Quite a few months ago, when the newly minted Illusion audio (Illusion Audio) products were just starting to come on line, I was approached by a senior sales manager at ORCA Design (ORCA Design & Manufacturing) about building a demo vehicle for him. Right away, when I heard the words demo car, I was thinking show car with products and glitz everywhere...not my usual cup of tea; but immediately, I realized this wasnt going to be that type of project.
The car, a current gen 2009 Scion Xb, is his daily driver, and the goals are:
1. to achieve a nice level of sound quality with illusion audio and Mosconi products in order to showcase them to current and potential dealers. It will also attend sound quality meets and comps to just be part of the community.
2. All the products need to be visible as it is a marketing tool for potential dealers.
3. The hatch area still needs to be stealthy and usable in order for products to be carried on sales trips.
4. Maintain a simple and classy theme in line with the brand quality and daily driven nature of the vehicle.
So...lets get started.
first a few quick shots of the car itself, not much has been done to it, other than being lowered and on rims, I actually really like how the rear tires fill the well...and not an ounce of rubbing anywhere during my test drives:
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Needless to say, ORCA supplied all the products :D
The signal starts with a Kenwood 9990 nav/dvd all in one headunit...installed in the stock location:
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The iPod and USB cables were routed to the glove box:
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And I added a simple push off/release on momentary switch to a blank panel to serve as the bypass switch. This design is very simple and reliable and works with any Kenwood, pioneer and Sony units, just push it once and off you go.
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The car of course, uses a Mosconi 6to8DSP for tuning, and all adjustments are done from the front seat using a Bluetooth enabled laptop:
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So, moving onto the front stage.
We chose to go with a 3 way set consisting of the Carbon C6 midbass, C4 midrange, and tweeter.
The midbass were installed in the stock lower door location but with a twist. As mentioned before, the idea is that the drivers need to be visible at all times for marketing purposes....even though as you'd imagine, with how shallow the speakers are, they can fit behind the oem door car with zero issues.
So I approached the door build in the same manner I would if the speaker was too deep to fit behind the door card; that is to build it out, and then mold a front trim ring onto the door card.
So here is what the final results look like, with a ring wrapped in graphite Alcantara:
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The car, a current gen 2009 Scion Xb, is his daily driver, and the goals are:
1. to achieve a nice level of sound quality with illusion audio and Mosconi products in order to showcase them to current and potential dealers. It will also attend sound quality meets and comps to just be part of the community.
2. All the products need to be visible as it is a marketing tool for potential dealers.
3. The hatch area still needs to be stealthy and usable in order for products to be carried on sales trips.
4. Maintain a simple and classy theme in line with the brand quality and daily driven nature of the vehicle.
So...lets get started.
first a few quick shots of the car itself, not much has been done to it, other than being lowered and on rims, I actually really like how the rear tires fill the well...and not an ounce of rubbing anywhere during my test drives:
Needless to say, ORCA supplied all the products :D
The signal starts with a Kenwood 9990 nav/dvd all in one headunit...installed in the stock location:
The iPod and USB cables were routed to the glove box:
And I added a simple push off/release on momentary switch to a blank panel to serve as the bypass switch. This design is very simple and reliable and works with any Kenwood, pioneer and Sony units, just push it once and off you go.
The car of course, uses a Mosconi 6to8DSP for tuning, and all adjustments are done from the front seat using a Bluetooth enabled laptop:
So, moving onto the front stage.
We chose to go with a 3 way set consisting of the Carbon C6 midbass, C4 midrange, and tweeter.
The midbass were installed in the stock lower door location but with a twist. As mentioned before, the idea is that the drivers need to be visible at all times for marketing purposes....even though as you'd imagine, with how shallow the speakers are, they can fit behind the oem door car with zero issues.
So I approached the door build in the same manner I would if the speaker was too deep to fit behind the door card; that is to build it out, and then mold a front trim ring onto the door card.
So here is what the final results look like, with a ring wrapped in graphite Alcantara:
