Thread: The best Car Audio/Media in a Range Rover Classic

To further add to this, has anybody added speakers to the LSE rear doors, if so what size and do you have pics of the end result?

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I added tweeters to the front doors on my hard-dash as the early door cards have one speakers behind a drilled out section and the sound quality is bad enough it's hard to hear vocals when moving.
Made worse by them being an odd size.

The later hard-dash have two speakers in each front door. I think the soft-dash is the same.

It depends on how far you want to take it. I've had years of experience installing car stereos in various car. When your a teenager and an electronics technician all your mates want you to fit their stereos. Just for the record i'm well passed a teenager now.

Personally i cannot be bothered with the effort anymore as i don't 4WD with the stereo on because i enjoy my surroundings. However for someone who had a RRC as a daily driver or not too fussed about serenity, here goes:

The RRC has a terrible placement for a CD player, if you intend to utilize the standard location in post 85 RRC (in front of gear stick) Forget about using a CD player, it is just not worth the hassle to find one that will work on the angle. These days you can get great digital media players that will fit in the same standard DIN size. (Which is not quite standard DIN in the RRC, slightly bigger)

However if you do want to use a CD player then you could either mount it to the top of the dash in the centre where the flat bit is, it would take some cosmetic work to make it look pretty but could be done. Alternatively you could mount it to the right of the driver like in the pre 85 RRC. It is easy enough to cut out the air con vent to DIN size if you can't be bothered finding a pre 85 plastic piece.

The soft dash does not have this issue as the CD player is mounted in a much better location.

I'm assuming people want a very good sound system so i'll skip the easy and cheaper solutions (which would work quite well if all you wanted was to listen to music so the trip was less boring or if you wanted to listen to the footy)

OK so in the hard dash fit door pods to the bottom front of the doors and fit 6 or 6.5 inch speakers split system. This means in the door pod you would end up with a 6" (6.5") woofer and where the 4" speaker (i think it is 4" but it might be 5.25) currently in the door is, replace with a tweeter. (If you really knew what you were doing you could utilize the 4" speaker as the tweeter to get a less harsh sound)

This would work optimally if the system was amplified. But not necessary if you buy the correct speakers. While on this topic it is the amplifier that makes the biggest difference to how the music sounds not the speakers. The reason is the amp creates the sound, the speakers just replicate it. Having said that good speakers help too. It is best to match the sensitivity of the speaker to the amp. The less sensitive the speaker the more powerful the amp needs to be. It is easy to spend less money and get a very good head unit (CD player) and more sensitive speakers and end up with an exceptional sounding system. Don't be fooled into thinking it can only be achieved using an amplifier.

For the back door you could fit Pods again and run a 2 way speaker. Or just fit the 4" speakers to the back in the standard location on the roof.

Remember the good speaker need to be in the front. Too many people make the mistake of putting the good speaker in the back. I ask you, where are you sitting? And when was the last time you went to a concert a turned your back to the stage to listen to the band?

Lastly if you want a sub woofer, you will NEED and amplifier. The amp should be more powerful than the sub can take if possible. This way you don't need to run the amp up flat out (this is where distortion happens). 200 Watt amp to run a 120 Watt sup is a great ratio. 12 inch subs are popular because they give the best bang for buck and have a good frequency response for most music. I'd go with a 12" if you can find the space, but a 10" will work almost as well if you get a good one. The alternative is to get 2X 10" subs. Sub woofers are a thing of their own, the sound they produce can be altered easily by changing the box they are mounted in. My advice, just by a standard box and fit a 12" sub. It should be sufficient.

Soft dash - it looks like you don't need the door pods for the front doors. I also assume you have speaker in the rear door as standard. All the same rules apply and you could end up with a great sound system but it might look more like standard fitment because you can just fit the speaker and tweeters in the stand locations.

That is my advice for what it is worth.

Originally Posted by Jazzman

It depends on how far you want to take it. I've had years of experience installing car stereos in various car. When your a teenager and an electronics technician all your mates want you to fit their stereos. Just for the record i'm well passed a teenager now.

