FAQ: Installing Rear Speakers

Alright! Hooked them up, after some fuss with those tabs that hold up the 6x9's, and they are AMAZING!!! It was pretty easy after using the long screws that Infinity put in with the speakers and it slowly pushed the part in between the tabs so the speaker would fit. Overall, they fit very well, and hang only about 2 inches lower. Before installilng, I pushed the button on the 'floating' tweeter part to increase the speakers by 3db, and I can hear the difference! I also got an Infinity window sticker with the speakers, which I put on my rear driver's-side window. I put it on the inside, not the outside, so from outside it's reversed, and when you're in the backseat and hear crisp music, you know exactly who's responsible. Since each one has two tweeters, I get all my highs, mids, lows, and all the bass I want! With the stock speakers, when you turn up the bass a little, all you get is the bass. No highs, no lows, and no mids. The sticker on the inside-top of the trunk says that the stock speakers are Bose, but I guess we've come a long way since '95...

The rear speakers in our '95 Riv are not as loud as I think they should be.We have all factory audio (am/fm, tape and cd player). Is there an amp for the rear speakers? If so, where is it located?

The radio IS the Amplifier on a '95. The front and rear speakers are directly attached to the Radio.

Thanks Ab, I thout maybe the rear were powered by an external amp, but I'm deff not an audio guy. Thanks for the info. Maybe I'll buy an amp and some snew speakers from an audio store. Any suggestions?

I have Alpine Type "R" 6x9's in the rear running off of the radio (read my Sig). They sound awesome. Also, the fronts are already wired up for a component speaker setup, so a descent set of components with a low(er) RMS rating would work in the doors.

I like the Alpine R's because they have a silk tweeter, not a titanium (or metal). The highs tend to get "tinny" at high volumes with a titanium (or metal) tweeter.

Thanks Ab, I will look into that. Would like to keep factory radio for now. Just a little more power to rear. Just dumped over two grand into it to get it road ready for my son. Don't want to do much more 'til winter is over. Buffalo winters can be tough on cars and my son just got his license August 30. If he gets through winter without killing it I will start mods in the spring. For now just made sure its safe and reliable. But did up the body just so it looks cool. I will be posting pictures this weekend. I think you guys might like it.

bigdave wrote:

Thanks Ab, I will look into that. Would like to keep factory radio for now. Just a little more power to rear. Just dumped over two grand into it to get it road ready for my son. Don't want to do much more 'til winter is over. Buffalo winters can be tough on cars and my son just got his license August 30. If he gets through winter without killing it I will start mods in the spring. For now just made sure its safe and reliable. But did up the body just so it looks cool. I will be posting pictures this weekend. I think you guys might like it.

You will effectively get more power to the rear if you put in almost any set of aftermarket speakers. The OE speakers are 8-10 ohms, nearly all aftermarkets are 4 ohms - take about 1/2 the power to run them.

So first thing to try is the aftermarket speakers of your choice. Most likely the increased volume and loudnes will surprise you.

Albertj

I went with Eclipse SP6900's. they are 2 way 90w RMS, they do have a titanium tweeter but there is no tin sound from the speakers tweeter.

The Eclipse 6x9 tweeter can be seperated from the base cone and mounted high above the speaker, taking away any chance of reverberation through the tweeter from the speakers woofer component. Eclipse IMO is probably 1 of the best trebile speaker companies out there atm. The titanium tweeter will deal alot better with long term use than a silk or PP injected counterpart. Silk is more commonly found in home audio tweeters and they are most times cooled by ferro fluid, as far as I know, the silk car audio tweeters are not ferro fluid cooled. If you plan on running alot of watts to your trebile system then you will want to opt for the more durable design of the 2. I always got pissed off when the tweeters would blow in the older 6x9's but the woofer of the 6x9 was still fine. Replacing a speaker because a 1 inch component section doesn't function properly is just a large irritation.

Besides with road noise even if there were a tin sound coming from a metal dome tweeter you would never hear it.

bigdave wrote:

The rear speakers in our '95 Riv are not as loud as I think they should be.

It might be absolute volume but it also may be perceived volume and frequency response. In my '97, the "full-range" dual-cone rear speakers were absolute crap, no treble at all... Thus, I had to bias the fader to hear anything from them. I put a cheap pair ($70 +s/h) of proper co-ax or tri-ax speakers in, and I now can leave the fader almost in the middle and also hear something higher than a kilohertz back there.

Could it be,the batteries in the "hearing aid" are gettin weak?

Scroll through the photos and you can see how accessible the rears are.

https://rivperformance.editboard.com/showroom-f3/99-riviera-t586.htm

I have Alpine S 6x9. The Alpine R's are a good choice as well. I went with the S's because I only wanted the rears for fill and put much more cash into the Focal components in the front.