To Baffle Or Not?

Awesome, so I wouldn’t lose any sound quality with the plastic housings?

 

With cutting boards? No - as long as everything's good & tight. Those cheap store bought baffles - maybe - they're pretty flimsy. In either case, you'll want to decouple hard surfaces with foam, etc.

 

Ha,
I was just looking for opinions on baffles and I saw your reference to cutting boards...best $3 templates money can buy...

 

If, by baffle, you mean the speaker-to-interior door panel baffle, then it will make a noticeable difference in cabin noise. I have Dynamat around the speaker opening but also 2 long strips on the outer door skin. One above and one below the side impact tube. This minimal amount of sound deadening helped a little but not much. I was going to Dynamat the whole interior skin but added these foam rings and they made a noticeable difference. I did it to direct the sound into the cab but a lot of noise comes in through the gap between the speaker and the inner panel grill. These baffles sealed it off. Now I’m no longer doing the whole door.

 

What kind of foam baffle is that and where did you get it? My door panel rattles inside with the speaker bass and the extra soundproofing I tried doesn’t help.

 

$59 Soundskins SSK-RINGV3 Foam Speaker Ring Kit - (6) 1" High Rebound, Waterproof Acoustic Foam Strips and (4) Wave Reflection Pads

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07W86QZWV?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

It’s Soundskins. They’re a little pricey but easy to apply. They’re thick and soft enough not to buzz. You can also use foam gasket tape found at hardware stores.

I also removed the green OEM plastic threaded inserts and used sturdy nuts and bolt to secure the speaker to the door. That might be what’s causing your rattling. The Dynamat around the speaker hole also helps create a nice seal against the speaker adapters.

 

Are you still using the factory head unit? If that's the case, consider upgrading it before making any other changes. If you prefer to keep it factory, you could enhance your current setup by adding an amplifier.

If you're interested, selecting a quality Line Output Converter such as PAC or JL Fix82/86 can help eliminate the factory EQ issues and fix the factory time alignment.

I delved into upgrading my factory JBL system, and even with amplification using an LC7i, the sound wasn't satisfying. However, after finding a Fix86 on the marketplace for a great deal, my speakers came alive.

 

So to get back to the original issue:
I think what's happening is that there are a lot of connection 'interruptions' from the head unit to the speaker. When you add an after market speaker, guess what?...you've got to buy an adapter harness to between your new speaker and the OEM speaker input. That's another interruption in a chain of interruptions because the door woofer connects to the tweeter first...then to the kick panel molex/harness...then to your aftermarket speaker. As just mentioned, the OEM HU was tuned to operate with the OEM speaker so expect to be disappointed, as I was, with the results.

The first thing I did was get a decent aftermarket HU and the modest 22 watts RMS was a big difference over the OEM HU. Later adding a 5 channel amp and a sub took it up a giant step. Even a modestly powered name brand amp will be so much better than HU power.

 

2nd gen tacoma owner here and I can agree. I've worked on various vehicles, never went to fully active component systems, but I've installed amps on cars, a couple of Chevys and my own truck. The largest 2 upgrades would be deadening the doors (I did the outer and the inner skins on mine), and an amplifier to the door speakers. Most aftermarket HUs only power to the 22-25 rms per speaker which turns to most people raising their eqs on the HUs to combat the lack of sound. Once I added a 5 channel amp to my truck, I have a mostly flat eq on my HU and have actually turned down some of the frequencies. I have a Pioneer HU (can't remember which model), Hertz DSK 165.3 in the front doors (Access cab with no rear speakers), 1 10in Kicker sub in a ~.9 cuft box that fits between the rear seats, and a JL 900/5 powering it all. For deadening I used secondskin damplifier pro and it helped a lot.

 

The baffles and the sound deadening will help when you’re driving and while parked. But, without those, parked in your driveway…the speakers should already be sounding pretty good. If something’s not sounding decent, it’s time to investigate.

I’ll be honest, the initial setup on my new system was slightly worse than my stock unit with Subaru tweeters…from a natural sounding perspective (not power output). But I continued patiently with the tuning process…looking at as many variables as possible until it progressively got better. The answer, for me, was in the gain settings.

I also run my system EQ completely flat. Even the sub. I even have the sub bass boost EQ turned all the way down/off. And it thumps but also covers the bass at lower volumes. For the amp setup, I run the tweeters on the cleanest setting but I added some gain overlap on the mid bass and a bit more on the subwoofer. This way I’m not always adjusting my bass for each song. You need to be prudent with gain settings so I used a DD-1 distortion detector and it really helped dial in my sub and mid bass.

I would seriously recommend the DD-1 for setting up your amp/system.