Personally i cannot be bothered with the effort anymore as i don't 4WD with the stereo on because i enjoy my surroundings. However for someone who had a RRC as a daily driver or not too fussed about serenity, here goes:

The RRC has a terrible placement for a CD player, if you intend to utilize the standard location in post 85 RRC (in front of gear stick) Forget about using a CD player, it is just not worth the hassle to find one that will work on the angle. These days you can get great digital media players that will fit in the same standard DIN size. (Which is not quite standard DIN in the RRC, slightly bigger)

However if you do want to use a CD player then you could either mount it to the top of the dash in the centre where the flat bit is, it would take some cosmetic work to make it look pretty but could be done. Alternatively you could mount it to the right of the driver like in the pre 85 RRC. It is easy enough to cut out the air con vent to DIN size if you can't be bothered finding a pre 85 plastic piece.

The soft dash does not have this issue as the CD player is mounted in a much better location.

I'm assuming people want a very good sound system so i'll skip the easy and cheaper solutions (which would work quite well if all you wanted was to listen to music so the trip was less boring or if you wanted to listen to the footy)

OK so in the hard dash fit door pods to the bottom front of the doors and fit 6 or 6.5 inch speakers split system. This means in the door pod you would end up with a 6" (6.5") woofer and where the 4" speaker (i think it is 4" but it might be 5.25) currently in the door is, replace with a tweeter. (If you really knew what you were doing you could utilize the 4" speaker as the tweeter to get a less harsh sound)

This would work optimally if the system was amplified. But not necessary if you buy the correct speakers. While on this topic it is the amplifier that makes the biggest difference to how the music sounds not the speakers. The reason is the amp creates the sound, the speakers just replicate it. Having said that good speakers help too. It is best to match the sensitivity of the speaker to the amp. The less sensitive the speaker the more powerful the amp needs to be. It is easy to spend less money and get a very good head unit (CD player) and more sensitive speakers and end up with an exceptional sounding system. Don't be fooled into thinking it can only be achieved using an amplifier.

For the back door you could fit Pods again and run a 2 way speaker. Or just fit the 4" speakers to the back in the standard location on the roof.

Remember the good speaker need to be in the front. Too many people make the mistake of putting the good speaker in the back. I ask you, where are you sitting? And when was the last time you went to a concert a turned your back to the stage to listen to the band?

Lastly if you want a sub woofer, you will NEED and amplifier. The amp should be more powerful than the sub can take if possible. This way you don't need to run the amp up flat out (this is where distortion happens). 200 Watt amp to run a 120 Watt sup is a great ratio. 12 inch subs are popular because they give the best bang for buck and have a good frequency response for most music. I'd go with a 12" if you can find the space, but a 10" will work almost as well if you get a good one. The alternative is to get 2X 10" subs. Sub woofers are a thing of their own, the sound they produce can be altered easily by changing the box they are mounted in. My advice, just by a standard box and fit a 12" sub. It should be sufficient.

Soft dash - it looks like you don't need the door pods for the front doors. I also assume you have speaker in the rear door as standard. All the same rules apply and you could end up with a great sound system but it might look more like standard fitment because you can just fit the speaker and tweeters in the stand locations.

That is my advice for what it is worth.

Excellent reply, very helpful, yes there is a time and a place for the serenity of the the bush and there is a time and a place for great sounding tunes 😆

Current plans are:
Clarion NZ502 flip out screen
12 slimline sub in spot where standard spare wheel is in a custom carpeted fiberglass box
Best speakers that will fit as per sizes above
May or may not add speaker to rear LSE door
1 Mono amp for sub
4 or 6 channel amp for speakers flush mounted on drivers rear side behind custom paneling

Some questions

What are peoples experience with brands to use?
Also is anyone running the Clarion NZ502 with its built in Hema offroad maps? Does it work well?
Anyone upgraded the pillar tweeter when upgrading the fronts and would that mean 3way splits?





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I thought the Harmon cardon speakers would be fine, why replace them?

Hi

Another option is coaxial speakers, I put some of these Visaton units in my partners car and they sound pretty damn good.

Soundlabs Group DX 13 - 4 Ohm

Much easier to install than splits.

Steve

Originally Posted by Vern

I thought the Harmon cardon speakers would be fine, why replace them?

Which models came with them and what are they rated to? Will they handle the power from a high quality/power amp?

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Originally Posted by SteveFarmer

Hi

Another option is coaxial speakers, I put some of these Visaton units in my partners car and they sound pretty damn good.

Soundlabs Group DX 13 - 4 Ohm

Much easier to install than splits.

Steve

Cheers, I think something like that is the go for the rear, upfront I want to make use of the available spots if possible

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