I purchased an '08 S2000 not too long ago. The previous owner had installed new component speakers and an amp to drive them. He wired the amp output into the head unit adapter harness so as to avoid running new wires to the speakers. I thought this was fairly clever, although I have no idea if this is the "correct" way of doing things. I'm also not sure if this means that the amp is powering the roll-hoop speakers or not.

My problem is that having the little roll-hoop speakers right next to my head makes it very hard to have decent bass and mid-bass without being overwhelmed with high-pitched sounds (especially "s" sounds). I have tinnitus, so I'm particularly susceptible to this. I've tried messing with the amp's gain and filters but I'm having trouble making things bearable.

What would the S2Ki community recommend I do? Should I disconnect them? Should I install some kind of volume knob for them? Any advice on how and where to do either of these things?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

Sending the amp's output through the stock speaker wires is a perfectly acceptable
approach - there is ultimately a limit to how much power those wires can handle,
but it's doubtful you are exceeding it.
In the stock set up, the roll-hoop speakers are driven off the rear channels of the
headunit. If the amp is a four-channel amp, it's likely that it's still wired this
way, and using the headunit's fader control you can lower the rear speaker's volume
independently of the front. If, on the other hand, it is a two-channel (Left and Right),
the P.O. may have done something funky like attached both front and rear speakers to the
same output, in which case I'd do a little rewiring:

• disconnect the rear speakers from the amp's output
• reconnect them to the headunit's rear speaker outputs

Now the rears will have much less power than the fronts, and you can adjust the pront/rear
balance with the fader.
HTH