WS420 Tuning Thread -- Calling Gurus

[dogbert]

K that kinda makes sense.

So for my 80 and 100 H test tones, I can play them until I don't hear them and the turn the xover just a hair over that so it does not "center it " and that will get my xover dialed in pretty close?

Like philsailz said, when the volume is halved.

[philwsailz]

K that kinda makes sense.

So for my 80 and 100 H test tones, I can play them until I don't hear them and the turn the xover just a hair over that so it does not "center it " and that will get my xover dialed in pretty close?

Uhhh... Not really...

Darn it... The topic is so much easier when there is a hands-on situation. Without hearing it, the topic is a lot harder to describe.

Let's try it this way. Say you want to use an 80 Hz frequency as the exact crossover point.

My recommendation would be to play the subwoofer and amp by itself and adjust the crossover until you hear the 80 Hz note halved in volume. Then turn off the sub amp and tune the HI PASS crossover on the full range amp so that it plays the 80 Hz tone at half volume.

At that point both crossovers in both amps will be set pretty darned close to 80 Hz.

If you set the woofer crossover to the point where you could NOT hear the tone, you might, (depending on crossover slope) end up with the sub amp playing roughly the music below 50 Hz. Then on your full range amp, to make the 80 Hz signal go away completely, (again, depending on crossover slope) you might find that you had set the crossover as high as 200 Hz.

As a result, you have used the crossovers to PREVENT sounds between roughly 50 and roughly 200 from being played. The music will sound thin, and the subwoofer will be putting out nothing but the very lowest notes, and it might not do that very well...

That is a very simplified way to describe it, but hopefully helps with the uderstanding...

[Ks]

Okay, lets take it back a notch because that sounds way over my head.

Crossover settings: We have a High and a low or stereo filter ( option)

on the amp it has marks and #'s for this lets say we have the choice of 50,80,110,140 and of course every where in between

For the Sub, Can I set the filter to "low pass" and set the Xover to 80 and call it a day?

and the in boat speakers to a "high pass" and set it at 110

will that cover the basic spectrum of most songs?

with those settings am I going to be missing something from my music?

I was assuming that once the points are set then you can dial in a bit to find the balance of the music if need be, but can we leave it at the set points above and have good full sound?

thanks

Korgae

[philwsailz]

Okay, lets take it back a notch because that sounds way over my head.

Crossover settings: We have a High and a low or stereo filter ( option)

on the amp it has marks and #'s for this lets say we have the choice of 50,80,110,140 and of course every where in between

For the Sub, Can I set the filter to "low pass" and set the Xover to 80 and call it a day?

and the in boat speakers to a "high pass" and set it at 110

will that cover the basic spectrum of most songs?

with those settings am I going to be missing something from my music?

I was assuming that once the points are set then you can dial in a bit to find the balance of the music if need be, but can we leave it at the set points above and have good full sound?

thanks

Korgae

Youre assumptions are totally correct. The frequencies you suggest, (80 HZ low pass for the sub, and 110 hi pass for the full range) are right on the money. To some it appears mathematically that you might have an issue with the settings at 80 and at 110, but we all set them up that way; it works.

Your comment about dialing it in after the fact is right on the money too. I was going to comment to that effect yesterday in another post, but figured it would be just adding to something that might be tough to understand. Absolutely, tweaking after the fact is fine. You want to set the system up where it sounds good to you. If you are a total sound quality nut, you will probably have different settings than someone who might be only after loudness and efficiency. That is fine.

Just know that the settings you understand and described so well are pretty good guidelines to stay at least near to. When I say near, I mean to say that one day when you are dinking around with the stereo and you find that your low pass sub crossover setting is around 500 Hz, and the hi-pass crossover is set to like 2K you probably have gone too far in your tweaking....

In fact try that scenario; you will not hurt anything, and it will let you hear and understand what the crossover settings mean to you and do for you.

[kko]

Here is a step by step.

1) Unplug all the RCA’s from your amps. Turn all the amp gains down.

2) Turn the radio up to find the maximum volume. Set the system with the head unit volume at 85% of max. This is the loudest the radio should ever go. Radios will create distortion the higher the volume is turned up. Which will create distortion on the output signal before reaching the amps. So find a safe easy to remember volume. If the head unit is 35. Max should be 30. If the head unit is 40. Maximum should be 30 to 35 and so on.

3) Once you have found the maximum volume set point. Turn the radio back down. Use a test CD that you are familiar with for tuning. Something that has highs and lows and vocals.

4) Make sure the settings on the radio are flat. You should not tune a system with the treble or bass up.

5) On the top of the WS 420. Set the gains at the mid level. Make sure to adjust both the main gain and the aux gain. Set them both to this mid level. This is the level where most systems will be. The WS 420 has the ability to provide more voltage if there are long rca runs but most boats will be in the middle as this is a safe setting.

6) Make sure all the eq adjustments are flat. Right in the middle. Plug in all the rcas from the eq to the amps.

7) Plug in just the RCA’s for the in boat speakers amp. Set the high pass crossover at around 80HZ to 100HZ.

8) Turn the radio up to the max safe level found in step 2. Turn the eq up to about ¾ of max volume.

9) Slowly turn the gain up until you hear the speakers distort. Slowly back off the gain from that point a small amount until you hear the speakers play as loud as they can with no distortion.

10) Unplug the RCA’s from that amp and plug the RCA’s into the amp running the tower speakers. Set the high pass crossover on the amp for the tower speakers at 80HZ to 100HZ.

11) Slowly turn the gain up until you hear the speakers distort. Slowly back off the gain from that point a small amount until you hear the speakers play as loud as they can with no distortion.

12) Unplug the RCA’s from that amp and plug the RCA’s into the amp running the subwoofer. Set the low pass crossover on the amp for the subwoofer at 80HZ. On the WS 420. Turn the bass level to max. The ring is a frequency adjustment. All the way down to the left is 30 HZ. You will want to put this around 60 to 80HZ. So about ¼ of the way up.

13) Slowly turn the gain up until you hear the speakers distort. Slowly back off the gain from that point a small amount until you hear the speakers play as loud as they can with no distortion.

14) Turn the radio back down and plug in all RCA’s and do a final check with everything playing. You should now have the gains set at “unity” Meaning they are all at the same level and you are matched across the board.

15) Note that you can adjust the high pass and low pass filters to tailor the sound to each boat. As you can set the high pass higher to get more volume but at the expense of losing some low end mid bass.

16) You can then fine tune the sound on the eq as well. Using the knobs and rings. Most systems will not need much in terms of boost.

17) You can then leave the eq volume set and use the radio as the main volume. And then turn the in boats down with the towers up or vice versa depending on you goals.


Tim
Wet Sounds

yeah but have you ever done this before?








just kiddin sounds like a nice step by step procedure even chpthril could follow!!!!!!!!!!!!