How do you listen to music? Need inspiration/ideas for a mobile/bluetooth solution

[ixxified]

Hey there,

I don't want to install a radio on my hotrod - neither do I want fixed speakers somewhere.

But I do want to listen to music, maybe Spotify from the phone and attached via bluetooth to some speaker(s). I do have a cross rollbar in the back - maybe some attachments to it?!

I need some ideas, inspiration, specific speakers, installation ideas .. pictures would be great..

Thanks guys!

[OldSpool87]

Neither my cars have radios and I was thinking this same thing. The JBL Extreme puts out serious sound in a little package. You could probably fab up a mount or just use small bungies to secure it. depending on your level of ocd.

[ixxified]

Thanks for the advice on the speaker .. Haven't seen this one before, the loops on both sides might be great to attach some leather strap or something .. dont want to have mounts or brackets or smth.. Therefore this could work ..

Anyone else who did this and can share pictures?

[gomezoneill]

I use Spotify in my cars and love it. I have a bluetooth amp in the house too.

[Tonethebone]

Personally I opt to drop the top and listen to the 3.0 litre symphony as I wind her through the twistys. Beethoven would have loved this score!

[ian c2]

I listened to a few options in the “portable waterproof Bluetooth” section at best-Buy late last year .
I can’t recommend any , as I ended up buying a Bluetooth adapter and using an old pair of pc monitors instead (work break area) , but what I will recommend is listening before you buy as there was quite a large difference between what are all basically same-sized speakers .
They seemed to come in 2 sizes . Coke can , and beer can . Beer can more expensive but sounded better , Allthough one coke-can was giving them a run for their money ...

They’re small and light enough they could be fastened onto a sun-visor or radio delete plate etc with a Velcro strap or similar .
Most could be “paired” so you could have a stereo pair too .

Not sure on battery life , but that should be a concern too if you don’t want to wire .

[Jonny042]

Noise isolating earbuds from Klipsch.

[ian c2]

I hate buds .
And so do cops ....

Bose just brought out some sunglasses with speakers built in !!

[ian c2]

Off-topic , but photobucket have been holding my photos to ransom for years and I’ve been refusing to pay to access them .
Then whilst searching for info on a 964 build I’m doing I come across “hostage photos” from a 964 I built about 15 years ago ...

Not really a hot-rod stereo ....
Just one McIntosh amp weighs around one million pounds
but boy did it sound good !

That McIntosh head-unit would be perfect for an early car looks-wise , and was just temporary as I had a problem with the permanent one running ipod .
It ended up in my sisters 73 vw camper , but then she got offered “a great deal” so traded it in for a $100 unit with Bluetooth ....
That was a great deal .
For the d1ck at the stereo store that takes advantage of clueless customers ...

[Tbone1209]

Saw a beautiful hotrod at last year's Rgruppe Treffen. Had two UE Booms mounted on the floors in front of each seat. They had hard wired power running to them and a cool little bracket fabbed up to hold them tight. Sounded fairly good though not magnificent which is what you'd expect from such a system. Wish I'd taken pictures.

[ian c2]

I just googled ue boom .
The volume +and - buttons look familiar , so I believe that’s one I auditioned at Best Buy .

At the time , we had a bang-olufsen Bluetooth speaker on the bedroom sink/make-up unit counter that blew the socks of anything I heard in Best Buy .
Was a small funky looking thing . I have a subwoofer the same shape in the front room tv system .
If you’re going to go rear seat route it would open up a lot of options size wise , and the b&o ones would easily fit , but then you’d need 12v running and an inverter (not sure but I don’t think it had a battery as it used to go off once she was ready and carrying it to the kitchen to get coffee)

Besides , I’m not sure I like the idea of rear speakers .
I rarely go to a concert and sit with my back to the stage

There’s a guy at work who’s phone plays real loud and has bass too (which you need in a car or it’ll sound like a tin-can stereo) , he’s a gadget freak so I’ll ask him what he’s done to it as it’s no doubt cheaply modded
He was showing me last week how it projects his screen onto the wall to watch movies in 65” .
I now know why his production figures are so much lower than everybody else’s

[AG81]

I went with a system less the head unit..... Everything hidden away. Any bluetooth device is your source. I am using a JL Audio TwK-88 for my bluetooth interface. It has both Analog & Digital Inputs.
Bluetooth device is a Mosconi AMAS-2.

