Hey, ElDude. After a couple messages from you and some research on my own, I have decided to replace my TSX’s front speakers and add an amp to power them. I currently have a JL 250/1 powering a 10W3. You and I had discussed the Avincars but you were afraid that, while they’d definitely sound better, output wise, they would have a hard time keeping up with the sub. I tossed around the idea of going with the Alpine Type S that others have used, but think I might be in the same boat. Anyway, I am going to buy a JL 300/2 to power new front components and, based on your instructions, tap the front signals before the amp.

Anyway, you seem to have a ton of experience with this car. My questions for you are, what would you recommend? What are you currently running? I found some old posts of yours and plan to install them using your spacer plans as well as adding some damping material to the doors while I have the doors apart. My main goals are a nice, tight mid bass, clean mids, highs that are not overly harsh, and tweeters that do not look out of place on the dash. Like I said, what do you recommend and, if you sell them, what would your price be?

Any recommendations from other members are welcome.

Lastly, how difficult are new components to wire? I would like to use the crossovers that come with the new set which should require me to run new cable to the doors and dash? Any tricks to getting wire to the dash locations?

Thanks in advance for the help. I am really looking forward to this upgrade.

 

bullyx2,

Let me just share 1 thing from the component install I did last weekend. Just using the stock amp and its signals, I planned on replacing all 4 cabin speakers and the tweeters. When doing the front doors, I thought about using the included crossovers, but decided against it purely for difficulty of install. Without dash disassembly, which I didn't want to do, but would make this a lot easier, it would have required running a wire fish from the door metal, through the door cable run, into the dash, and pushing enough slack of wire through there that you could reach down the tweeter hole with some kind of grabbing tool or hook and pull the wires up. You would only need to run 2 small gauge wires for the tweeters to run off of, but, lacking the best tools to do this, I simply cut out the stock tweeters, dremeled the holes a tad larger to fit my infinity tweeters, and soldered the infinity leads to the stock wires. The effect is full range going to the doors, and a little too much range (imo) going to the tweeters, but it was an easy and efficient (and cheap) install.

I should add that I'm running a JL 250/1 on a DLS sub in the rear, with my 6x9s removed completely. After some tweaking, I think the balance is fine. Its not competition audio, but it sounds damn good for every day use.

 

Thanks Reach. What amp are you running to the door speakers? If I was going to use the stock amp, I'd go without the aftermarket x-overs. But with an aftermarket amp, I'd then have to tap back into the stock wires after the amp. Could be an option though.

Right now, I am not using my 6x9's but they are still installed. Bass is a little overpowering now so I am leaving them in. Once I get the new fronts and amp in, I may remove them and work on balancing them.

What Infinity's are you running? Do you happen to have a pic of the tweeters in the dash? I have a set of 6.5 Kappa components @ home (one blown mid) and just installed a set of 6.5 Perfects in a friend's S2000.

 

My install... recent thread. https://acurazine.com/forums/audio-video-electronics-navigation-22/now-running-infinity-kappas-340737/

Stock amp for the cabin speakers. I didn't take any pics but I can grab a quick pic for you tonight, I prolly won't be back to post until tomorrow tho

 

Mounted with included hardware, which allows me to angle them a little bit.




(sorry, pictures taken on a treo)

 

reach....those look cool and it's great that you can aim them! I've got the UP6s from DLS (avincar) I am dealing with some vibration resonance in the doors ( I need to fix those using all the az threads). Have you got a lot of that buzzing since your upgrade to the fronts?

 

No buzzing or vibrations. I used metra brackets for the doors, and drilled new holes in the brackets to line up with the infinity screw holes, and screwed then in tightly. With the snap-in brackets, the fit is extremely tight and torsioned, so no buzzing and I don't expect any to develop.

 

my buzzing/vibration is the door bits and trim, not the speaker mounting. the added dynamic range of the speaker highlights the somewhat loose door assembly.

 

then if i had to guess, I'd say when he re-attached the doors, he didn't put them on 100% (no offense).

I'd recommend removing the door panels and ensuring that all of the 'christmas tree' snaps are attached to the door panel and not just in the door without connecting to the panel. When removing each panel, a few of these stay on the door and unless you take the extra time to pull them out and re-mount them, they'll do you no good, and in addition could cause vibration since its an anchor point that is now floating instead of anchored.

edit: also, check the wiring to make sure its not vibrating. I electrical taped up a bunch of my wiring for extra insulation and so it wouldn't 'tap' on the door, then taped it to the metal frame with just enough slack to make the connections.

 

Thanks for the quick pix Reach. Looks Good.

Subdued, Other than the door vibration, how happy are you with the DLS?

 

I like them (DLS UP6) a lot. They sound really nice - very natural. no distortion what so ever. this is with a DLS amp (ca41) and the DLS mag 10 sub. all rears are disconnected.

I know there are mbquart, focal, dynaudio, with great sound quality. but I had great confidence that avincar's formula was a good set up. in fact a proven formula. and I didn't want to play audio doctor.

I just need to read all the door vibration thread. I have isolated it to the driverside door switch assembly and that panel and there is a fix for that- nothing I will enter my own phase of "modding"...I get it when the volume is loud enough to cause these vibrations but not loud enough to mask them. when it is low it's ok when it is medium its vibrates with certain bass frequencies, when it is loud I cant hear it -duh. the doors have dampening material and are solid- you should hear the door close! the door vibration is not constant. only with some music. ken even heard it with alot of a massive attack cd. and track 6 on depeche mode's new playing the angel cd triggers it.

I'll give a formal review sometime in the near future. with pics of course.

 

pics of my avincar dls amp/speaker upgrade install on my TSX are at this azine thread p.2

 

Thanks. Loooks good. Do you know how Ken wired those? Did he run new wires to the dash? Also, how much power are they seeing from that DLS amp?