When the Ford Motor Company wanted to increase exposure on its new entry-level luxury sedan, the Lincoln Zephyr, the company knew just where to go. MJH Sound, located in the heart of car country in Ann Arbor, MI, was just the ticket. James Norman of MJH took a look at (and a listen to) the Zephyr and knew he wouldn't have to do too much to it. The car comes standard with a six-speed transmission, a head unit with THX processing capabilities and solid MP3 information display. But of course, there's always room for improvement.
Body Building
The Zephyr's a good-looking car, but really, can you ever be too good looking? MJH outfitted the Zephyr with a Body Appearance Package from SMS, an MJH affiliate. This upped the ante with front and rear spoilers, side skirts, a deck lid spoiler and exhaust tips. They also threw on an SMS LED license plate kit and shaved the entry button panel. M1 Autobody gave it a coat of Oxford White Metallic to make it shine. Under the hood, SMS dialed in an ECU tune and added a K&N drop-in filter. The company also outfitted the Zephyr with a Magnaflow Power Exhaust and H&R Springs Lowering Kit.
Taking Stock
It was decided to leave the Zephyr's stock head unit in place. MJH were suitably impressed with its THX processing capabilities and MP3 display. The stock Zephyr amplifier was also judged satisfactory, but to get everything "just so," the signal was directed to the subwoofer amplifiers (more on them later) to add some more voltage and allow the bass to be tuned.
Next, Norman and MJH turned their ears to the soundstage. The stock sound system appeared to be pretty well balanced, but it was determined that the Zephyr was lacking some luster in the 10 to 14kHz range. Some speaker tweaking was definitely in order. Two of the stock high-frequency components in the front doors were replaced with tweeters from Image Dynamics. Image Dynamics tweets were used not only for their power handling but also because they are designed to be crossed over at 900Hz, lower than most tweeters. "Without knowing the crossover frequency of the stock audio system," explains Norman, "it was safe to say the tweeter would be able to react to any signal sent to them."
It should be noted that no sound damping was added to the Zephyr. "It's quite amazing how sound-proof the vehicle is stock," remarks Norman. Even so, in the future, he'd like to add some Dynamat behind the rear taillights and under the rear deck, but for now, hats off to Lincoln.