novice building a car stereo

[Cosmonihilator]

My car stereo *****! Speakers cut out and sound terrible when they do work. The car is too nice to neglect this issue.

Currently I have a 4x20 receiver running 3.5s in the dash, and 6.5s in the rear side panels. It has a factory 2x40 amp running the door speakers, which are 6.75s.

I think I know what I want to do, but want some feedback from somebody that knows what they're doing. I have a few other questions on top of that.

I want to keep the factory receiver. All new speakers and a new amp. I want to put the new amp in the same place as the old one, and want it to run the door speakers and the rear speakers.

Can I splice the four outputs on the existing receiver into the two speakers in the dash? Would I gain anything from doing that? Or would I just start a fire and waste all of my money?

Any suggestions to help me ball on a budget? It would be great to know where and how I can cheap out.

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[wew lad 5,000+ posts]

My car stereo *****! Speakers cut out and sound terrible when they do work. The car is too nice to neglect this issue.
Currently I have a 4x20 receiver running 3.5s in the dash, and 6.5s in the rear side panels. It has a factory 2x40 amp running the door speakers, which are 6.75s.

I think I know what I want to do, but want some feedback from somebody that knows what they're doing. I have a few other questions on top of that.

I want to keep the factory receiver. All new speakers and a new amp. I want to put the new amp in the same place as the old one, and want it to run the door speakers and the rear speakers.

Can I splice the four outputs on the existing receiver into the two speakers in the dash? Would I gain anything from doing that? Or would I just start a fire and waste all of my money?

Any suggestions to help me ball on a budget? It would be great to know where and how I can cheap out.

the speakers you're talking about splicing together are not the same size, so no you cant do that. i would ditch the rear speakers and get a ppi900.4 for doors and dash speakers. do some research on active vs passive components to understand how you need things to be set up properly. you cant just splice stuff together, different speakers need different filters.

Passive Crossovers

Advantages of Electronic Crossovers vs Passive Crossovers

from there id still recommend a new headunit, and new door speakers able to handle the power. passive components are fine in the door, but you need to find out how its set up. is there only a midrange in the door? or is there a tweeter too? is the 3.5 in the dash just an added channel for better sound quality, or is it acting as your tweeter? if the latter is true just run active off a ppi900.4, or just keep tweeters on the headunit and have the 6.75 and 3.5s off the ppi. keep in mind a ppi900.4 has A LOT of power for midranges. keep the gain low for small drivers

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

My car stereo *****! Speakers cut out and sound terrible when they do work. The car is too nice to neglect this issue.
Currently I have a 4x20 receiver running 3.5s in the dash, and 6.5s in the rear side panels. It has a factory 2x40 amp running the door speakers, which are 6.75s.

I think I know what I want to do, but want some feedback from somebody that knows what they're doing. I have a few other questions on top of that.

I want to keep the factory receiver. All new speakers and a new amp. I want to put the new amp in the same place as the old one, and want it to run the door speakers and the rear speakers.

Can I splice the four outputs on the existing receiver into the two speakers in the dash? Would I gain anything from doing that? Or would I just start a fire and waste all of my money?

Any suggestions to help me ball on a budget? It would be great to know where and how I can cheap out.

Replace the 3.5 with tweeters like the power acoustic nb1's ..I think they can be had from Walmart for $8 a pair they have a built in 6db crossover ..they will work inline with your other speakers ..then your radio power will be fine ..only other option would be to design a passive crossover network using caps and or coils ..but that is too complicated for most

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

You should have kept it stock. Cheap speaker swaps are always inferior to stock if your car is 2004 or newer.

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

You should have kept it stock. Cheap speaker swaps are always inferior to stock if your car is 2004 or newer.

