McLaren 720s speaker upgrade

[BCotrell]

Take it to a shop. Adding aftermarket speakers isn’t likely going to do anything positive. Going to take a bunch of weird maneuvers just to get those pioneers hooked up only to realize they are underpowered On the factory hu or amp

 

[Bobbytwonames 5,000+ posts]

You are the one that chose this life

You know nothing about my life. You couldn't deal with half of what I've been through. Keep barfing and getting tossed from Wal-Mart. First World problems.

 

[Joeko23]

The replies have taken a sharp turn in the wrong direction. I haven’t gotten this far in life by taking the easy way out AND when people tell me something is impossible this is just a bigger driving factor for me. Anyway this is the base system in the car with 4 speakers (2 mid/base and 2 tweeters) the upgraded system is B&W and people on McLaren forums say the B&W is pretty crappy as well. I’m going to measure the impedance of the stock speakers. I’m pretty sure there is already a built in crossover in the factory amp that’s why it’s making that scratchy sound. I’ll report back with my results. My plan is to buy matching impedance components and install them.

 

[wew lad 5,000+ posts]

The replies have taken a sharp turn in the wrong direction. I haven’t gotten this far in life by taking the easy way out AND when people tell me something is impossible this is just a bigger driving factor for me. Anyway this is the base system in the car with 4 speakers (2 mid/base and 2 tweeters) the upgraded system is B&W and people on McLaren forums say the B&W is pretty crappy as well. I’m going to measure the impedance of the stock speakers. I’m pretty sure there is already a built in crossover in the factory amp that’s why it’s making that scratchy sound. I’ll report back with my results. My plan is to buy matching impedance components and install them.

Sometimes the factory speakers will have the crossover built in. Without a scope or some other quirky way of testing frequency response out of the wires, you won't know. Not sure how much documentation mclaren has.

 

[Joeko23]

I doubt there is a crossover built in. I don’t see any filters or capacities attached to the magnet. Here’s a pic. The impedence is 2ohms for the stock speaker. Im ordering a pair of midrange 4 ohm speakers (Rockford Fosgate PPS4-8) since I think the real issue is that it’s bandwidth restricted causing the scratchy sound from the tweeters. I also found out that I can fit 8” speakers instead of 6.5” if I remove the plastic housing for the stock 6.5”. I think the B&W system is 8” woofer, 4” mid range (there’s just an unconnected speaker wire in the door) and the tweeters along with a center channel speaker. That would explain why there are 2 inputs. The 2 inputs are probably for a dual voice coil subwoofer. I’m also ordering a pair of 2 way speakers that are 2 ohm (JBL GTO620) just in case there is no bandwidth restriction and the scratchiness is caused by different impedance.

 

[BCotrell]

Why wouldn’t you consider some sort of dsp first that will allow you to de-equalize factory curves/equalization and set your own. The speakers might actually be fine.

 

[wew lad 5,000+ posts]

I doubt there is a crossover built in. I don’t see any filters or capacities attached to the magnet. Here’s a pic. The impedence is 2ohms for the stock speaker. Im ordering a pair of midrange 4 ohm speakers (Rockford Fosgate PPS4-8) since I think the real issue is that it’s bandwidth restricted causing the scratchy sound from the tweeters. I also found out that I can fit 8” speakers instead of 6.5” if I remove the plastic housing for the stock 6.5”. I think the B&W system is 8” woofer, 4” mid range (there’s just an unconnected speaker wire in the door) and the tweeters along with a center channel speaker. That would explain why there are 2 inputs. The 2 inputs are probably for a dual voice coil subwoofer. I’m also ordering a pair of 2 way speakers that are 2 ohm (JBL GTO620) just in case there is no bandwidth restriction and the scratchiness is caused by different impedance.

Ok, hopefully that fixes it. Might be worth upgrading the headunit if you still have issues and maybe adding a small 4 channel amplifier.