rossinio

The default bridgestones were so bad, I didn't really believe it until I changed to the as5s

I heard a good trick is to do a before and after drive (at speed) with the boot empty vs full (usually of holiday stuff) to see if that makes a difference. The biggest thing is still the tyres though. Annoyingly road surfaces in the UK are generally very bad, it is only when you get to good tarmac you really notice the difference. I also did silentcoat under the bonnet and bought the skoda cover to go over it which may have helped a bit. Mine is all just silentcoat to stop vibration with closed cell foam over the top. Without the mass loaded vinyl it is not finished yet. https://www.deadening.co.uk have loads of stuff.

Another vote for Goodyear Asymmetric 5, make sure they have right amount of air in them for best results, I added recommended for 4 people. The Bridgestones it came with were garbage in comparison. I have also done a fair bit of noise insulation in boot, under rear seat but still not got around to adding the mass loaded vinyl I bought a year and a half ago.. I also haven't touched the door panels, and the buzzing noise in right door panel decelerating between 3k and 2k without using pedal seems to have temporarily vanished.

Fronts were just a pain with axle stands and a jack, I had to remove some soundproofing once I tried to put it back together as there wasn't enough room above the wheel arch liner round the wheel. I would love a garage and a flat surface to do this stuff on, it would make it a lot easier.. I've already done the boot (but not above the wheel arches) with silentcoat 4mm and 6mm CCF. It did make a difference, but MLV will make more. Doors is after everything else I also did under the rear bench seat with silentcoat/CCF but not sure if that really did anything. On calibration, I just had another go with the umik-1 and used the RTA with the automatic mode, from 100 - 1k, then 1k - 10k, then 10k -18k. I did front left and right and it has made a big difference (and is much easier than doing it by ear or with REW etc). It's on my other laptop but I'll get screenshots of the EQ. I also did input alignment with the input signal analyser to get things flat first. I'm routing FL->RL and FR->RR, my rears are 4db lower than fronts and it seems much more sensible. For some reason I got better sound with "4 channel Input Front/Rear" in the routing mode section, needs another look as previously I did have it on 2 channel input. Very tempted by the Focal IS165VW, but will be when I get to doors. I didn't realise you could just pop out the rivets (and that they are plastic). It's not obvious from photos and I thought you would need to drill them out. If everything is a straight swap then it seems like a good idea, do you need to buy extra connectors for the speaker cables or do you reused the existing ones?

Thanks, when I get a chance I'll go through the videos. I'm still not 100% happy with it, mainly due to lack of isolation from road noise and a sound that has bass but feels unbalanced. MLV is next in the boot area when I get time.. I did the arch on the front right (from outside the car, after removing wheel and arch liner) with silentcoat 4mm and 6mm closed cell foam but tbh it doesn't sound much different to the left when I am the passenger. It was a lot (lot) of effort and I should have done the boot mlv instead. Getting the interior panels off to reach the rear arches isn't obvious from the workshop manual but I'm going to try removing the covering panel next to the glass above the rear seats. Once you have full access to the rear arches it looks like you have quite a lot of room for silentcoat/ccf/mlv which should really help. Main improvement so far is still the tyres, going from awful Bridgestone Potanza S001 to Goodyear Asymmetric 5 has completely changed the amount of road noise. Still cheaper than the amp I see quite a few people now saying the M5DSP sounds much better on high power mode. Is it really that noticeable, even with stock speakers? Also, how did you remove the rivets for the stock speakers? Another annoying creak seems to have appeared but only when the passenger is in the seat, sounds like plastic creaking but need to be the passenger for a while to isolate it. Thought it was the speaker at first..

Just switched to 2 channel input and dropped the rears by 3db, massive difference. What were Skoda thinking with the rears in standard setup? I've dumped my old config done with the RTA/mic and gone with trying to do it by ear using a lot of different music. It's only in the car that I am ok with the "loudness wars" as some of the older recordings need a lot more effort to sound good. The actual EQ looks pretty awful visually but at least it sounds better! I recently got new tyres which has dropped ambient noise significantly, next up is doing the boot with MLV (already has silentcoat and closed cell foam on top). Doors is on the list as well..

Great stuff, as long as they don't get noisier!

Bit the bullet and got Goodyear Asymmetric 5s fitted yesterday for £333 from black circles fitted at a local garage. Much much better than awful Potenzas. Did a full alignment on all 4 corners (£100), toe was well out on both front and rear and steering angle was out a lot as well. Next test is on bad roads nearby and at motorway speeds. Recommended..

I've got the service workshop manual (body) pdf but it looks like you need to rip out so much to get to it. Remove seat bench, side airbag, wheel house trim panel, trim panel of panel c, seat back rest etc etc etc Looking for a shortcut!

I've been doing a fair bit of soundproofing but can't get to the rear arches from the inside. I've followed the service manual but it starts getting hairy as soon as it gets to the plastic part at the top behind the rear seats where the seat release handle is. Has anyone done this before who can give me a hint? I can't believe I have to remove the rear seat backs etc to get to this..

I've gone through the steps in the "magazines" using their RTA in the tool with a calibrated mic (umik-1) and it sounded ok, but it's still a dark art. E.g. Placebo "Nancy Boy" or Nine Inch Nails sounds weak but anything like Anjunadeep or actual techno sounds fine (both Spotify via Android Auto). I suspect that converting to full power mode would really help (even with stock speakers) but I am very hesitant to run wiring to the battery (for now). Only concern about getting the door panels off is putting it back together and getting rattles, but at least we don't have to deal with that awful black goop like my old mx5! Your bit about source material is spot on, it's always frustrating getting better audio equipment and noticing bad mixes, awful compression etc etc.

Incredible! Very impressed, I couldn't figure out how to get to my rear arches on the hatchback without dismantling everything including rear seat back :( I see in your pictures that you managed to do it but looks like a lot more work on hatchback. i would be very very interested in seeing your m5dsp results after tuning. I'm still struggling a bit, I can make dance music sound pretty good but really having a harder time with rock & vocals.. The other thing I have noticed is that it is much easier to get a half decent sound on the drive but this doesn't translate to something good on the motorway due to all the road noise. This is with silent coat and noise isolator across boot floor and back seat. I even did the driver side arch from the outside but didn't make much difference. If only I could get to the rear arches.. I actually have some mass loaded vinyl so that might be next project for the rear. How much difference did deadening the door panels do?

I'm also looking for this.. Plain matt black would be fine as well

That's v interesting, what did you have before, was it potenza s001? Did you notice a real difference?

Rotated the tyres and saw that the rears (now at the front) had pretty bad uneven wear after ~6k miles so I will be doing a full alignment when I change the tyres, hopefully on a hunter machine. Still no closer to choosing a quiet tyre, latest tyrereviews video has Goodyear asymmetric 5 as a good choice still for 18" so leaning towards that or the crossclimates. As5 are very reasonably priced on blackcircles atm.