Car Stereo & Security No. 52 - Son of Seismic II

In October of 1996, British news stands offered issue number 52 of Car Stereo & Security magazine with the first article on Car Audio Product's van.

If you're wondering why normally sane
people would look like this, try polishing
Perspex until 4am, and you'll find out!

Paul, the team and I had not even finished the installation when these the first shots were taken.
Despite the fact that market expectation was great, no one outside of our shop had any idea of what the van would have. Everyone in the circuit expected a bass car. So when the word went out that we had cut holes in the floor, speculation of a rule-breaking port to the outside spread quickly. But as everybody found later, the only thing blowing air to the exterior of this award winning vehicle was the incredibly powerful cooling system that kept the amps in the motorized racks from getting toasty.
The following is the transcript of the article. Enjoy!

Unfortunately I well remember the demise of 'Seismic' - the first demonstration van in the UK. It was on the way back to the importers' offices in London from a Sound-Off in Torquay when it suffered a serious engine fire. How serious? Serious enough to destroy the interior and audio installation completely. There was much mourning and deep depression in the land.

Then came 'Son of Seismic' and an all-new van. But by the end of the 1995 season, the guys at Car Audio Products felt that even more could be achieved. So a new installation was devised, and this time the aim was to produce a system that could compete in both SPL and Point of Reference classes at expert level. The intention was also for the van to make a trip to the US to compete with the best the States has to offer. Bring on the 'Son of Seismic II'.

It requires hours and hours of work to make the edge of a piece
of plexi catch the light like this. When the POR system
is in use, there's a set of solid grilles to cover this lot.

Before we get into the meat-and-two-veg of the feature, I ought to point out that the system isn't totally finished. But even so, there's so much to talk about that I could fill the whole magazine with what's been done. And before we go any further, let me point out one thing - if you think that this is just a revamp of the system used last year, you just couldn't be further from the truth. Every component, cable and panel was removed from the vehicle before work commenced on the current project seven months ago, Since then, a total of 6,500 man-hours has gone into it. In all, seven people have been working on the system although the three main stalwarts are Pail Richardson, who is responsible for the design of the SPL side of the system; Alberto Lopez, designer of the POR side; and Nathan Pearce helping out with the actual physical cutting, shaping, fitting and wiring. And believe me, there is enough cable in the thing to wire an old-style telephone exchange. 

Three Into One

The back of the grilles just
have to be seen to be believed.

The installation in 'SoS II' is actually two completely separate systems, with only the head unit as a common component. One is essentially for sound quality and the other for SPL and demonstration purposes, although there are actually some differences between what's used for the latter two. I really can't go through a list of the products used since there wouldn't be any space left to tell you about some of the more intricate parts of the installation. In total there are 46 speakers (16 of these being 15in woofersused for the SPL system); 18 Earthquake 1000BX amplifiers, including two which have been modified to run in pure class A at 30W per channel; two 240A alternators; 18 batteries; three signal processors and two head units. I'm sure you appreciate why I'm not going to go into how the whole lot is connected...

The rather strange positioning of the
Eton drivers is not for looks; the system
has been fired up with the amps outside the
vehicle and is said to "image like a charm".

Although we can't show you a picture of all the head-unit installation because it wasn't quite there at the time of my visit, let me assure you that it's definitely something speacial. In fact, you won't actually be able to see a head unit at all. The display has been custom-made and will go behind a smoked plexi panel in the top of the centre of the completely custom-built dash. Yes, that's correct - there is nothing of the original dashboard left in the vehicle. the one that's there has been built from scratch from 1in MDF which is filled, sanded and trimmed to perfection. Getting back to the head-unit, the display is in the dash but the main player is in the bottom of the centre console - the discs are inserted via a small slot in the driver's side. A custom-made set of controls has been manufactured and built into a stylish armrest in between the seats, giving superb ergonomic experience from the driver's chair. 

Crankin'

For the demo part of the
system, Paul reckoned
they needed a bit more Hf
than the Eton tweeters had
to offer. So there are five
more in each kick panel.

For real SPL frenzies, you wouldn't actually want to be inside. After all, the old system in the van recorded a score of over 150 at events last year, and the new system i sure to improve on that. So, they're in the process of building a console that'll plug into the van, making the system fully controllable from outside. Talking of control, to ensure that the system has enough power on tap, the regulators for the alternators (capable of producing 500A between them) can sense the voltage of the supply to the audio system or the van's own electrical system depending on what it's required. The actual voltage at which the regulators operate can also be adjusted.

