Well I went to my first SOS Competition.. TMC S.O.S. Detroit!

First off- These bikes are loud clear and definitely have Bass for a motorcycle. The event went very smooth and the judging criteria was laid out ahead of time, and pretty fair.

They were broken down into Light, Middle, and Heavy weight classes. I was a light weight (8 speakers or less, no subs, and limited to 2x10 inch mid-bass).

The SOS team have it down to science; they are not looking for the loudest bike, or the one with the most bass. Balance of all things audio - highs, mids, and lows. They do pay attention to speaker placement as well. If you have some custom things, IE.. Amp racks, clean wiring on display, fabricated brackets (should flow with theme of the bike), and speaker grills and so on. These things all help your score.

So onto the Competition.

I think I did well for my 1st time out of the box. There were some big names and builders on site with their bikes and their customer’s bikes. I got to meet a few and got some good reviews of my system. Daniel Hearn was one of the judges’ and he gave me some good feedback. The competition goes quickly, you get 90 seconds to play as many songs as you would like! But, pick songs that show case your system the best. Don’t play a song that you have not personally heard on your system, volume control is key. They listen for distortion, rattles, clipping, anything that does not sound right will be found and points lost.

Also, look at the height of the tent that you are under, this plays with your vocals and highs depending on how tall the tent is. I was told my vocals and highs were really good and that my bags needed a bit more bass, they could not keep up with My highs and mids. Dan said If I had went a couple clicks down on volume it would have helped.

Some of the Middle weights could still be considered a “riders bike” (not with a lot of storage though).

A few of the heavy weights were modified big time and I don’t think I would be comfortable riding them on some of our Michigan roads. But man, the BASS was ridiculous!

It was a great experience. If you are on Facebook join the Team Money Cycles Sound off Series page. I posted a video. Heck, I even got a shout out last night on the FB Live review done by Rickie Will of the Detroit Competition. He commented that my bike is a “Riders bike”, and they were surprised by my stock looking Ultra and the system I had.



Juice

 

Congrats man! It's a lot of fun for sure. Lightweight is a really competitive class.

 

Congrats Juice. Good write up Juice. I doubt I'll ever get to the competition level with nothing around us for competitions. I think there are a few car competitions still kicking around, but haven't seen any bike ones. Good to know how the light weight category works and good to know what it might take if I guy ever decided to try in Sturgis one of these Summers.

I'll have to try and find the competition at Sturgis this summer to see what goes on.
.

Are you limited to watts, amps, etc or more or less just speakers?

 

dam, 8 speakers with 2 10"s is lightweight? do they count a tweeter or horn as a speaker? just thinking from a strictly amateur side, that 4 or less would be the lowest class? would be fun go check one out though, maybe i'll see if there are any at street vibrations in Reno coming up.

 

No limit on wattage or amps. I have 4 amps and about 3,450 watts. Just speaker type and size.

Juice

 

The regular horn/tweeters(VO B3, ST25/35, PRV, GZ) do not count as speakers. The compression drivers with wave guides do count as speakers. The Beyma coax with combined woofer/compression horn only count as 1 speaker.

Juice

 

Congrats Juice. It's nice to hear it was a positive experience and you got a nice shout out from one of the OG's. So have you been bit by the bug?

Zach

 

Z,

It was a good, fair show. No, not bitten. I have been at this audio for a while and enjoy the hell out of it until, it becomes work. I will not change everything just a couple items, and I will do some more research on porting bags and tuning bags for a desired frequency range. I still want to keep my stealth look. I love bike nights and people scratch their heads when I play music as my bike looks pretty much stock.

Juice

 

Congrats Juice. I watched the Facebook video and your bike sounds great.

 

Thanks, It was fun and eye opening on some of those bikes.

Juice