I am a car guy and an audio guy. I worked in car stereo many years ago for a decade. Even though I am older now, it is in my blood and still fun to me.

I read a lot of threads about the audio system prior to purchasing my car, but I also wanted to keep an open mind when evaluating it myself.

I wasn't planning on addressing the audio so quickly, but I found it to be the thing that bugged me most about the car. It took some of the fun out of driving it and "listener fatigue" set in fast.

So I started planning small upgrades right away............I purchased my car in November of 2018.

as of 2/25/21

4" MB quart speakers 2 pair. $40 replaced with 3" Focal L&R w/tweets and 4" Focal coax center
8" Polk subwoofer free- $60 value
2 channel amp (mtx) free- $150 value
Audio Control Amp and ACR control **** $600
Stinger stealth sound dead 36 sq. feet $120
Speaker adapters for front and rear doors $50
Focal 6.5", 3", tweet components, 4" coaxial, rear 6.5" coaxials- friend sale $300: value $800+
Stinger 4 ga. wire kit $60
Stinger circuit breaker $20
Foam "fast rings" $30
Used dash/center speaker grills to modify and keep oem ones just in case $60
2- 20' "bundled" wire to wire crossovers in trunk $50
Black aluminum tweeter mounts ebay $85 shipped
misc. speaker grill cloth $15
12" infinity shallow 2/4 ohm subwoofer $130
2'x'2' MDF (3/4") and wood glue $20
ML front speaker grills (used-ebay) $75
Box covering of some sort $? (coming soon)

Total spent $ 1635 Total Value $3k+

As I pass by $1,000, this isn't the lowest budget upgrade, but since I am doing it in small steps it seems a little easier to spend the money. Maybe it will help others take as many steps as they would like for better sound.

 

To me, the center channel was the weakest link in the system.

$19 a pair MB Quart 4" coaxial speakers. This is an entry level speaker, but better than OEM and I just needed a starting point.

Metra 72-7400 speaker harness can be modified to plug into factory connector, so no cutting needed. $5 on ebay.

I had to cut off 2 of the mounting tabs and drill out the mounting holes on the remaining tabs and the speaker bolted right in.

I added the tape because the tweeters were a little too harsh and bright for me. A better speaker would fix this also.


Focal 4" coax upgrade 5/19


Updated mount and grill work below......So worth the extra effort. Sounds so much better.





I will definitely do this to the left and right dash speaker also.

 

$19 a pair MB Quart 4" coaxial speakers temporarily

3" Focals (part of a component set). I had to get creative on the mount, I wanted to angle the speakers towards the dome light, rather than have them fire directly up.

I will clean up the mount a bit and cut a better piece of foam when I cut out the center of the grill and add grill cloth.



Not sure how I will mount the tweeters yet. I definitely don't want to put holes in the dash. maybe use some kind of universal mount

 

8" factory subwoofer replacement upgrade

Metra 72-8104 speaker harness plugs right into factory speaker connector, no cutting needed. $5 on ebay.

This particular Polk Audio subwoofer is no longer made, but any 8" 4 ohm Dual Voice coil Subwoofer should work.

I wired my subwoofer just like this picture.

I had quite a few rattles when done. I had about 2 square feet of sound deadening that I used to chase down rattles. Put in a variety of types of music, etc... while the car is apart to do this. The majority of my rattles was from the torsion bar holder thing in the center of the trunk area/rear deck where the torsion bars crossed each other. I used little bits of sound deadening and a zip tie to keep it from rattling.

The trim panel in the trunk will need to be modified for the magnet of this speaker, it hangs down farther than the stock one. I haven't decided the best way to do this yet, so I have that trim piece out of the car. the trunk light is just hanging for now. This should be pretty simple and barely noticeable when done......update-I have decided to leave the top trim piece off, it looks fine to me and the trunk light clips right into the metal hole in the rear deck.

 

coming spring 2019. Front doors and dash. A friend still in the car audio business got me a deal on these. I couldn't pass it up. this may delay later upgrades, but oh well.

 

speaker upgrade




I didn't do a good job taking pictures of how I sound deadened the doors, but I basically covered the entire outside skin of the doors from the inside, if that makes sense. When I had the speaker out, I fed smaller squares of sound deadening though the hole until the entire outside panel was covered. like the picture below. (not my actual car)



Hard to see in the pic, but I have the speaker spacer and speaker angled up about 15 degrees. I used a 1" spacer behind the lower left mounting hole with a longer bolt. I was afraid it may end up too close to the door panel when all buttoned up, but seems to be all good. I used sound deadening to seal up the big gap I created. Notice how I cut the foam ring also, hardly any foam on the bottom half. I originally thought I would take apart the adapters and change the angle, add bondo, etc... but this was easier, faster, cheaper, lighter, etc..... it usually takes forever to get rid of the bondo smell too. This speaker took about 2 hours at a very leisurely pace. I haven't done the driver's side yet.

 

Upgraded subwoofer amp. Leftover from a car I sold. The 8" sub sounds a lot better and is a little louder, mostly because I have independent gain control, crossover, subsonic filter and remote bass **** up front when I have music I don't mind "dirtying up" a bit with bass boost. This will never sound as good as a 10 or 12 in an enclosure, but I am happy with it for now.

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Amp progress.................not quite done





remote Bass **** near the volume ****. zip tied in place, no holes drilled.

I added a TRD sticker to cover up the MTX logo. looks a little more factory. it is nice that the Lexus trunk mat stops right at the edge of the amp (not pictured). I just removed the dumb first aid kit and all the straps for it.

Install is nothing fancy, but I like how it turned out for a basic install.


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just wanna say this is a great reference in case i do this in the future. i myself have upgraded the dash speakers with rockford fosgates and added a self powered subwoofer by tapping into the wires going to the stock amp. it's good enough so far but i see myself going this route replacing everything later one.

 

 

The factory sub is 2.5 ohms. if you have a 4 ohm sub it can run off the factory amplifier, but will have roughly 1/2 the output and roughly half the power running to it. Free-air sub is best, but most subs will work well in this setup. The speaker I am using is not specifically for free air (no enclosure) applications.

I modified my above post to include the metra connectors I used for the front speakers and the subwoofer. no cutting. someone else posted those in another thread, they get credit for that and I thank them.

 

 

 

yep, that's the one

 

absolutely, although I do recommend a dual voice coil subwoofer wired in parallel to get to 2 ohms. I am thinking running at 4 ohms it may not work as well. I am able to max out the volume on some CDs. It goes to 62 in case anyone needs to know that. I have never been a fan of under the seat type subs.

I will document details on sound deadening and chasing a few rattles. this is key and a step that cannot be skipped. the rear torsion bars rattled so much it made it sound like the speaker distorting.