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Rainbow IQ 320.25 install, reviews, and pics

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
Now that a bunch of us have this speaker set it's time to get to work doing some installs and posting pics/reviews. It will probably be a few weeks at least before I install but I'll start with my first impressions and some basic pics.

I've had a few different sets of mid-range components in various cars...MB Quart (back when they were better), Boston Acoustics Pro Series, and Elemental Designs are what I remember off the top of my head. These look like a decent quality product. I was definitely surprised at how small the motor structure/magnet is on the woofer though. The woofers also have stamped baskets as opposed to heavy duty cast baskets. As a result they feel light and kind of unimpressive for an 8" driver. I'll leave it at that for now and wait until I actually have them installed and playing to make any further judgments. The mids and tweets are about what I expected. The x-overs are fairly large and one of mine took a bit of a beating knocking around in the bottom of the box. It has some scuffs and the circuit board doesn't clip into the housing completely secure but a little hot glue should take care of that. That's about all I have for now...on to the pics!













 
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1canuck2

Ready to race!
Location
Ontario, Canada
Waiting and watching...
 

hatnlvr

Newbie
Location
Southern FL
Car(s)
07GTI,08GL450,08997T
Subscribed. I will have mine on Monday (didn't get them threw the group buy but I already had the order in before they sprung that).
 

6spdcoupe

Passed Driver's Ed
Location
Central Jersey
Car(s)
'06 E55 AMG
No worries on the midbass bud, it will be quite substantial. Neo motors serve the purpose of small and light weight, but make no mistake, they lack nothing in performance ! ;)
 

1canuck2

Ready to race!
Location
Ontario, Canada
Yes they are for the front doors.
They are supposed to be plug and play, both fitment and wiring, but that remains to be confirmed by the peeps who just bought them.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
I'm not sure about plug-and-play wiring. I've never seen the stock wiring but the speaker set comes with what looks like a single connection into the OEM harness to one of the x-over units (2 per side) and the tweeter lead has a plug on it as well. That leaves some wiring between x-overs and to other speakers. I could be wrong...maybe all the stock wiring is used but the majority of the instructions for install are in German.
 

danadeny

New member
Location
Baltimore
cool, cant wait to find out. i've been doing some research and these sound like the only product out there that comes close fitting with minimal modifications if any.
 

1canuck2

Ready to race!
Location
Ontario, Canada
I'm not sure about plug-and-play wiring. I've never seen the stock wiring but the speaker set comes with what looks like a single connection into the OEM harness to one of the x-over units (2 per side) and the tweeter lead has a plug on it as well. That leaves some wiring between x-overs and to other speakers. I could be wrong...maybe all the stock wiring is used but the majority of the instructions for install are in German.

Well, I don't have a set (and am eager awaiting some impressions before getting in on the new group buy), but by using the stock wiring, I meant you don't need to pull new wires from the HU to the door, etc.

I'd certainly assume you need some additional wire to wire the crossovers but this should be peanuts and cheap, compared to doing an entire new wiring install.

Anyone who has a set: did it come with any wiring for crossover to speaker, etc?

How does the install look like its gonna be wiring-wise?
 

chadillac3

Zapco
Location
Iowa
I could be crazy, but unless you tap into the wiring behind the stock amp (or crossover if you don't have the amp) you're going to need to wire directly to the passives.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
Passives? If you want to run an after market amp then yes, you'll need to either pull new wire into the doors or intercept the stock wiring from the HU. But just talking about installing these speakers...no need to mess with any wiring aside from what is already inside the doors. best I can tell from the included parts, there is a harness that plugs directly into the stock stuff and hooks into either one or both of the x-over units. I can post a pic tonight.

I could be crazy, but unless you tap into the wiring behind the stock amp (or crossover if you don't have the amp) you're going to need to wire directly to the passives.
 

chadillac3

Zapco
Location
Iowa
If you don't use the included passives, then you're not going to benefit from any potential custom tuning for these drivers. On the product page for these the Rainbow site said they did different crossover slopes, points etc for each side...that "work" is done by the passives they included. Otherwise, why bother including them? They speakers have to get wired to the included passives somehow. Or perhaps the included passives just replace the door passive.

I was under the impression that the cars with the separate premium amplifier have active processing in the amplifier, but perhaps not.
 

ZPrime

Big Geek
Location
Mayfield Heights, OH
Car(s)
2008 R32, 3603/5000
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