[ian c2]

There are lots available options for a streaming device , mainly made for the marine market as amps etc are hidden away in waterproof area .
Some are as small as an electric window switch .
If you’re wiring in permanent this is definately what I’d would do .
I have a little stereo Mosconi and a JL mini-block somewhere in the garage that will give great sound in a tiny footprint .
Or you could buy a bang and olufsen ice amp of eBay etc and build your own tiny class-d in a custom cabinet .

BUT , you still have to wire it , and you still have to have speakers .
And the op is shying away from this .

There are plenty of lightweight speakers available to go with lightweight amps (mcclaren specced there own for the f1 that are pretty light) , but it’s the placement of them that’s hard if you want the look of a hot rod with no stereo ..
and if if they sound crap when you’ve hidden them , there’s no real point in going to the trouble to install them .
It’s a tough one to think about .

[ian c2]

I just had a realization that they’re probably in the dining room ...
I’m currently living in a 4-bed garage as I have too much going on and too little space in the garage

Here’s some pics of the mini components and the carbon-fiber speakers that where going to go with them in that now abandoned project .
A 12” sub would take up more room and weigh more than that system

If you’re in Europe , especially England , some of the early genesis amps can be got for a song on the used market and have a relatively small footprint.

[ian c2]

Originally Posted by ian c2

There’s a guy at work who’s phone plays real loud and has bass too (which you need in a car or it’ll sound like a tin-can stereo) , he’s a gadget freak so I’ll ask him what he’s done to it as it’s no doubt cheaply modded
He was showing me last week how it projects his screen onto the wall to watch movies in 65” .
I now know why his production figures are so much lower than everybody else’s

I asked him today what it was and its a JBL attachment for his Motorola Phone , but apparently it’s only for Motorola phones

https://www.jbl.com/JBL+SOUNDBOOST+II.html?dwvar_JBL%20SOUNDBOOST%20II _color=Black%20Matte-USA-Current

[Cajundaddy]

Most car sound solutions have been a grand disappointment for me, even with a high price tag. Too high of a noise floor and too many acoustic compromises. When I want to REALLY listen to music I use these, mostly on long highway trips or airplanes. No, I don't give a rats azz if cops don't feel comfortable with me wearing them on the road.

These are the newer versions of the ones I own which I have used for 10+ years.

https://www.amazon.com/Shure-SE215-CL-Isolating-Earphones-MicroDriver/dp/B004PO10E2

[ixxified]

Thanks guys for all the input .. Still on the fence - checked out a few speakers these days (btw I liked the coke can and beer can comparison ;-)) but I have to say these weren't really enough .. Headphones yeah well .. I did that with noice canceling phones from Bose - nice but it also cancels off your engine sound .. hmmm

I need to check out these JBL systems mentioned above ..

And you got me - speakers in the back .. Was just an idea (b/c there is space) but you're right .. ;-) Should think before I speak (message to myself ;-))

[et cetera]

I'm building out my car to be a lightweight hot rod, so I pulled the entire stereo system. I still wanted the ability to listen to some music. I've wired up a set of 2 inch speakers to a bluetooth amp module and installed them in the space where the radio goes. It turns on when the car does and syncs to my phone automatically.

I used an old Anker Soundcore for a container and just swapped out the board with something simpler. So, its basically the same sound you would get from a portable bluetooth speaker, not great but better than nothing. The whole thing weighs maybe a pound.

I'm now working on a dash trim that is going to have a mesh grill over the speakers. Should blend well with some basket weave vinyl.

I may eventually try to upgrade the speakers and board to something with a little more power. At some point I'll have a write up on my build thread.

[merlinfe]

This was my solution. It works very well although now there are Marine amps with the bluetooth built in. The speakers fade into the doors cards after a while and you don't really notice that they are there. I get the want for astheticaly pleasing interiors however.

Radio Delete / Hidden Audio install

- Steve

[darrin]

I did something very similar to Merlinfe -- use a bluetooth module to feed music to 2 channel amp with my iphone -- the iphone's volume buttons control the speaker volume and I mounted the amp (a vintage a/d/s powerplate I bought used for a song) under the passenger seat. I went with separate tweeters (mounted high on doors) and 5.5" woofers in the traditional door location. Suspect the OP could use some form of acoustically transparent(ish) fabric/etc. on the door cards to make the speakers pretty darn hard to see/spot. Advantage here is that it's stealthy but sounds great.