Wet Sounds, a maker of a marine hifi amps and speakers, is developing its first marine radio, which will have some unique features suited to boaters.
The head unit will ship at the end of Q1 for both the retail aftermarket and the OEM market.
The deck will tie into other networks on the boat, said Wet Sounds, which claimed it decided to expand into head units following requests from its retailers.
A Wet Sounds deck would also give the company more control over the sound quality of the full system.
“We found people would judge our system based on how the head unit [that came with the boat or another supplier] was running,” said President Tim White. “It was the last piece of the puzzle. We decided the best thing to do was to build one the way we wanted.”
Since boaters tend to crank up the volume, the deck will be designed to accommodate full volume. Most radios start clipping at 70 or 80 percent volume settings. “We know they are going to crank it all the way up so we’re designing it where it won’t clip the output,” said White.
The deck will have 4 volt output and will be offered in a modular system so it can fit low end and high end budgets.
It will work with most phones and media devices but full product features and pricing will be announced early next year.
Wet Sounds also recently began shipping one of the first convertible coaxial/component systems for the marine market, it said. It’s new 808 series, 8-inch interior marine speakers come in a box with all the necessary brackets and tools to mount the tweeter separately or in a coaxial design.
The system includes an 8 inch mid bass driver with a 1 inch titanium tweeter. Power handling is 125 watts at 4 ohms. The 808 is designed as an upgrade speaker for larger boats that can accept the larger footprint driver.
Source: CEoutlook
