Mic+placement recommendations for recording CSL airbox sounds?

[shibui]

What mics are people using and where are you placing them securely? I’ve seen some nice video audio on the YouTubes.

[nextelbuddy]

So audio recording is something I struggled with and I still struggle with. I've learned a lot over this past year from other YouTubers that specialize in recording video and audio and focusing on the audio portion.

Audio is tricky because it's very sensitive and microphones are very important.

Some people appear to get lucky with their microphone setups where they just go buy a mic. Throw it in the engine bay and record a video. Sync it up and it comes out okay for them

Whenever I tried to do it, my audio was always garbled or clipping because of the CSL air box was so loud in the engine bay. I don't know how other people don't get clipping problems but I got clipping every single time. It was very frustrating.

I was mainly using lavalier microphones connected to an audio recorder or lavalier microphones connected to a GoPro and my audio was always severely clipping. Very disappointing.

One person I saw on Instagram who had good audio or at least appeared to have good audio stated they were using a DJI camera paired with the wireless DJI mic and they just threw the DJI mic into the engine bay and didn't have any problems. They may have had clipping but I didn't hear it very hard. They may have fixed it in post.

One of the tricks is finding microphones that have good specs. Usually cheap lavalier microphones are going to distort because the diaphragms get distorted with loud noises.

What I ended up buying was a wireless microphone kit just because I've always wanted one and the reviews on this one were good. It came with a receiver and two transmitter microphones with lavalier mics And I played around with the gain of the microphones. Trying not to be too high and not too low.

Another thing is let's say you have a GoPro and you record audio. The audio might sound good, but then you plug in a lavalier mic to it and all the sudden your audio is clipping. It's because the microphone on the lavalier mic is lower quality or sometimes the mic line input on audio recording devices and GoPros is too sensitive and there's no way to adjust the gain on microphone inputs sometimes.

I have a standalone audio recorder that is great but unfortunately the microphone 3.5 input on it is very hot and sensitive. So any lavalier Mike, including a good quality one produces clipping audio and because it's a lower end audio recorder like a base model and doesn't give the option to adjust the gain on the microphone inputs like the newer models.

Here's a video of my car with a GoPro in the cabin and a wireless lavalier mic in the engine bay and one on the back of the car and blending the intake and exhaust sounds together, but the intake is obviously more pronounced here

A lot of the video is heart throttle running around but at the 2 minute and 18 second Mark starts three separate runs of full throttle runs. That gives you a good idea of what the CSL box sounds with a decent microphone under the hood

https://youtu.be/nxoxGoin_5U?si=0t6xuwMMwCxqP1LK

Here is a link to the microphones I used

https://a.co/d/8s1WL1U

And here are some YouTube channel videos that I saved that were good resources.

https://youtu.be/7dZMa1axfyM?si=-mpKvlinJdNAs33n

https://youtu.be/WAJbJVpFUrA?si=C6hYIGtoV2Q2DgeA

https://youtu.be/XRT44_-Irk8?si=FKR1uZd2aNdvaKxm

https://youtu.be/5byu5kehKZU?si=0kpYwO0TuikLjoh3

Hopefully this helps. It may complicate things more since it's not a very cut and dry answer of. Just buy this and do this and you're good

I do think that you can maybe just get a GoPro throw it in the engine bay test. What sound you want? Get your audio and it comes out okay, but a lot of the magic happens in editing and bringing down the highs and clipping areas in editing.

[Thrifty S50]

You need something with an adjustable pre-amp. As stated above, without it youll just have the audio clipping beyond recognition, or youll get way to deep into audio equipment, just to make things 'work'. I stick my shotgun mic right into the mouth of the airbox, with pre-amp set to 1 out of 10. Just sync the files in post with an audio marker both the camera & mic can hear clear enough.

You can see how it sounds here:

[nextelbuddy]

You need something with an adjustable pre-amp. As stated above, without it youll just have the audio clipping beyond recognition, or youll get way to deep into audio equipment, just to make things 'work'. I stick my shotgun mic right into the mouth of the airbox, with pre-amp set to 1 out of 10. Just sync the files in post with an audio marker both the camera & mic can hear clear enough.

You can see how it sounds here:

So what do you mean something with a adjustable preamp

In your video you show a Rhodes shotgun microphone but what else are you using

Is your microphone a stand-alone audio recorder? Is the adjustable preamp on the actual microphone itself, so does that mean it's a powered microphone?

Or are you running a 3.5 microphone line from that shotgun microphone to your GoPro?

[dHam_Slow.46M]

So what do you mean something with a adjustable preamp

In your video you show a Rhodes shotgun microphone but what else are you using

Is your microphone a stand-alone audio recorder? Is the adjustable preamp on the actual microphone itself, so does that mean it's a powered microphone?

Or are you running a 3.5 microphone line from that shotgun microphone to your GoPro?

In the video description, he listed that he used the Zoom SGH-6 shotgun mic. Since he's using a Zoom, I'd suspect its connected to an F1 recorder?

https://zoomcorp.com/en/us/field-recorders/field-recorders/f1-sp/

Def a shitty rig duct tape job, but I guess if it works it works? High not recommended though.

[Thrifty S50]

In the video description, he listed that he used the Zoom SGH-6 shotgun mic. Since he's using a Zoom, I'd suspect it’s connected to an F1 recorder?


Def a shitty rig duct tape job, but I guess if it works it works? High not recommended though.

Correct! On all accounts hah! Not ideal but it def works, duct tape holds it fine and makes for quick removal. The mic is powered, just 2 AAA’s. Excited to see what y’all record 💪

[dHam_Slow.46M]

Correct! On all accounts hah! Not ideal but it def works, duct tape holds it fine and makes for quick removal. The mic is powered, just 2 AAA’s. Excited to see what y’all record 💪

Actually pretty impressive, I never thought of using that combo. My question is, did you stick the entire thing into the "mouth" or was it partially sticking out?

I guess the F1/SGH-6 is compact enough and "cheap" enough, but I'm now curious if a recorder rigged safely somewhere else and just run an XLR cable to a compact shotgun mic rigged in/close to an intake would be a "safer" solution. It'll run up the cost, but might also open up the can of possibilities of also recording the exhaust/cabin w/ a 2nd mic.