Dramatically improved audio for $150
 

Well, I followed the lead of some folks on this forum...thanks to all of them for the invaluable descriptions and pictorials....and the quality of the audio in my car is now orders of magnitude better than it was.

I have a Sport package with the base stereo. From reading reviews on here I elected to go with the Infinity Reference speakers: 6000CS 6.5" components in the doors/sail panels and 6x9 9603 3-ways in the rear deck. They're efficient, so I can make the most out of the power available from the stock HU, they sound pretty good and they're relatively cheap.

Now...if you search around on Ebay, they're REALLY cheap. I got mine for a grand total of about $150, including shipping from Canada to South Florida. The fronts were some open-box demo speakers and the rears were used but fully functional. (One caveat: One of the tweeters for the fronts is bad, but there was a guarantee against DOA so we'll see how that goes...still, at about 1/4 the price of a new set I can afford to go get another tweeter if I need to).

A couple notes on install issues that hopefully will be helpful to someone.

- The tweeters CAN be mounted in the stock location without cutting anything. They don't snap in like the stock tweeters, and of course you can't use the existing wiring as it would bypass the Infinity crossover and send bass freqs to your tweeter (the stock tweeter appears to have the high pass filter built in). This also gives you stock aiming of the speaker, which isn't that great. However, I don't like it overly bright so so far I'm happy. Once I get the other side replaced, I may decide I'm better off using the adjustable mount and cutting the sail panel as others have done for sound stage purposes, but I can always do that later.

- The idea used by several others on the forum of using Lexan and a jigsaw to make an adapter for the 6.5" woofer is a GREAT idea. Others have mentioned having to enlarge the stock cutout, but with these speakers I didn't have to do that.

- Someone posted that you can bend the top of the rear seats down enough to get to the rear deck speakers. Personally, I don't see how, unless they aren't mounted properly...there are clips or whatever holding the seat backs to the body, and you have to lift them upwards to get over them....which you can't do without unbolting them from the bottom. At any rate, its insanely easy to take out the rear seats in this car. Seriously. Don't even waste your time trying to avoid it.

- You'll either need a very short torx driver, a small allen wrench or a socket (9mm I THINK). The socket worked great for removal, but I couldn't use it on the re-install because there wasn't room with the Infinities to get it over the screw head. I could fit my torx driver in under the glass to get to the front screws, but not the backs, so I screwed them up from the trunk. The holes weren't perfect, but close enough. Come to think of it, I could have used my own screws with a philips head and a much shorter screwdriver....whatever.

- Pay attention to polarity! I made sure I saw the correction post about the pink, not purple wire being positive on the driver's side rear, and then botched the other side. The white wire is ground, not black, doh! It makes a HUGE difference in bass output.

- The difference in clarity is nothing short of amazing. No more muddy mid-bass hiding all the detail in the music. THe bass itself is pretty amazing, to the point where I actually started questioning whether I needed to get that Basslink...but I came to my sense, of course I need it. Still, even with no sub, no amp and the stock HU I'm very happy with the sound at normal listening levels.

In conclusion: If you don't like the sound of your stock base stereo but are afraid to bother because you don't have $500 or more to spend on it...don't let that stop you!

I'm the one that installed those infinity speakers without taking off the back seats. Like I said before its doable--its a tight squeeze unless you have overly large hands. At any rate once my amp came in, I took the seat backs off to run wires and what not and to ensure the fitment of the 6x9s--it was a seemless install. It is easier to take the back seats off than bend the seats back to do the 6x9 install--its doable but takes some muscle work. No crease was left in the seat like someone incorrectly assumed. But like you said--taking the seat back off is probably the easiest part of this install. I will have pics up soon of my setup. Ultimately I will fiberglass the sail panel in Black to expose the Kappa tweeters and match the piano black trim. I also plan on adding a Polk/Momo 8" sub. With the amp I cannot turn the volume up past 15 without it being BLARINGLY loud.

pictures would be helpful

I actually don't think pictures of my completed install would be very helpful at all...it looks 100% stock! This can be considered either good or bad I suppose. I thought about pictures of my progress, but I would just be rehashing what others have already done. Alas, I'm no pioneer :-)

jds

Hey, where you at in South Florida? I'm living in Miami now.

bereau13: Those are the same speakers I got! I paid a bit more, but got them at Brandsmart for 220 (fronts and rears) since they listed them as a discontinued model :D Who am I to correct them.

Glad we are agreed on how much better such a simple swap worked out :D

Wow, $220 at Brandsmart is pretty damned good. I would have paid the extra for peace of mind...but not the extra for what they should have charged you :-D

rabinabo, I'm in Sunrise, near the Sawgrass Mills mall.

jds

I'd be interested in hearing how much better those speakers sound than stock. I have the base stereo too. I'll PM you later to see if you'd like to meet sometime.

pixs would be cool
either way nice upgrade

Where and how did you mount the crossover for the front speakers?