The custom-made control panel for the
head-unit is located in the centre arm rest.

All the power form the two alternators runs to the rear of the vehicle (where the amp racks are) via a pair of 1/0 gauge cables and of course the earthing for the engine has been uprated to a similar dimension. Each amplifier has its own battery and each woofer has its own amplifier, connected with 8AWG cable. The signal for the woofer array also passes through a USD pro equaliser and is time-aligned before it gets to the amplifiers. As with all the clear acrylic panels used in the van - and there is an awful lot of them - all of the edges of the baffles between the woofers  have been polished by hand to an incredible finish. The hours required to do this really can't be justified but it's superb to see.

Sound Quality

The sound quality or point of reference system uses the head-unit that's been grafted into the vehicle. The output from the unit can be switched one of two ways - either directly into the two previously mentioned modified Earthquake 1000 BX amplifiers for the listening part of a Sound Off competition or via a pair of USD equalisers for the RTA section. As well as being modified to run in Class A, there are other changes to the amplifiers. Once the correct input gain levels were found, the pots were removed and replaced with fixed-value resisters and all the bass EQ and crossover facilities were removed. It's not the head-unit volume control which i actually used to select the listening levelof the system but a set of high-quality motorised pots placed just before the amplifier in the signal path.

Photographing plexi is never an easy task, but I'm sure you
can see the perfection of this piece. Beneath it are the two fuses
for main power cables and the two alternator regulators.
oh - they've even used Zeus fasteners - like with F1
bodywork - to make changing a fuse a quick job.

The sound-quality system uses a completely different speaker array from the SPL side. All the speakers (two 8in woofers two 51/4in mids and a pair of 3/4in tweeters) are from the German ETON company, ho manufactures raw drive units for domestic loudspeakers, although there has been some modification of the units to suit this application - such as increasing the cone mass of the woofers.

The bus-bars connecting the 16 batteries - one for
each sub amplifier - take a hell of a lot of polishing.
There's even a stiffening cap for each amplifier as well. 

As for the apeaker positioning, this is quite radical although I have been reassured by Alberto that it's a proven method of placement. Both the mids and tweeters are mounted into the floor of the vehicle. The mids are mounted into the best piece of plexi shaping that I've seen in a car in the UK. The material was shaped over a die so that an angle mounting for the speaker was formed. This was then machined to within 0.015in so that the speaker would seal perfectly when installed. All the speaker fixings into the plexi are via Allen bolts and proper captive fixings so that a good tight joint can be formed without causing cracks in the acrylic. Behind these drivers is a small enclosure made from many layers of fiberglass; this actually hangs below the original vehicle floor. 

Here are just six of the 16 amps, held
in a pair of forced air-cooled motorised
amp racks. Even though none of the wiring
is going to be on display, it's all been
loomed beautifully. 

The tweeters also have one of these tasty-looking enclosures, but they are really there for cosmetic reasons. The two woofers are mounted in the rear section of the centre console using an aperiodic system to "...improve the load seen by the amplifiers and enhance the low-end response". All the speakers in the van have two sets of grilles, the idea being that when either the sound quality or the SPL systems are in use neither will interfere or be damaged by the other. And if you look at the quality of these grilles you just can't be anything but impressed. 

Even the tool kit on the back door is all
Snap-On, well except for the Mag-Lite.
I wonder of they'll miss the ratchet
screw driver.

I knew that I was going to run out of space with this feature; there is just so much to cover. I haven't even had a chance to talk about the motorisation of the amp racks and the fact that there isn't one original panel in the interior - all of them have been custom-made. Then there's also the metalwork that went into strengthening the van ready to take the system and... You really have to make an effort to see this system when it's finished. The degree of work that's gone into every little detail is absolutely stunning. Nice one CAP!

Car Stereo & Security No. 52 Cover

Car Stereo & Security No. 52 Index Page

Car Stereo & Security No. 52 First Pages

Car Stereo & Security No. 52 Third Page

Car Stereo & Security No. 52 Fourth Page

Also, don't forget to check the past posts on this vehicle:

Car Stereo & Security No. 51 - Get Some Earth Shaking Bass Poster

Best Sound in a Vehicle - Part I - The Head Unit

Best Sound in a Vehicle
Can I brag? How much? Can I brag a lot? Is it bragging if performance is evidenced by the facts and certified by experts?