Next to theaters, cars are the ideal speaker environment

Large flat reflective surface right in front of your face. More large flat reflective surfaces inches from your ears. Speakers down by your feet, some within inches others several feet away. With a great big obstacle in between. Honestly, it is hard to think of anything less ideal. Compared to a car your coat closet is a dedicated listening room.

The one thing about a car from a designers point of view, they do know the volume. Whatever the options, at least the volume stays the same.

So you have confused ideal with uniform. This happens all the time. May I suggest a dictionary? If all you did was start using words according to their actual meanings the improvement from that one thing alone would be, uh, outsatanding.

I always have pretty good sound. Just no soundstage, no closing my eyes and point out the instruments location. Clarity, in lows, mids and highs, never an issue. Magic though?

Can get pretty close in a van or RV if you really watch what your doing..

My Camry will please. I tightened the whole thing up with dampening mat.
4 doors, trunk, and floor boards.

It’s all wonderful until I start it.. LOL

Alpine head set
10k watt system. Three, power amps. Two 3K stereos and one 4K mono. class ds 1/2 ohm stable. YUP 1/2 ohm..
COOL as cucumbers.. at 4 and 8 ohm.

I use a 30 farad cap bank, all wired with SOOW 4 x 4 gauge copper. I still have most all of my trunk and it looks beautiful it’s all in armor and mounted in two custom modified well pockets either side of a FULL size spare, behind the rear tires. Dude it can bounce.. Kids can’t believe a single 10" and my setup can hit 120+ db.. 124 actually AND I drive up, all grandpa like..:-) Stone stock 2003 Camry. Perfect shape..

You pop the trunk and swing the doors open up against a two story about 60 foot wide.. :-) Its clear, that’s, all but good... MONO ay...

The second 12 VDC battery is in the spare compartment centered under the spare. Lithium. 200 amp alternator and a Gel Cell for the starter, main and computer circuits.

I’m wired at 4 ohms for the bass and 8 ohms for the doors, dash, and rear deck.

Single 10" IB (sealed) rear
4 6 x 9 coaxial in the doors
4 tweet buttons AMT doors
4 5 1/4 coaxial front kick panels and rear deck
2 top mount dash 3" FR drivers

Again looks all factory.. The Organic Mechanic strikes again.
Boom Boom. "Da Club" comes to mind.. little Carlos, War.. Cisco Kid. :-)

Guy/Girls.. 1000.00 at the most.. all the drivers, less the tweets and sub, are pro drivers. I did the work.. No funblin fool in my cars or PUs..

Regards

i am not fond of listening in my car save for long trip....

Car is midway between an headphone box around your ears and a small room....

The imbalance between reflective surface and other absorbent and diffusive surface is extreme not unlike a nude room...No uniformity here except the uniformity of reflective surface all around......

In a car source is most of the times problematic, external and internal noises, listening position is unbalanced in regard to speakers and speakers have generally drastic limitations of their own.......

I can understand that a speaker designer want to begins with precise measurement from one specific room or car tough and can create a work of acoustic art for sure...


BUT,


A thing i know is ALL speakers need room controls, a pair of speaker cannot replace the room settings by a miracle in the design....They can be designed to accomadate particular room or position for sure...

The speakers are often a box and the room is a box.....These 2 boxes interact one with another but not only and always in a destructive way, the room impeding the speakers.... By the way that explain why some people falsely claims that near listening free us from room controls...This is not true at all in any small room...

These 2 boxes interact also constructively and the room may add and must add something essential to the speakers....This is the reason why acoustical setting of the room is so fundamental in ALL case....

My main point is that the room or the car are not mainly a source of passive obstacle to be taken care but active player with advantages of their own that may work their part with the speakers..... Acoustical art is the art of balancing this passive deficit with the potential active credit of ANY room...

Controls and treatment are not there to nullify the room and make it like an anechoic chamber, in the opposite, they are there to make the room glorifying the speakers and the speakers glorifying the room... Producing then a unique synergetical room/speakers sound phenomenon...


I suppose then that we can apply the same recipe in a car and create an acoustical marvel in a car like in a specific room....

Room/speakers interaction is UNIQUE phenomenon each time...The same goes with car/speakers.....

Nothing is more powerful in my experience and experiments in audio....

Much less than 'Ideal' but certainly another environment with which to play with EQ.

I heard Richard Clarks Cadillac and his Grand National back in the early 90s on the IASCA circuit. I was gobsmacked. I haven't heard many high end systems that could come close in dynamics, accurate bass reproduction and yes, even imaging. It was two eye opening experiences.