Dash speaker info

[dyeager535]

Alright, calling any audio person that can answer these questions. Hopefully people check here, not much activity in the audio forum I see!

Anyways, I'm thinking I may need to replace my front dash speakers. I found out that they are 3.5" by searching here, great. So I checked Crutchfield (only because I figure they would have a good online selection to look at) and see that indeed, there are plenty of 3.5" speakers.

My question is the "top-mount depth". A couple say they are 1-9/16", and to me that looks like how far "down" the extend, so what would hang down under the dash bracket? Haven't looked closely, but I intend to keep the dash stock, so I would imagine that what extends above the bracket would be the problem area?

Lastly, in one post, it was mentioned that the front speakers are not actually tweeters. So being that I can only assume, tweeters are more high range? Makes sense, they are smaller. Anyways, if that's the case, is there going to be anything in the 3.5" range that is a bit more "rounded" in performance, since that's all you can hear decently?

I'm not interested in adding/changing anything else in the system, just the front speakers in the near future. Once I start digging in to see what the PO's did with the rear speaker wiring, I may have to do those too, but that's for later.

 

[pauly383]

The dashpad on 80's rigs has a metal crossbar under the sprayed on foam where the speaker holes are that will hit the top of most aftermarket speakers . I have a cracked pad with a dashmat on it , so I just cut a hole in the dashpad . Did this to me on Blaupunkt , and with my current soundstream speakers .

If I had a clean dashpad , I would of just dremeled the area UNDER the opening .

 

[dyeager535]

Do you think the brackets could be modified to drop the speakers down, if you happened to look at them while you were dealing with this? Maybe bolt the speakers to the underside of the bracket?

 

[pauly383]

Yup was thinking about that , if you have room behind the gauges , and room above the passenger side a/c duct , it could work . Haven't looked in ages .

 

[dyeager535]

I was thinking the same...perhaps the only reason it wouldn't work would be due to AC ductings, but since I don't have any, maybe I can get some decent speakers in there...hmm. Will be some time, but if/when I get around to it I'll post back up if I find something to work.

 

[BulldogK5]

I installed some Infinity Kappas up there with no problems in my old '91. I'll have to see what the '90 has (can't remember right now) but they did not cause a problem either.

 

[crash81]

i put memphis audio in my dash worked great and fit perfictly under dash pad

 

[Randy92782]

I had pioneer 3.5's in each corner and a Eclipse 4X6 in the middle and had no problems clearing anything. I can't remember there being a brace under the dash pad either. Maybe i just never paid close attention...

 

[Copasetic]

I've got Kicker 3.5's in my dash and I didn't have to modify anything.

 

[chevyfumes]

I'm sure this doesn't help but I got a replacement at radio shack that fit but instead of wiring it to the stereo I wired it to my CB, works great, just an idea.

 

[BulldogK5]

Not sure if that helps with the question at hand, but that is a damn good idea. Which did you wire to the cb, the center speaker (4x6 I think)?

 

[RootBreaker]

I'm sure this doesn't help but I got a replacement at radio shack that fit but instead of wiring it to the stereo I wired it to my CB, works great, just an idea.

that is how I used to have it.. I need to get a new front speaker and hook my cb back up to it.. nice and loud and dont have to worry about an external speaker...

I tried recently hooking up to my headliner speaker above my head (still hooked up... ) and tell you what... BAD IDEA!!!! get that squuuureeeeeech sound now...

 

[chevyfumes]

Not sure if that helps with the question at hand, but that is a damn good idea. Which did you wire to the cb, the center speaker (4x6 I think)?

Yeah thats what I did and yeah figured it had no real bearing on the thread but thought I'd throw it out there anyway cause it works so damn good.

 

[jonrpick]

Yeah thats what I did and yeah figured it had no real bearing on the thread but thought I'd throw it out there anyway cause it works so damn good.

I thought of using the factory center dash speaker for this as well.

 

[dyeager535]

So now that this is back up top, the third speaker brings another question.

Running a stock stereo, how would I wire up three speakers to the front channel, without overloading the radio? I know you aren't just supposed to hook a bunch of speakers up to one terminal, but running three speakers up front would probably be a bit better sounding than the two tiny ones up front and the largers all the way in the back.

Since I've got space for it, I'd think this to be a decent mod.

CB is already handled, factory one cuts the radio off while receiving, and uses all the speakers.

 

[jonrpick]

So now that this is back up top, the third speaker brings another question.

