Too-simple speaker question... Finished

I've been buzzing around the site looking for speaker advice, and I can't seem to find anyone who is as simple as me...

I have no problem with the existing front speakers, except that they are blocked by your leg when driving, and they in turn block your leg when getting out of the car!

I don't want to add enough audio power to act as another supercharger, I just want to replace the simplistic rear 6x9 speakers with a nice pair of coax or triax speakers that put out some mid and upper range...

From what I remember from my college electronics, putting "common" 4 ohm speakers in place of the weird GM 10 ohm speakers will blow out the output amps in the factory radio... Does anyone out there have a suggestion for a simple drop-in replacement for the rear 6x9's??

Thanks in advance,
Mark

I haven't had any sort of blowouts with my speakers.


Buy a pair of Infinity Reference series 9623i's for the back, they're triaxial and sound awesome! I recommend you buy off of Amazon, they have really low prices and sometimes you can get free shipping.

Also, to make the install go a lot easier, pick up a Crutchfield wiring harness:

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_12071014/Speaker-Harnesses.html?search=speaker+harness&tp=3097&tab=review

It is more than worth the $10 you pay for it. Good luck!

I put Alpine R-series 6x9 in the rear deck and were driven by my radio without any problems. I have upgraded to a 5 channel amp.

My factory rear 6x9s were 4 ohm.

You can use 4 ohm 6x9" speakers in the rear deck just fine. The speakers used in some factory systems are 10 ohm, resulting in lesser output from the rear of the car. This keeps most of the sound up front. For the same reason there are no tweeters in back - to keep the sound focused and up front, even with your leg in the way (sound can easily travel around legs!)

But driving 4 ohm speakers with the rear channels won't hurt anything, it will just make the rear sound louder (more power delivered) with more highs and midrange if you use 2 or 3 way designs. The added power is safely within the factory head's capability, although there's not a lot to be had - maybe 8 watts - so don't expect it to get really loud.

Many thanks to all of you for your "input" (pardon the pun.)

I can't believe how quickly I got all the information I needed!

Special thanks to Derek for letting my know I was running on an outdated premise... I have 2 different kinds of arthritis that keep me from climbing into the trunk unless absolutely necessary (like for the fuel gauge sending unit) and I didn't know that the General had finally joined the 20th century's impedance standards.

Hmmm... I wonder if I can still get Jensen Triax II's (advanced age showing...)

IBx1 wrote:

Also, to make the install go a lot easier, pick up a Crutchfield wiring harness:

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_12071014/Speaker-Harnesses.html?search=speaker+harness&tp=3097&tab=review

It is more than worth the $10 you pay for it. Good luck!

Now that is a great tip, and a great device. I've never been to Crutchfield, but I'm looking there now...

Here: LINK

Amazon has them listed, new, for $79.45 and $9.95 shipping. From the same guys who I bought mine from, MY_CYBERSHOPS. Take that deal before someone else does. Don't bother with Crutchfield for anything else, they sell at full retail price.

I want to thank everybody for their input and recommendations. I weighed them all, along with my own requirements and some other input. I ended up going with a pair of Rockford Fosgate R1693 "Prime Series" from Crutchfield.

For a quick, cheap and easy improvement over something that didn't deserve the name "Concert Sound II", this package ain't bad. Some of the other choices available elsewhere either didn't fit according to Crutchfield's fraction-of-an-inch database, or else would have required about $17 more to order the GM adapter cables a la carte from Crutchfield, that were included for free.

I'm not an audiophile, I simply wanted something more than weak bass to come out of the rears. These new speakers have more capacity than I needed, or could "light up" with the factory system: 60Watts nominal/120Watts peak, and from my best guess, about 30 ounce magnets. Strangely, nowhere could I find magnet size specified, but since they're at least 3 times the size of the factory units, and considering that the 2 speakers with packaging, screws and wires weighed in at over 10 pounds, I figure they must be at least 30 ounce magnets...

Before replacement, I turned the fade all the way to the rear to listen to the original speakers one last time. As the frequency response of a telephone line is about 3 KHz, I'd say that the factory speakers weren't putting out anything above 2 KHz... (As a side note, these factory units in my '97 were still 10 Ohms.) Also, I'd had the fade biased to the rear just so I could hear something from the back.

Once armed with a T15 Torxdriver, a flashlight, a couple Percocet and those custom GM adapter harnesses, it literally took only 20 minutes to bend myself into the trunk and replace both speakers. It is truly idiot-proof because the adapters have polarized spade connectors to match the speaker connectors, and the database knew that another pair of Blaupunkts that I was considering had tweeter/midrange speakers a fraction of an inch too tall to fit under the package tray upholstery. In fact, fitment was such a near thing with the way that the upholstery "domes" over the speaker cutout, that I had to mount them so that the larger midrange speaker is on the side with more clearance.

After extricating myself from the trunk, I fired up the radio and CD to listen to them and readjust my settings. By comparison, I do have to run a little higher volume to feed those larger, lower-impedance magnets, and I'm a little disappointed that the midrange & tweeter still don't match the treble of the front speakers. An amp would probably improve both.

However, after going for a short drive and fiddling with volume, fader and equalizer, the difference is unmistakable. If the old speakers (through upholstery and DashPad cover) were putting out 2 KHz, then these are putting out 8 or 10... Also, the balance of power now works with the fader in the center detent, so I'm getting more relative treble via the front speakers as well.

A half-hour and $77 for everything including shipping... I'm content