How To Achieve The Best Sound From The Bmw E36 Audio System
Several people are the proud owners of BMW’s compact luxury car the E36 or the E46. The E46 came out in coupe convertible hatchback sedan and even station wagon body styles. Although no longer in production the E36 and E46 are superior automobiles that are a pleasure to drive. While you are driving you will want to listen to something interesting such as music. Your BMW’s sound system makes that possible. When it comes to your E36 audio system including the E36 speakers or the E46 speakers you will want to understand a bit about how speakers work such as knowing the difference between passive and active crossover in speakers in order to ensure that you will achieve the best sound from your BMW’s audio system.
Sound is produced by waves that occur due to changes in air pressure. Fast wave vibrations produce highpitched sounds while slower vibrations create lowpitched sounds. Within your BMW’s speaker system are different kinds of drivers which are built to best accommodate certain types of sound frequencies. Woofers pick up lowpitched sounds well while tweeters are crafted to easily produce highpitched sounds well. Midrange drivers are there to capture all of the best of the sounds in the middle of the frequency range. For each driver to do its specialized job first the frequency signal has to be broken down into low high and mid ranges. E36 speakers use crossover to perform this vital function.
There are two types of crossover: passive and active. Passive crossover uses inductors and capacitors to break up the sound frequencies into units that the drivers can handle. Crossover capacitors are attached to tweeters and crossover inductors are connected to woofers. Both capacitors and inductors are attached to midrange drivers. Capacitors do a great job of conducting sound frequencies that are above a certain range and not such a great job conducting lowerfrequencies. Because the tweeter is designed to deal with high frequencies the capacitor feeds it frequencies it is best designed to handle. The opposite is true of the inductor. An inductor can best accommodate frequencies lower than a certain preset level and those low frequencies are what the woofer is waiting for in order to produce those deep bass lines in your music that you hear. Because the midrange signals will produce frequencies in between what the inductor or capacitor could handle alone both are connected to a midrange driver in order to send it the signals for which it is designed.
For those desiring a bit more ease of use and precision of exactly which frequencies will be sent to the components active crossovers might be for you. Each driver comes with an amplifier and these active devices break up the signals before they get to the amplifier. This allows you to personally adjust the range of frequency you want to send to a particular driver. They are however more expensive than passive systems.
Quality speaker components makes your car’s music beautiful.
About the writer: Wayne Hemrick is an audio technician and BMW owner who truly appreciates audio excellence. In this article Wayne explores how to get the most pleasure from your E46 speakers and E36 speakers. His clear explanation on how speakers work will help you get the most from your E36 audio system.
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