GM and Dodge have very crappy speakers on 2004 and newer most have the foam surrounds disentergrating within 2 years ..most Ford and imports use decent speakers and what you said is correct

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

GM and Dodge have very crappy speakers on 2004 and newer most have the foam surrounds disentergrating within 2 years ..most Ford and imports use decent speakers and what you said is correct

Doesnt matter about build quality, they actually tune the head unit response curve to make the speakers work well in that particular vehicles acoustics along with having a proper seal and baffle. Aftermarkets are useless without sound processing power, proper baffles and acoustical treatment& deadening along with amplification. There is no sense in getting cheap aftermarkets at all with a half @ssed install where you just throw them in the stock head unit which has an eq curve that will work against the aftermarkets

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

Doesnt matter about build quality, they actually tune the head unit response curve to make the speakers work well in that particular vehicles acoustics along with having a proper seal and baffle. Aftermarkets are useless without sound processing power, proper baffles and acoustical treatment& deadening along with amplification. There is no sense in getting cheap aftermarkets at all with a half @ssed install where you just throw them in the stock head unit which has an eq curve that will work against the aftermarkets

I've known a lot of disappointed people due to this ..expecting big sound and to be let down ..some have even wanted their stock setup back because it sounded so much better ..like you said in most cases changing just a deck and or speakers can be pretty disappointing to someone that doesn't understand what they are getting into

 

[sfall]

Doesnt matter about build quality, they actually tune the head unit response curve to make the speakers work well in that particular vehicles acoustics along with having a proper seal and baffle. Aftermarkets are useless without sound processing power, proper baffles and acoustical treatment& deadening along with amplification. There is no sense in getting cheap aftermarkets at all with a half @ssed install where you just throw them in the stock head unit which has an eq curve that will work against the aftermarkets

How do you know that's true? Did you take before and after measurements? I'm not saying you're wrong, just that a bit more info would be helpful.

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

How do you know that's true? Did you take before and after measurements? I'm not saying you're wrong, just that a bit more info would be helpful.

Jeff knows

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

How do you know that's true? Did you take before and after measurements? I'm not saying you're wrong, just that a bit more info would be helpful.

1000+ noobs over the past years running into the same problems. Frequency response graphs on diyma forums. Countless local installs i have to fix. Basically experience and research. Thats why theres an EQ defeat features in high end digital sound processors like alpine pxa h800, audison, helix etc... This is just common knowledge in the SQ world of car audio,nothing new.

 

[sfall]

Looking at your post, you need to make sure you do a quality install, along with buying new components. What I mean by that, is get your power from under the hood and wire everything up with new cables to eliminate any potential issues with the old wiring. From there, I would recommend an overall strategy that focuses on doing one thing right is better than doing a bunch of things half ***.

If you want to keep the OE head unit, most amps have speaker level inputs along with standard line level. This allows you to use the powered speaker cables from the OE HU as interconnects. However, I've never done this myself, so I'm hoping that some of the other posters who have, would give their opinions on doing it this way.

As for what you should buy, I don't think I know about your situation to make responsible recommendations.

Also, if you're OK with having stuff shipped, look at Sonic Electrionix web site. They have a huge selection of budget products that look pretty good.

 

[Cosmonihilator]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

The stereo is still stock, just wanted to give as many specs as possible. It's a year 2000 Saab.

I don't want to take any shortcuts, that's why I'm asking for help from people with experience. The potential splice I mentioned would go to two 3.5s, same size.

 

[Jeffdachef 5,000+ posts]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.
The stereo is still stock, just wanted to give as many specs as possible. It's a year 2000 Saab.

I don't want to take any shortcuts, that's why I'm asking for help from people with experience. The potential splice I mentioned would go to two 3.5s, same size.

you arent gonna get any strong output or clean sound at all from splicing the speaker wires of the stock head unit. Its the worst way to go and the biggest mistake you'll ever make.

Best thing to do is to get a dedicated good head unit with a 24 bit dac, 13 bands of eq, time alignment and 4 volt pre-outs. Sound and signal coming from a straight RCA connection of a head unit is infinitely better than whatever LOC or high level input you use.

DO not cheap out on the head unit Its the brains of the operation, If you have a stupid brain, you'll have a retarded sounding setup plain and simple.