I'm looking to upgrade my speakers. I want to go with two-way separates, because my leg keeps getting in the way of the door speaker!

I heard a pair of Focal 165K's at an audio store, and fell in love. They are AWESOME, and they're very high efficiency (93 db/watt). My question is, how hard will they be to fit?

I saw a post here which said that there's 70 mm to the window. These speakers have a mounting depth of 69 mm, pretty close. Can I beef up the basket ring to make it a little thicker (maybe 3 mm) so that I ahve adequate clearance? Anyone out there have any experience / know the answer?

Thanks,
Howard

 

If they're too deep just cut the back side of the basket off. It's no big deal and most decent speakers are designed to deal with the elements. If you're going to upgrade the speakers, even with high efficiency ones such as you describe, I'd give strong consideration about either swapping the head unit for one with more power or adding an amp to the stock head unit. The stock head unit does not have the power needed for decent speakers, even good high efficient ones.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Strike:
[B]... If you're going to upgrade the speakers, even with high efficiency ones such as you describe, I'd give strong consideration about either swapping the head unit for one with more power or adding an amp to the stock head unit.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by laster:
[B] They do sound a lot better that the stock ones though even without the amp/head unit.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Strike:
[B]

 

To address your question about depth, I built out the speaker enclosure with 3/4 " MDF ad still had plenty of room for the door skin to fit back in. So basically I'm saying there is plenty of room to mount alomst anything, with a little custom work offcourse. I installed Polk's

 

Some day I may do my car up big and fit in a set of G&S Red Lines. Probably nobody has ever heard of them but lets just say that the magnet rivals some 8 inch subs I have seen! I mean huge!

They were loud crisp and super clean. Coupled with a set of Vifa tweeters(silk dome) I had the best sounding system I have ever heard in my life. Ran a set of 12" Aria subs and had a screaming 130 DB system that was great. Though that wont happen in my S.

If you got the guts you can do almost anything! Hell if you wanted to you could put a set of oversized 6.5" mid bass speakers in the door where your butt is a set of 6" mids and tweeters in the windshield pillars and then do a stealth 8"or10" in the spare tire area and be booming!

Sorry for the tangent.

Confushious say: need not kill fly with cannon.

 

I just thought you folks might be interested in seeing the speakers - especially Pinky, who talked about 6.5" speakers with drivers as big as 8" speakers. Here they are:
Focal 165K Speakers

 

Thanks, MindCore. That's the answer I was looking for.

Howard

 

GR8-S2K,

I agree with Strike about merely 'cutting the basket' ONLY if the total depth doesn't exceed the amount you mentioned. The basket isn't the only thing you have to worry about.

The window rolls down behind the speaker, and there is also a white thing attached to the window (maybe a stop for a leaf switch?) which takes away even more depth. I should have my install pics back today (10/24) on CD, so look for those pictures on my website later tonight. When I get the chance I'll also display some drawing showing the depth of each portion of the speaker enclosure and door setup.

Of course, you can build up the door a bit as mentioned by Mindcore, but you have to be careful...too much building and you can get a bulge (this all assumes no cutting except for the basket).

Anyway, check my site either late tonight or tomorrow for detail. Click on 'Michelle' and then 'modifications'.