Sound System and Water Cooling

Attached are two photos of Pachuca's sound system that we commissioned today. ... Well ... it's really a car radio system but modern car systems are pretty good.

The centre piece is a Pioneer DEHP3950MP "CD Receiver" which has an AM/FM tuner, a CD player, and can deal with MP3 and other inputs. At the back are RCA connectors for various peripherals such as a 6-CD stacker or an amplifier. It has two auxiliary inputs, with Aux1 at the front. It is described as follows:

DEHP3950MP PIONEER CD TUNER
\MP3 WMA REMOTE

• In Dash CD Tuner with MP3, WMA, WAV and Detachable Face Security.
• DFS (Detachable Face Security)
• Card IR Remote Control.
• BMX (BiMetric Equalizer)
• SUPERTUNER IIId with Digital Processing.

The speakers are a pair of "marine ready' Kicker 05KS693. They're described as follows:

Kicker 05KS693 6"x9" 3-Way 180W Car Speakers3-way 6" x 9" speakers Curvilinear Injection Molded Polygraphite (CIMP) woofer Santoprene surround 2-1/2" Midrange 1" Kaladex semi-dome tweeter Low-profile, high-strength steel basket RMS Power Handling: 90 watts Peak Power Handling: 180 watts Frequency response: 30 - 21,000 Hz Sensitivity: 92 dB Top-mount depth: 3-3/16" Priced per pair Car speakers are usually come as a pair unless noted differently.

Stephen and Brenda came for lunch and to start up and evaluate the system. We played a CD and it sounded great. After Stephen tweaked some of the settings it sounded even better. We then simulated a movie session while at sea. We plugged the inverter into a cigarette lighter plug that I wired up next to the receiver then used a cable to connect the earphones outlet of the laptop into the AUX1 input of the Pioneer. We put on Matrix Reloaded and started watching. The sound was full and robust, but with a bit of hum. Stephen has a small amplifier that we can put in line between the laptop and the Pioneer which he says should do the trick. Then he plugged in his MP3 player into the Pioneer and the sound was superb. Finally we connected Brenda's short wave/AM/FM radio to the Pioneer and the sound was excellent.

The plan was to use the Pioneer-Kicker combo as a Hi-Fi stereo sound outlet for various systems and we think that we have been successful.

Attached photo 0551 shows Stephen at the table in front of the system. I built the speaker boxes with 9mm marine ply, lined inside with 3mm of rubber material. The receiver is set into a face board of 12mm ply and is open at the back to ensure good cooling. 0552 shows Brenda and Stephen watching the movie.

The 3rd photo shows the final work for the day. The blue item is a repaired anti-siphon valve. The previous one was blown with the result that it acted as a salt-water shower over the running engine. It was mounted to that piece of masonite that you'll see leaning against the wall just to the right of the black hose. Masonite! Can anyone believe this? The water filter to the left was not much better off. It was hanging on by one screw. I've mounted the items onto varnished piece of marine ply cut for the role.

Robert