Hello All,

I purchased the car in July and have slowly been revamping the car. I just wanted to share my latest restoration/upgrade which is an updated audio system.

I replaced the stock head unit with a Sony Model with the built in Class D amplifier. And I paired it with a pair of Morel Maximo 6 complements. It’s a pretty modest upgrade but does what I want and sounds great. I also installed some noico sound deadening material in the door to further help the efficiency of the system.

 

Is there any particular reason you went with the Morels? I just got back from an audio shop and they were pitching me the Morels. Never really knew much about them. Do you feel like they are a substantial increase in quality/volume to the stocks?

 

Which head unit did you end up with? How did you install the tweeters that come with the speakers?

 

I have heard of Morel before, they make floor standing speakers that retail for about how much I bought my S2000 for (15k USD).

I was open to buying JL Audio, Focal and Morel. After listening to the JL Audio C2, Focal Auditor RS16, and these Morels, I decided I liked the mellow sound characteristics of the Morel tweeter vs the more harsh sounding tweeters of the other two brands. I also liked how warm and natural the mids and mid bass sounded for my kind of music. With that said, I know there are many better speakers out there for way more money, but I wasn't willing to spend more than 200 USD on the speakers as I don't see a point in going high end on a car like the S2k.

Another consideration was the high sensitivity of the speakers as I was planning on using the head unit to power them. With that said, I went with the Sony DSX-M80 and wired the 12v to the unit directly from the battery as recommended by Sony as this head unit has a built in Class D amplifier rated at 45 watts continuous RMS.

 

How much did you end up spending? I usually like to keep cars stock (or pretty close to it) but the oem sound system in the S2000 leaves much to be desired. I have the stock exhaust on the car so perhaps it might be worth upgrading my sound system!

 

Indeed I have my stock exhaust too! Like you I tend to leave all of my cars stock, but my other cars are significantly more modern, and I missed the ability to use my iphone as a source for music and podcasts. What I like about my head unit is: A. Its conservatively styled (for this type of equipment) and B. The backlighting is adjustable to match the S2000's other lights and indicators pretty closely. Unless you were a car collector or someone who is really into the S2000, you would probably just assume my head unit was the stock one that came with the car.

From Crutchfield, I purchased the headunit for 260, https://www.crutchfield.com/p_158DSX...y-DSX-M80.html and the speakers were 150, https://www.crutchfield.com/p_210MAX...-Maximo-6.html
It came with wire harness to connect the head unit to the audio controls built into the s2k on the left. Crutchfield also supplies the adapters to connect to the existing speaker harness at no cost.

I bought an additional baffle from Amazon for 20 dollars, and some sound deadening material that came out to roughly 60 dollars (Noico and Boomat).

From Modifry I bought a pair of speaker adaptors for 30 dollars.

So including tax, and all, I spent slightly north of 500, which I thought was perfectly reasonable for what I got in terms of features and sound quality. I also got a project to work on for a weekend in my garage away from my family which was basically priceless.

 

Thanks for the great thread and response! I really appreciate it. It's nice that you can replace the speakers without having to remove the moisture barriers in the doors. Was it obvious which speaker adapters you needed from Modifry? I've been to a nice audio shop here in the Chicago area and the head unit displays were awful. Yours looks good. I could see myself going the exact same route that you did, and $500 total is quite reasonable.

 

I noticed you got the M series instead of the G series? Does it have any difference between the two? I thought it was for non cars...

 

@jeffreygebhart No problem! As for the modifry adapter, these are the ones I picked up: https://modifry.com/index.php?route=...product_id=191 I think I chose it because the Morel speaker appeared do be deeper than most others and I just wanted to make sure I didn't have any issues clearing the window glass when it rolled down. Whatever my reasoning, it worked out perfectly. Its been my experience that @modifry products are well engineered and thoughtfully designed to work well with the S2000 and it just makes these projects go smoothly and alot more fun. As for the moisture barrier, I peeled it off for the installation, and reapplied some of the adhesive Honda (p/n 08712-0003) used and tacked it back on. Best of luck if you choose to tackle the project yourself! Btw, I love the cars in your garage! But I have to ask, whats it like to drive them in those tough mid-west winters?

@Sang Yi I looked into both, I originally wanted to buy the G series since it was cheaper and looked to have the same feature set and design, but Crutchfield was out of stock. After a month of waiting, I gave in and bought the marine unit. As far as I can tell, the main difference between the two were that the Marine unit had a high contrast display, the "Marine Grade" components, and the slightly higher price. I really enjoy the high contrast display for my less than stellar vision. I can't say much about the marine grade components but I guess it can't hurt, and obviously, I don't like the slightly higher price. It may be marketed for marine use, but seems to work fine in a car, since it is nearly identical except for the aforementioned differences. Hope that helps.

 

I bought this one https://www.crutchfield.com/S-ETGSZ3...y-DSX-M80.html

I used the existing Honda factory bracket but stuffed 3 layers of double sided 3M tape to the back of it to keep it tight.