Question for those who have upgraded their speakers

I am interested in this. I upgraded my radio to July with map card. Is this speaker plug and play and is there a link of some sort how this installs.
First I should ask will this work on my stereo?

 

I added kickers and a small amp. The amp made a big difference. Here's a link for the amp.
https://www.amazon.com/Alpine-KTP-4...d_r=ZH90HG6MS4TBBKER7WK1&psc=1&qid=1571419023

 

Stock head unit?

It's not plug and play. You will need to run power wire from the battery through the firewall to the sub You will also need speaker signal, so you will have to one of the speakers, or double pin one of the connectors. You might also need a remote wire signal, which would mean tapping the blue antenna wire on the stock harness. Not hard if youre comfortable with wire work.

 

Thanks

 

It will work with any stereo. Just run the L/R speaker lines to it if you don't have low level RCA out from your radio.
Slide it under the drivers seat (will not fit on passengers), run a power cable from the battery, speaker lines, run the bass control level control cable to a spot to adjust level as you want and rock on. I did not have to run a wire from the antenna, it senses the signal and knows to shut off.
This thing is amazing IMO. Had mine in for 1.5 years and zero issues.

Lot of youtubes on it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3633fQ_YWw

 

I just put in a major upgrade on the whole Stereo.
Went with the Kenwood Excelon DNX996XR (wireless CarPlay, Garmin maps, and three cams, and a flux capacitor), Maestro RR, Kenwood DRV-520 dash cam and a boyo front cam, Alpine S-S65C series component fronts, Alpine SPE-6000 series rears, and Alpine 300 psu series sub (Alpine sells one that bolts right behind your rear seat and comes with all the brackets and harness for your vehicle.
The difference is amazing!
It was one thing I wanted was some state of the art electronics.
I used Crutchfield, and got all the components with no modifications or drilling.

The Chaplain

 

Nice, any pictures?

 

Pretty much plug and play. Read this thread it gives you the plugs so you don't need to cut or two any wires. Sounds great. I got mine as a refurb on Amazon for 150. I also saw Fry's has the inifity version on clearance for 75 if you have one local.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...-premium-upgrade-kicker-key-180-4-amp.541375/

 

Do you have the frys link?

 

https://www.frys.com/product/8684880?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

 

Or cut the connector off the old speaker and solder it to the new one.

 

assuming you had room behind your stereo to hide the amp

 

This Alpine unit is what I installed. It comes with the bracket and wiring harness for Tacoma’s. Worked great and sounds awesome!

https://www.alpine-usa.com/product/toyota-tacoma-4-door-sound-system-psu-300tcm

 

I too questioned using Kicker, even the series that everyone was installing. I decided to go with a higher series Kicker, was disappointed, and sent them back. Then I tried 2 high-dollar coax and component sets from JBL, again, no joy. Finally ordered the CS series Kickers. For whatever reason, these are much more sensitive and responsive to the factory head unit, especially at lower volumes. I can't explain it, but these simply outperformed everything else I tried on factory power. It wasn't even close. While the JBL component set was louder at full volume and cleaner, it was uneven throughout the entire volume range, and the crossovers didn't work because the head unit wasn't producing enough power. The others produced very little bass, which the CS speakers create a lot of.

 

I think the biggest problem with this is that people are buying 300 watt speakers and connecting them to the 60 watt OE system. There is somewhat of an art to matching audio components. You can pick manufactures that you know / like. But you also have to pay attention to the specifications of the devices you purchase to ensure that they are compatible. There isn't enough power on the OE system to drive a 300watt speaker. And it will not sound good. Kicker is a "decent" manufacturer. But there "are" better brands out there.

 

They aren't 300 watts rms....

 

OK, just curious - what were they?

 

I think 100 and 130 rms, I chucked the boxes. They sound very MEH when I first installed them. After them breaking in for a few weeks they sound much better.
I also added noico to the back wall and the doors behind the speakers. I need to take the panels off again and do more.

 

What do you recommend?

 

Lol, the OE system is probably putting out somewhere in the neighborhood of 5-7W a channel.

Also power handling does not equal sound quality, even if you match the RMS amp to speaker. Sure if you get a 300w speaker running 300w you'll undoubtedly get more SPL, but I could find numerous speakers with <100w max that would sound miles ahead. The high power handling seemed to be a marketing thing, so people could both have more SPL and brag about the power. Sensitivity dictates the real "sound" or SPL at least. You can send less power to a 93 db w/m2 speaker and have it be louder than a 88 db w/m2 speaker. I agree with power matching though, you should aim to get the most out of the speaker. If you want it to at least have the SPL and sound you can feel though it will need some reasonable power though.