Worth upgrading the speakers with stock headunit?

I found just the tweeter upgrade made a world of difference. Added a Sub, and did'nt replace the door speakers.

 

For the people going the DIY route and sourcing your own amp and speakers, how do you wire the amp?
Are there any general guides one can follow?

i looked at oem+ but that’s really pricey and I see taco tunes sell plug and play harnesses, but not sure if it’s universal.

I’m not interesting in adding a sub. Just better tweeters and speakers with an amp is what I’m looking for.

The Tacoma I’m getting is MT so i don’t think those come with the “premium” audio.

 

I bought tweeters and speakers from crutchfield and they said they “fit my vehicle” and came with wiring harnesses. I erroneously thought they would be plug and play. They were not. I needed to solder in capacitors into the harness and also splice the crutchfield supplied harness with the tweeter harness.

with the 6x9’s on the front door I had to solder the factory harness to the crutchfield harness.

now, this wasn’t hard at all, as I have done this on dirt bikes a bunch, however I just wasn’t expecting it, as I’ve never messed with car audio.

I now know that generally your going to be doing more when you wire in a 4 way amp for your speakers in addition to going to the battery and head unit....... I haven’t looked at the details, but now I’ll look at YouTube much more closely before adding any more audio, simply because I have no idea how audio works.

had no problem wiring in an arb compressor just days before...

 

Thanks for the feedback. Although uncomfortable splicing in wiring and even soldering if I have to I’m just going to look for a plug and play solution. Right now the taco tunes looks to be the right fit, I’ll be reaching out to them to see if I can get the speaker kit with the amp minus the sub. Or maybe their amp kit and wiring harness and speakers from crutchfield. more research required.

 

I upgraded my speakers and left in the stock head unit installed the first year of ownership, made a big difference. Not perfect but much better and allowed me some time to to figure out what to do next. In the process of upgrading the head unit now.

 

Yes it is the JBL head unit

 

depends on the quality of speakers and if you plan to use an amp.

I put in rockford fosgate powers, I think they max at like 300 watts with 150rms...I don't have an amp and on the stock head unit the sound was better and I could crank them louder...but of course, mine are really good speakers too. I'm not a fan of kickers, they seem only marginally better than stock, even their top of the line speakers have like 90rms and 180 max...ok for stock right off the lot but not really an upgrade compared to others...which is why they don't cost a lot

 

What head unit you going with? Id be interested to see if you get enough bass and power to just not have to get a sub...

 

I quite like the newer headunits in the base and SR5 for the 2021+ models. Part of the reason I bought a 2022 SR recently.

Other than the rear channels being weak with typical bass rolloff (not a factor in the rear speaker-less SR), how is the sound signature from stock headunit?

Is it fine just to have a 75w per ch amplifier straight in, use TMB normally or is a DSP needed to properly shape amp amplify new set of speakers in front?

 

I replaced front tweeters that helped…. Replaced front and rear speakers helped some but tied the rears into the fronts helped a lot much louder…the rears have a weak signal….front signal is stronger oem radio has no issues. Also added a sub 12” Jl behind rear seat. Perfect now

 

Upgraded to Subaru Tweeters and front door Kicker 6x9s It made a slight difference and I was happy with the results. For even better results they have micro amps that goes inside the dash that will feed them more power. Rear door speakers I left alone as those have about 25% of the volume of what the fronts have from the Toyota sound engineers.

 

Can you explain how you tied the front speakers to the rear.

 

You have to find the wires in the kickpanel and the wires that run to the rear doors under the foot trim piece the one near front seat the speaker wires are always twisted together so two rears would be twisted together in the bundle cut the wires to the rear and attach them to the front. Have to do this on both sides. Simple once you get in there and look at it.

 

Okay. Thanks for your quick reply.

 

Looked into OEM+ and other Taco sponsored speakers / amp. After research and looking into cost - this is what I got. The Subwoofer does not have the Boom of a 10 or 12 inch sub, but at 60 yo - the boom blasting up my a@$ from the Kicker is good enough. You need to get the Amp for this to work. Also, replaced the non-Jbl head unit. Simple Pioneer fit like factory built. The Alpine amp is placed behind the Pioneer Head Unit.

Pioneer DMH-2660NEX
Amplifier Alpine Power Pack

$290 KTP-445U Universal Power Pack

KTP-445U

Speakers Upgrade.
Dash - Kicker

$119 H631SFJ101 - Genuine OEM

H631SFJ101 Tweeter.
Front -

$190 Kicker 47KSC69304 KSC6930 6x9 150 Watt 3-Way Car Audio Speakers KSC693

Kicker 47KSC69304
Rear - Kicker 47KSC6504
Powered Subwoofer

$360 Kicker 46HS10 Hideaway Compact Powered Subwoofer, 10"

Kicker 46HS10

 

I have a 10” in my closet I may sell fits easily behind rear seat. New condition
Like this shipping could be expensive though

$240 Rockford Fosgate Prime R2S-1X10 Single R2S Slim 10” Shallow Subwoofer Loaded in a Wedge Enclosure with 200 Watts RMS / 400 Watts Max

Rockford Fosgate R2S-1X10 Prime R2S Single 10-Inch Shallow Loaded Enclosure

 

Definitely incorrect. I changed out dash and door speakers with kickers and put a 300 amp Rockville powered sub under each front seat. It was a huge improvement for around $300. I’m sure an upgraded HU would give even more improvement, but I’m good, for now.

 

A few weeks ago I had installed in my 2nd Gen Tacoma new Kenwood speakers and a 4-channel amp.

With the new speaker it sounds so much better then before!
I was told that it will sound even better when I have a new head unit installed, plus I'll have more features including Apple CarPlay.

Should I expect a lot better sound quality with the addition of a new head unit?

I'm still researching/deciding on which head unit to get, I am leaning towards the Kenwood Excelon DMX809S.

Kenwood Excelon FFC-XP6902C (front)
Kenwood Excelon KFC-X174 (rear)
Kenwood Excelon X302-4 (4-channel amp)

 

Add a powered subwoofer. It makes a difference a lot. It gives you that lower frequency.

 

I am wanting to upgrade the speakers , does anyone know what brand is good and fits well for a 2023 tacoma?