Icehawk's "OEM+" speaker upgrade

[Icehawk]

Absolutely worth it to me. If the car sounded like this stock, I wouldn't have considered upgrading anything.

The only thing I would do differently on my car is a cheaper sub driver. Maybe I'll amp mine down the road if I'm looking for something to do/blow money on and that might improve its value by exploiting more of its performance.

You could get close to what I did for a lot less - I went with CDT's higher end drivers and replaced everything. For best value only replace the F&R doors and tweeters and skip everything else. If you can handle mounting the tweeters, IMO, you can build a nice setup for <$500 otherwise plan to spend a little bit on having a pro assist.

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[Dustbunni]

Are there smaller tweeters that fit more in the oem spot? Or what if you ran a traditional speaker in the front and rear doors with an attached tweeter? If that makes sense

 

[VT Skier]

Can you PM your installer's contact info? I'd like to upgrade my stereo and am not a DIY guy. I'm in SWFL, so not a bad drive over. I'm interested in his idea to use a better processor/amp instead of (or in addition to?) upgrading the speakers.

 

[Icehawk]

Are there smaller tweeters that fit more in the oem spot? Or what if you ran a traditional speaker in the front and rear doors with an attached tweeter? If that makes sense

I think the DRT-25s I bought for the rear would have fit fine, the ES-1200 has a chunky integrated housing that was the issue.

You don't want to use a coaxial speaker, the tweeters will not be in a good spot down by your knees.

Can you PM your installer's contact info? I'd like to upgrade my stereo and am not a DIY guy. I'm in SWFL, so not a bad drive over. I'm interested in his idea to use a better processor/amp instead of (or in addition to?) upgrading the speakers.

Absolutely, I'll send you the info. He did seem to think amping w/processor would net good results with the stock speakers - his opinion is that it would sound better than the route I took. I do know from past experience that amping drivers makes a huge difference - but I've never tried that on stock speakers.

 

[VT Skier]

Thank you. It will be a few months before I get to this, but I'll update everyone at some point.

 

[Icehawk]

Remounted the sub driver and added more sound deadening to the outside of the enclosure as well as a few sheets of sound deadener in that area of the trunk. I'd love to hear what amping the box would do before blowing more money...

 

[RUNN1N]

I know nothing about car audio, and this isn't FL5-related, but my Del Sol came with a (early 2000's) Pioneer Premier 2-way amp in the trunk and the speakers sound good (definitely upgraded).

I'd like to add a self-contained subwoofer to round out the package... any recommendations?

 

[Icehawk]

Budget? Size?

 

[RUNN1N]

Budget? Size?

The trunk is big enough to fit two adult humans, and I just spent almost as much on wheels and tires as the car itself... so cost isn't a huge concern.

 

[Icehawk]

Look at the JL boxes, high quality stuff made near me.

 

[RUNN1N]

Look at the JL boxes, high quality stuff made near me.

THANK YOU!!!

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