This forum used to be more about finding very good low distortion drivers that were unique that anyone could afford to use with maybe a little extra preparation for use in a vehicle. Currently trending on this forum are high end car audio specific drivers from companies like AudioFrog, Dynaudio, Focal, Hybrid Audio, and Hertz. These are great, and definitely are proven drivers, but they are also not the only options out there. Many of these car audio specific high end drivers from the above car audio brands also cost a lot of money and that is understandable given the limited market they are in.
These car audio specific drivers must also be designed for use in extreme environments and still offer a long warranty or not fail in a year in those environments. I think people who tend to purchase these car audio drivers also tend to abuse them, and they may not understand how to implement them properly like using a high pass filter to remove sub bass frequencies from them so they don’t exceed their excursion limits.
In this thread I put together a list of drivers that I identified as useful for car audio from places or sources some people may have forgotten about. Most have TS parameters that work for quasi-infinite baffle use in a car door and most don’t have open or exposed voice coils that will degrade in the potentially wet environment of a car door. They also have cones that will stand up better than a typical paper cone driver made for home audio use would.
I’ll start out with 6.5” mid woofers and then move onto 8” mid woofers. The 6.5” mid woofer is the most common and versatile size that can be used for both two-way and three-way front stage systems. The drivers with inductance reducing shorting rings will and smoother upper end frequency responses are best for two-way front stages, but these also tend to cost a bit more because they are harder to make. For a three-way front stage that requires less from the mid bass driver with a narrower passband, typically 80 Hz to 400 Hz, one can get away with a less costly driver.
A driver that is designed to be used for a specific task such as a true woofer will do better for that specific task and should cost less too. You may give up an extended smooth upper range frequency response but gain efficiency in the lower mid-bass region which is good for three way systems.
Finally, an 8” driver is really best for a three-way system in a car audio environment, mainly because of the beaming characteristics of the larger diaphragm, and the typical off axis lower door placement that most of these will end up in. They also tend to be deeper, so implementing them in many car doors may only be for a select few. With a decent low distortion subwoofer however a 6.5" mid-bass driver is all you really need. If you want very loud though some 8" drivers may be a better option.
Since AudioFrog makes fantastic midbass drivers I will use those as the benchmark to compare to when modeling.
First up is the Scan Speak Discovery 16W/4434G00 from Madisound. This driver is made for car audio by Scan Speak, and its relatively shallow so it will fit in many places. It has an fs of 55 Hz and a total Q or Qts of .48. Madisound offers this driver in one of their auto sound kits with the the R1904-613001 tweeter and passive crossovers which is also made for auto sound. It can be had for a modest $118 each.
www.madisoundspeakerstore.com
Scanspeak Discovery (red) vs AF GS60 (blue) vs AF GB60 (purple)
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With a proper HP filter on it I think the 70 watt rating is about right but as you can see you cant put 70 watts on it without it.
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These car audio specific drivers must also be designed for use in extreme environments and still offer a long warranty or not fail in a year in those environments. I think people who tend to purchase these car audio drivers also tend to abuse them, and they may not understand how to implement them properly like using a high pass filter to remove sub bass frequencies from them so they don’t exceed their excursion limits.
In this thread I put together a list of drivers that I identified as useful for car audio from places or sources some people may have forgotten about. Most have TS parameters that work for quasi-infinite baffle use in a car door and most don’t have open or exposed voice coils that will degrade in the potentially wet environment of a car door. They also have cones that will stand up better than a typical paper cone driver made for home audio use would.
I’ll start out with 6.5” mid woofers and then move onto 8” mid woofers. The 6.5” mid woofer is the most common and versatile size that can be used for both two-way and three-way front stage systems. The drivers with inductance reducing shorting rings will and smoother upper end frequency responses are best for two-way front stages, but these also tend to cost a bit more because they are harder to make. For a three-way front stage that requires less from the mid bass driver with a narrower passband, typically 80 Hz to 400 Hz, one can get away with a less costly driver.
A driver that is designed to be used for a specific task such as a true woofer will do better for that specific task and should cost less too. You may give up an extended smooth upper range frequency response but gain efficiency in the lower mid-bass region which is good for three way systems.
Finally, an 8” driver is really best for a three-way system in a car audio environment, mainly because of the beaming characteristics of the larger diaphragm, and the typical off axis lower door placement that most of these will end up in. They also tend to be deeper, so implementing them in many car doors may only be for a select few. With a decent low distortion subwoofer however a 6.5" mid-bass driver is all you really need. If you want very loud though some 8" drivers may be a better option.
Since AudioFrog makes fantastic midbass drivers I will use those as the benchmark to compare to when modeling.
First up is the Scan Speak Discovery 16W/4434G00 from Madisound. This driver is made for car audio by Scan Speak, and its relatively shallow so it will fit in many places. It has an fs of 55 Hz and a total Q or Qts of .48. Madisound offers this driver in one of their auto sound kits with the the R1904-613001 tweeter and passive crossovers which is also made for auto sound. It can be had for a modest $118 each.
Scan-speak 16W/4434G Discovery Autosound Woofer
Scan-speak 16W/4434G Discovery Autosound Woofer
www.madisoundspeakerstore.com
Scanspeak Discovery (red) vs AF GS60 (blue) vs AF GB60 (purple)
With a proper HP filter on it I think the 70 watt rating is about right but as you can see you cant put 70 watts on it without it.
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