obstructing.


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[jgarcia1925]

is there anything this man does that is not cool? wow. man if i wasnt is so much debt i would love to build something for my GTI. that car is begging for a system upgrade so bad.

 

[BMW Alpina]

Thanks Payluder,
This thread and your car is going to be my inspiration for the future system that I am going to install on my own Honda Fit