Premium Audio Upgrade for less than $250

I pretty much did the same thing

 

So I just finished this tonight. Had the tweeters in for about 5 days before I installed the kicker speakers. I’ll start off by saying that this was way harder than it’s written up to be. Maybe I got the wrong connectors from Crutchfield because I had to splice the small speaker connector from the kicker box to the Crutchfield adapter. The small one wouldn’t go on all 4 speakers, I had to do it to all 4. The bigger one slid on but the little ones did not. I was bending the housing on the speaker trying to get it on, so I just said fuck it, cut it off & spliced it to the one that came in the kicker box.

I’d say that was about and hour or so with that, then I realized that I didn’t need the stock kicker speaker housing, which I drilled on & tried to put my door back together with no avail. So I took that off, put door back together & the speaker didn’t work. At this point I almost gave up & put the old one back in place. I was half tempted to pay someone to do it for me. Fuck it, the tweeters sounded really good alone anways, maybe I’ll send these back I thought to myself.

I re-pulled the entire door & the speaker. I noticed my stupid spliced wire had become disconnected. I re inserted it & tried again, it worked. I then went on to finish the job. It definitely gets easier the more you do it, as has been said.

With all that being said, I’m not that thrilled. The bass is definitely not ass deep anymore & I feel like the front left speaker is quieter & possibly messed up. Maybe because of the way I had to install it. It’s very crisp when it’s loud which is better but now I feel like I need to add a sub (8”/10”). I’ll know more about the entire result tomorrow once I drive around with it all day.

Im attaching the best EQ I found in 45 seconds of messing with it, what’s everyone else running EQ wise?

This took about 4 hours & it’s beer drinking time now.

 

The small connectors for the speakers only go on one way. If they won't push on, just flip it over and it will.

 

I feel as thought the 3 way 6x9s might be way too bright (high) due to having 2 tweeter/voice coils on them. That's why I went a different route.

 

You have a lot of sneakers.

 

I can’t remember but I’m pretty sure I tried every way with the little ones, if it didn’t work I’d flip it. No way I had bad luck 4 times in a row.

Those are golf shoes (that’s why they’re in the garage) & most of them came from Burlington Coat factory when they had a Nike surplus. Only $20 a piece so I loaded up, I love golfwrx forums as much as tacomaworld.

 

Webforums are the devil.

 

I am new to car audio but have spent weeks purusing the www for information. I also went with Subaru tweeters, Kicker 6x9 3-ways up front and Kicker 6.75 coaxials in the rear doors.

There is a loss of bass until the speakers are broken in. Give them a few weeks and then they will sound better. Think about a brand new baseball glove, same concept in a way.

There is way too much high level from the tweeters and 3-ways and was a very ear-screeching experience for me. I took a forum member’s recommendation and went with Kicker 6x9 Component system instead of the 3-ways.

 

How do the 6x9 components sound?

 

I have my EQ settings exactly where yours are and it sounds great. True you do need to tone down the treble a bit vs. mids and bass so it isn't overpowering but the EQ does a good job (for me) balancing it all out with these settings. I would agree the bass does tend to break in a bit the more you listen to it. I thought about a sub for a bit but the bass is so good for my tastes as-is I don't plan on messing w/ any other audio stuff the time being. Sorry you had pains w/ the connectors to the speakers, definitely shouldn't have any loss of fidelity or volume on left vs. right so there probably was something to the install steps you had to take. I guess the good thing now is that once you've done them once, it takes all of 5 minutes to pull the doors back apart if you want to make a change.

Good luck!

 

The same as the 6x9s without too much treble/highs. Using a component system is not plug and play as the tweeters are wired to crossovers in a component system.

For plug and play and to remain on topic, the 3-ways will give you the best bang for your buck coupled with the 6.75 coaxials in the rear doors. Dropping the treble on the stock head unit EQ can help, this is also dependent on the music you listen to and other factors.

Initial bass loss is expected, everyone should give the woofers time to break in. You’ll find yourself dropping the bass back down on the EQ in a few weeks. The speakers mentioned on the first page have the ability to shake the rear view/side mirrors and your door panels when turned up. I know this doesnt mean much but just to give everyone an idea of the speakers on a stock head unit without an amp.

 

Well I thought i was doing the right thing by getting 3 ways for the rear doors. Should I return them or just bolt them on and deal with it?

 

Which 3-ways?

 

Rockford Fosgate Prime R165X3

https://www.crutchfield.com/p_575R165X3/Rockford-Fosgate-Prime-R165X3.html?tp=94&omnews=14684828

 

Typically a coaxial/2-way is used in the rear door to fill the sound. Nothing wrong with 3-ways in rear doors. I would throw them on at that price point and see how they sound. You might like them.

 

I guess you never really know until you try. For $125 i replaced all the speakers in the truck. Hopefully i will have some time this weekend to put them in and see how much better they are than the OEM.

 

Took the plunge while the sale was still on. Just arrived today. Not sure when I’ll have time to install, but now I have a fun project to look forward to. ; )

 

I will say that after driving around today it was well worth it & I think the sound is better than what I thought last night. And the bass/sound will develop & get better with time. This mod is well worth the <$230 that it cost me. With the hassles of the install done with & out of the way, I find myself looking forward to driving around cranking my music.

I did have a rattle in one of the rear speakers. I pulled the door/speaker, reinstalled & problem solved in under 10 min.

 

I have all my stuff, noico, 6x9s, 6 and 3/4rs, Subaru tweeters, and all adapters... my buddy who was going to help me has 3 kids with flu.... anyone near Ventura like beer or Irish Whiskey?

 

So I bought the full kicker system with an amp to upgrade the current system. I do have the JBL system and realize that the 2 plug connector doesn’t plug into the kicker tweeter 4 pin connector. I just bought two male 4 pin connectors from the dealer that fit from an sr5 part number to plug into the kicker 4 pin. Does anyone have the knowledge to assist me in figuring out which wire to put where. Thanks