I currently have a Pioneer head unit, four standard Rover speakers (two in pods, two on the rear shelf, all running off the head unit), A JVC 10″ subwoofer in a random box on the back seat and a Rallye Caliber amplifier dumped in the boot.

This setup, although sounding OK, is far from ideal. The Rover speakers are far too bright and if I push the bass up the sub booms too much. I know that the booming sub is probably because I fiddle with settings too much, but the only way to improve the speakers is, obviously, to replace them.

Elemental Designs SubwooferBeing on a very tight budget to upgrade the ICE (In Car Entertainment) doesn’t help. I have this thing about having, not necessarily the best of things, but the best I can afford. I mentioned previously about the Elemental Designs subwoofers (left). They will be coming, although not just yet. £40 per speaker is a bargain price and from reading independent reviews on the ‘net they are very highly regarded too.

My sub works at the moment so I decided to concentrate on the full range speakers instead. Again, compromise is necessary. I simply can’t afford Hertz (think hundreds per speaker) which would be ideal so am at the budget end of the scale again.

Infinity Reference SpeakersInfinity are highly regarded in the budget end of the market and regularly win awards and group tests. Sounds good to me. They produce speakers called the Reference range and for the money they appear to be fairly good value. I have spotted the Reference 6012i speakers (right) at Car Audio Security for around £45 and on eBay for about half that.

The Infinity Reference 6012i is a six inch coaxial speaker capable of handling 60 watts RMS at 92db.

Front Speaker PodsI think this will be a good place to start the upgrade. I can leave the Rover speakers on the rear shelf running off the head unit for the moment and build fibreglass pods similar to those on the left to house the Infinity’s in the front. I want to angle the speaker to point at the occupant rather than their knees. I can run these and the current sub off the Caliber amp and when I get the ED subs I have a Vibe Blackbox II amplifier that, as a stop gap measure, I can use to run them.

Future plans are to (in no particular order):

  • Purchase the ED subs
  • Build under seat boxes to house them
  • Fit the Caliber and the Vibe Amp onto a board which will then seat on the rear seat.
  • Purchase some 10cm speakers to sit in the space where the dash vents are currently which will give some higher sound fill.
  • Fit sound deadening onto every panel - floor, roof, sides, doors etc to stop vibrations and help retain sound within the car.

I intend to get photos of the current install and I will document all this as it happens, especially building the pods and the sub boxes so stay tuned!