Smart ForGigs: It's a mobile concert hall

STUTTGART, Germany - The Smart ForGigs study realised, together with audio partner JBL, what must be the world's smallest concert hall on wheels.

The high-end sound system in this ForTwo has a maximum power output of 5720W!

This Smart car reveals completely new qualities: with JBL, it aimed to produce an outlandish sound experience by equipping the baby car with the finest and most powerful audio components.

FIVE AMPLIFIERS

The result is a mobile sound system that brings even more 'joie de vivre' to the city with a mighty sound. And that's not all: the Smart ForGigs can also serve as a mobile amplifier for live concerts by street musicians.

Brace yourself, here's the breakdown of exactly how the sound is delivered to your ears:

Five amplifiers provide impressive sound pressure of up to 150 dB

Three JBL GTO 804 EZ amps serve the tweeters and mid-range speakers

Two JBL GTO 751 EZ amps power the sub-woofers.

They drive four type JBL GTO 609 C loudspeaker sets, each with two tweeters and two mid-range speakers. In addition to these, 16 speakers there are two powerful sub-woofers, each with a diameter of 30cm.

The music signals are provided by a digital signal processor from the Italian specialist Mosconi that can cover eight channels; with Bluetooth streaming it can also process uncompressed files in formats such as Wave or Flac and MP3 files.

The signals are transferred from mobile devices such as tablets or smartphones by Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP). iOS, Android and Windows devices are supported. 

FORGET ABOUT LUGGAGE

Smart says the design of the visible components of the mobile sound system is perfectly integrated. Ventilation openings in the car's dashboard serve as the visual model for integrating the speakers. Three mid-range speakers have been built into each door and four tweeters accommodated in the dashboard.

This ForTwo's Achilles heel, of course, is that the luggage compartment is filled by the sub-woofers, which are flanked by a pair of mid-range speakers/tweeters on the left- and right sides of the hatch door.

Ten square metres of insulation material fill the passenger cell and door panels, 100m of power, speaker and signal cable are hidden behind the panelling.

To add to the ambience, the Smart ForGigs has interior and exterior ambient lighting. The DJ can even use controllers to change colours as desired.

LET DOWN? IT'S NOT FOR SALE

The Smart ForGigs is a one-off and is not available for sale, but with the JBL sound system a unique sound experience is possible in all new generation Smarts.

The JBL sound system develops impressive sound volume and incorporates a six-channel DSP amplifier (240W) in the ForTwo and an eight-channel DSP amplifier (320W) on board the ForFour.

A total of eight (ForTwo) or 12 (ForFour) high-performance speakers, one broadband centre speaker, two tweeters in the mirror triangle, two lower mid-range speakers in the doors (on the ForFour additionally in the rear doors), two broadband rear-fill speakers and in the ForTwo a removable woofer on the left side of the luggage compartment.

The woofer is simple to remove without tools should more boot space be required.

DOOF-DOOF: Smart, with audio specialist JBL, has created what can only be described as an audiophile's dream: the Smart ForTwo JBL ForGigs. Image: Supplied