Running a stock stereo, how would I wire up three speakers to the front channel, without overloading the radio? I know you aren't just supposed to hook a bunch of speakers up to one terminal, but running three speakers up front would probably be a bit better sounding than the two tiny ones up front and the largers all the way in the back.

Since I've got space for it, I'd think this to be a decent mod.

CB is already handled, factory one cuts the radio off while receiving, and uses all the speakers.

Replace the front speaker with a "double" speaker.

http://lmctruck.com/icatalog/bzc/t.asp?page=82

It's a true dual-speaker that fits in place of your regular single speaker. So then you'd have 2 pairs of speakers in the dash.

 

[dyeager535]

And doing so won't hurt the stereo in any way? That's really my concern, although wouldn't a large single speaker be better in that location to offset the smaller fronts?

 

[jonrpick]

And doing so won't hurt the stereo in any way? That's really my concern, although wouldn't a large single speaker be better in that location to offset the smaller fronts?

Well, what kind of head unit are you using? If it's a 4-channel, then I'd wire it like so:

Front Channel
L channel --> left dash speaker
R channel --> left half of center stereo speaker

Rear Channel
L channel --> right half of center stereo speaker
R channel --> right dash speaker

That way the two front passengers would each have a left and right channel.

If your head unit has aux outputs, use them to drive a small separate amp for true rear speakers.

 

[dyeager535]

It's a stock unit, early 80's, 4 channel.

Would it be pushing the head unit too hard to "gang up" one or two more speakers on the front outputs?

Does speaker size have anything to do with it? Just wondering if the larger rear ones "draw" more than the fronts, meaning that perhaps the front channels are under-utilized and pushing them a bit harder wouldn't hurt anything?

If this wasn't a hard to find head unit, I'd probably just try it, but I really don't want to risk it.

I'm not trying to make it sound like an opera house of course, just that while cruising, road noise is pretty rough, and once the volume knon goes up past a certain point, the sound just sucks.

 

[jonrpick]

It's a stock unit, early 80's, 4 channel.

Would it be pushing the head unit too hard to "gang up" one or two more speakers on the front outputs?

Does speaker size have anything to do with it? Just wondering if the larger rear ones "draw" more than the fronts, meaning that perhaps the front channels are under-utilized and pushing them a bit harder wouldn't hurt anything?

If this wasn't a hard to find head unit, I'd probably just try it, but I really don't want to risk it.

I'm not trying to make it sound like an opera house of course, just that while cruising, road noise is pretty rough, and once the volume knon goes up past a certain point, the sound just sucks.

Your biggest concern is always impedance (ohms). If the head unit wants to see a 4-ohm load on each channel, and your speakers are rated at 4 ohms as well, then...you gotta use one speaker per channel. That's the most likely situation as most car audio speakers are 4 ohms. If you got lucky and found 8 ohm speakers, then wiring 2 of them in parallel would yield a 4 ohm load.

The size isn't really relevant unless you're dealing with a very small amount of power trying to push an extremely inefficient speaker, and even then, it's not the "size".

I'll put it this way... take an amp with 1 watt of output power. Connect it first to a 4" speaker, then a 12" speaker. If both speakers are equally efficient, the 12" will, for the most part, be louder, due to the greater surface area.

Example: My smaller guitar amp is rated at 6.5 watts. The stock speaker was an 8-incher. I stuck the amp chassis in a different cabinet with a 12" speaker, and it's MUCH louder. That same 6.5 watt amp driving a speaker cabinet with four 12's can be brutally loud--with no damage to the amp whatsoever.

Doubling the power output will only yield a 3db increase in actual volume.

If the sound suffers after a certain point, there could be a couple of different causes. One is speaker breakup, where the input level exceeds the limits of the speaker and it can no longer accurately reproduce sound. The other would be a situation where the amp section of the head unit is being overdriven by the source, be it the output of the radio or CD/tape/whatever. That's going to be internal to the head unit, and there's nothing you can really do about it except use the head unit as a pre-amp and use an external power amp for your volume. There are adapters available specifically for this application, and some amps have the feature built-in.

If you're not dealing with high quality speakers, then it could be a combo of both. I noticed that you're in the process of shopping for new ones. If you have a lot of road noise, your only 2 options are to cut it out, or increase the power of your audio system. No free lunch here.

Remember what I said a minute ago... doubling your power will only increase output by 3db. Cutting road noise by 3db will have the same effect as doubling the power.

Get some *good* speakers that can handle some real power. Try it with your head unit. If the results are disappointing, try supplementing it with an external power amp that's up to the task. More power is almost always a good thing. Underpowering speakers can damage them too.