I'm going to try and reason this out, so please correct me if I'm wrong.

My car is garaged, but it does get freakin cold here in Chicago. We've had several straight weeks of sub-freezing temps, and some days where it has gone below zero. I notice that when I am listening to the stereo and the car is cold, the sound quality isn't very good. It sounds rather muddy.

I would guess that this is because the speaker cones and surrounds have gotten "hard" from being in the cold.

Once I have the car warmed up and the heat blasting, the sound quality seems to return to normal. Usually 10-15 minutes after turning the car on.

Am I right about this, or is there something else? Maybe it's related to the amplifier being very cold?


To anyone interested, it's a Pioneer Premier DEH-P590iB head unit and Polk db6501 component speakers.

 

Dear God just move from that ridiculous climate.

 

some electronics and connections could act funny in extreme cold. I know the manual for my head unit mentioned it not being happy in cold weather like you're mentioning, it said it would take a few minutes to warm up and work 100%.

 

I would guess that the rubber surround is just too cold to be pliable and thus give less than normal sound.

 

Where I work in Canada, it will often get to be -31F ...

I have never had stock speakers in several trucks have SQ change. Although these are stock stereos in toyota tundras... I just thought I would throw these numbers at you.

Where i LIVE (not work) we get -13F often. I have never had aftermarket speakers nor amps change SQ on me.