Car Stereos: Speaker placement., inch woofers, focal utopia

Question
Hi,
I have the Focal Utopia NO. 7 and I'll be running this active.  I have two Milbert Bam235ab's and one Mosconi 200.4 AB to do this. I have the Pioneer Dex P99rs.  I'm placing the Focal tweeter and mid range side-by-side on the dash facing up angled at the window. The 6.5 inch woofers will go in the doors.  I'm placing Utopia 21WX BE in the center of the tweeter and mid speaker center dash angled up at the window. What are your impressions and thoughts. This is going in to my 78 Ford pickup that I have restored from the frame up.  The question I guess is "Can I hope for some outstanding sound or will it be run of the mill?

Answer
Hi Dale,

Sound imaging is a real trial and error process.  ESPECIALLY in a pickup truck.

At first read, it would look to me like you're on a good start -- having speakers facing towards free air or a non-pourous surface (your windshield) is a good start.

To get the best sound possible, I'd invest in (or borrow) an SPL meter, and adjust/tune your speakers to give roughly the same dB reading at various frequencies so the sound sounds blended, and not like it's coming from a bunch of distinctly sized speakers with different frequency response ranges.

And remember, the human brain has a hard time finding the location of very high frequency and very low frequency sounds, so you don't have to spend /as much/ effort into the placement of small tweeters or big subwoofers.

Justin