I mounted it where the Bose amp or crossover or whatever it is goes, right next to the speaker. There's nothing mounted there with the base stereo. I could only use one of the screw holes but it was good enough.

jds

i am planning on doing a similar upgrade to the stock stereo. i was wondering if you knew if the hu has out puts for a sub?

No, it doesn't.

awe man! that sucks. oh well i half expected it anyway. thanks

does anyone have any suggestions on what hu to replace the stock with?

I haven't heard of anyone successfully replacing the HU yet. many have tried and have found the AC/Heat contraols to be an issue. It all seems to be contraolled from the same circuit board. Do some searches to get the whole picture, but I know its not going to be easy.

test

Diagram For Removing Paneling
 

Is there a link to see how to remove the plastic panels for the doors, the HU, popping a 4gauge wire thru the driver's side foot panel, etc? I want to replace the stock speakers, and use my own speakers/amps, but i am a little intimidated because i would have to remove all the bose wiring and get it to the HU. I have 2 JLaudio amps, and would put them in the trunk, but that is a lot of car to have to hide the wires in, and i really dont wanna jack this car up considering i just got it 3 days ago. I thought the bose system would be doable, but there literally is 0 bass out of it. i was really surprised at how bad it was. shouldnt be considering i just got rid of my touring 350Z, and had to replace that bose system too.

The search function is your friend. Literally, you can find detailed information to all of your questions on this board.

Bureau 13

quick question on the install of the remote tweeter:

you said to not use the existing wiring because bass will go to the tweeter .

How did you wire it so that the infinity crossover is being used?

Thanks

Thanks very much for this tip.
I did exactly the same thing after I read your posting,
and I'm happy.

A few things I learned:

- crutchfield has a 6x8->5 1/4 adaptor plate that
fits the 6000cs perfectly (need to drill holes in it for
the speaker mounting holes, that's all). I did ebay for
the speakers but if I did it again I'd just buy everything from crutchfield and get this, nice speaker harness clips, etc included (crutchfield isn't _that_ much more expensive,
especially as both these speakers were on sale last
I looked).

- I believe the fronts are somewhat of an improvement.
The rears, though, are like night and day. And the rears
are easiest to remove.

- I'm not mechanically that competent, and there
were various things that challenged me a bit here.
But to echo earlier comments, the idea that changing
rears speakers is hard _because you need to remove
the rears seats_ is (in retrospect) simply funny. This
is nothing.

- all in all, it probably took me 6-7 hours total.
Doing it again, I could probably do it in 4. (But
see previous point, I'm not good at this stuff.)

- pep boys has replacement clips if you break a few
while removing the front door. The ones I got were for
GM and looked a bit different but worked fine.

- I managed to use a socket wrench to remove/install
all the rear speaker bolts. (Not only didn't I need
to fuss with getting torx bits as various others have
talked about, but it seems to me I must have had
it much easier than anyone who used the torx even if
they had it.) I'm not quite sure where others would
have found difficulty with this. Anyway, if you
have a small xmm socket (for x = ... I forget. 8mm perhaps?) try this first.

-ajg

Well, I just bought a set of Infinty speakers at circuit city. It was a tad more than $150, however -- like $320. That did include a 6x8 mounting bracket for the doors, which was a special order.

Now for the installation. I figure I'll do the back this weekend, the front next weekend, assuming the brackets come in. Too bad the pictures are missing from the DIY threads.

The $150 price assumes you make your own brackets and buy your speakers off of Ebay. You get a bit more security for the money if you do it your way...I had to send one of the tweeters back since it didn't work. Fortunately, the vendor was a good guy and replaced it. Check that feedback before you buy!

jds

Some clarifications:
All screws for the rear OEM speakers are 8mm, so best is to use a ratchet.
The seats come out in max 2 min. each. The rear plastic cover is tricky the first time, before you see how it is hold in place.
Due to the "tower" on Infinitys 6x9 3-way pushing in the top plastic speaker mask, mount the speakers from the trunk side. Someone mentioned it but did not give details on the replacement screw sizes :) The new screws from Home Depot are for metal sheet, #8, 1.25" length, cross-head.

I have a question: is this the "base" non-Bose (100 Watt 6 speaker) system we are replacing, or do new speakers also add a dramatic improvement on the factory 300 Watt Bose (9 speaker) setup? I have already added an Infinity Basslink sub and it really adds a lot on the low end. I would love to improve the highs a bit.