ePhoenix
Junior Member
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2016
- Posts
- 10
- Reaction score
- 6
- Location
- Calgary Alberta
- Ram Year
- 2016
- Engine
- Hemi 5.7
The system is not bad overall, except for a few bad apples as in any OEM car sound system. Thanks to all who pioneered with drivers and shared their experience here before myself.
What’s good:
• Head Unit (good sound, good power from the amp unit). It won’t shake the car beside, but it’s not the purpose of any OEM premium sound system.
• Door speakers (not bad at all for OEM). Properly x-over’ed as woofers (front) and woofers/mids (rear).
What’s so so:
• The subwoofer (wobbly and mushy)
What’s really bad:
• The dash speakers (all 3 of them). They stink! Very bad quality!
• The roof-mount speakers for the rear passengers. 2.5 inches full range speakers as components voice/high speakers!?!?!? Come on!
Ok, first of all, this is a poor attempt at designing a components sound system. The locations are right hopefully, so it is not hard nor expensive to work around the different glitches.
How it should be (components sound system):
• Dash speakers are for midrange sounds (voices) and highs (cymbals, etc…). The windshield naturally redirects the voices and highs toward the front passengers
• A subwoofer should sound low and crisp, not wobbly nor mushy.
• Door speakers should be woofers. They'e located too low for anything else.
• Headliner speakers should be midrange/tweeters (voice/highs)
What I did to fix the sound:
• Replaced the subwoofer with a Pioneer TS-SW2002D2. It’s drop in. Even the holes align with the OEM ones. You have to fill the hole at the bottom of the sub, that was used to screw the old sub in (not sure why they designed it this way, but it has to be blocked). Filled the box with polyfill (polyester pillow fill material) as it gives “more air” to the sub to compress and physic laws applying here as well, it generates more dbs. Used 6514 connectors either from Metra or Xtenzi to keep the original connectors and avoid splicing.
• Replaced the dash speakers with 3 x Kicker 41KSC354. They’re also drop in speakers. Nothing to alter. But they do have a real silk tweeter that makes all the difference in the world. Don’t worry about the 2 ohm/4 ohm drama on losing power. I did not notice any. Used 039C connectors either from Metra or Xtenzi to keep the original connectors and avoid splicing.
• Replaced the headliner speakers in the back with Infinity Reference REF-075TX. They are linked to the back door speakers. Used the provided passive crossover. I had to build a small bracket to hold them in the 2.5” OEM speakers location. It’s easy if you use something like a plastic lid and cut a bracket using the OEM speaker as a template. This is what I did and I angled the drivers toward the rear passengers (you’ll have plenty of highs from the windshield in the front and, after all, they are designed to complement the rear door speakers). The bracket does not have to be thick. Just made sure to put some foam pieces behind to avoid rattles.
What I will do later on:
• I have the replacement speakers for the doors. I am less in a hurry for these guys since they are not too bad as it is. I bought 4 Kicker KSC69 on which I have cancelled the tweeter by snipping the black wire that runs through the magnet. Components do no need coax speakers but these are high quality compact 6x9 speakers, already xover-ed at 2.5K and on which you can easily cancel the tweeter. They are higher quality than OEM although 4 ohm instead of 2 for the OEM. Again, I doubt that any power loss will occur since the Kicker has a pretty high sensitivity of 92 db.
• I will also Dynamat the widest possible area on the door at the back of the speaker, as well as the speaker area in order to strengthen the mount and eliminate undesired vibrations. Connectors for the door speakers are 6514.
The result until now:
• It’s not perfect (nothing is in this world), but it’s light years better than the OEM. I am very happy with the results. If you listen to blues, jazz, classical, pop, rock, or country, it is a nice upgrade while keeping the OEM system. For me, adjusting the mid equalizer slide to between +4 and +6 (others flat) brought the system as close as possible to a real band playing live.
What’s good:
• Head Unit (good sound, good power from the amp unit). It won’t shake the car beside, but it’s not the purpose of any OEM premium sound system.
• Door speakers (not bad at all for OEM). Properly x-over’ed as woofers (front) and woofers/mids (rear).
What’s so so:
• The subwoofer (wobbly and mushy)
What’s really bad:
• The dash speakers (all 3 of them). They stink! Very bad quality!
• The roof-mount speakers for the rear passengers. 2.5 inches full range speakers as components voice/high speakers!?!?!? Come on!
Ok, first of all, this is a poor attempt at designing a components sound system. The locations are right hopefully, so it is not hard nor expensive to work around the different glitches.
How it should be (components sound system):
• Dash speakers are for midrange sounds (voices) and highs (cymbals, etc…). The windshield naturally redirects the voices and highs toward the front passengers
• A subwoofer should sound low and crisp, not wobbly nor mushy.
• Door speakers should be woofers. They'e located too low for anything else.
• Headliner speakers should be midrange/tweeters (voice/highs)
What I did to fix the sound:
• Replaced the subwoofer with a Pioneer TS-SW2002D2. It’s drop in. Even the holes align with the OEM ones. You have to fill the hole at the bottom of the sub, that was used to screw the old sub in (not sure why they designed it this way, but it has to be blocked). Filled the box with polyfill (polyester pillow fill material) as it gives “more air” to the sub to compress and physic laws applying here as well, it generates more dbs. Used 6514 connectors either from Metra or Xtenzi to keep the original connectors and avoid splicing.
• Replaced the dash speakers with 3 x Kicker 41KSC354. They’re also drop in speakers. Nothing to alter. But they do have a real silk tweeter that makes all the difference in the world. Don’t worry about the 2 ohm/4 ohm drama on losing power. I did not notice any. Used 039C connectors either from Metra or Xtenzi to keep the original connectors and avoid splicing.
• Replaced the headliner speakers in the back with Infinity Reference REF-075TX. They are linked to the back door speakers. Used the provided passive crossover. I had to build a small bracket to hold them in the 2.5” OEM speakers location. It’s easy if you use something like a plastic lid and cut a bracket using the OEM speaker as a template. This is what I did and I angled the drivers toward the rear passengers (you’ll have plenty of highs from the windshield in the front and, after all, they are designed to complement the rear door speakers). The bracket does not have to be thick. Just made sure to put some foam pieces behind to avoid rattles.
What I will do later on:
• I have the replacement speakers for the doors. I am less in a hurry for these guys since they are not too bad as it is. I bought 4 Kicker KSC69 on which I have cancelled the tweeter by snipping the black wire that runs through the magnet. Components do no need coax speakers but these are high quality compact 6x9 speakers, already xover-ed at 2.5K and on which you can easily cancel the tweeter. They are higher quality than OEM although 4 ohm instead of 2 for the OEM. Again, I doubt that any power loss will occur since the Kicker has a pretty high sensitivity of 92 db.
• I will also Dynamat the widest possible area on the door at the back of the speaker, as well as the speaker area in order to strengthen the mount and eliminate undesired vibrations. Connectors for the door speakers are 6514.
The result until now:
• It’s not perfect (nothing is in this world), but it’s light years better than the OEM. I am very happy with the results. If you listen to blues, jazz, classical, pop, rock, or country, it is a nice upgrade while keeping the OEM system. For me, adjusting the mid equalizer slide to between +4 and +6 (others flat) brought the system as close as possible to a real band playing live.
