tmb

I just sold my '04 Grand Prix GT2 which had the stock sound system (not the better optional one) and it was the first car I have ever had that the sound quality was good enough for me so I never had the urge to upgrade.

Here is the point of that background:

I used that $$$ to buy a 350Z Enthusiast model with the stock AM/FM/CD sound system.
The CD sound quality is atrocious(sp). No Bass, Shrill highs and muddy midrange.

Heck, The sound in my '05 GMC Canyon PU is much better than this Z.

I bought this car for what it does best and am not trying to re-create the sound in my house but I sure would like to have at least the sound quality I had in my Grand Prix.

I have been reading through this forum on speaker upgrading but have not found anything on simple,basic sound upgrades.

Couple of questions if you all don't mind.

1) Is there a recommended front speaker replacement that is a plug and play which will make a decent improvement in sound quality?

2) That rear speaker area seems like it would make a decent sound chamber because it appears as though it is empty and runs the width of the car.
It currently sounds worse than the fronts but I guess the speaker is a coax whereas the fronts are component.

Is that area empty and as large (volume wise) as it appears?

I am not against cutting holes in that rear speaker area so is there a recommended component replacement for that area?

If I can improve the sound via the rear area, I would then simply move the fader to just the rears.

3) Any other opinions/ideas for a simple sound upgrade are greatly appreciated.


Thanks

maxipad96

iTrader: (5)

I recently upgraded my head unit and added a bazooka el8a tube (100 bucks). My stock non bose system now sounds pretty darn good. I'm not gonna say great or say that its as good as the basslink, but I loaded up the stock compartment w/ sound deadening material and threw that tube in there. Sounds really good for the money.

Kaitain

iTrader: (3)

I just added an Alpine CDA 9847 and JL Audio XR650 CSi for the front and I have to say I'm not very impressed. It sounds really bright and brassy but not in a good way. I have very little mid-bass and virtually no bass. The stock speakers, while muddy as hell, actually sounded better.

I haven't added an amp for the speakers yet so they are just running off the new head unit. Hopefully when I add an amp it'll sound better.

I just ran power and RCA cables for the speakers and I have an amp for my subwoofers which will be installed as soon as I go pick up a box from Mike in Sarasota. I also plan to add an amp for the front speakers.

One thing I've found is that regardless of what people say, you DO need speakers behind you. I put a temorary sub and some speakers in the hatch area and it makes a world of difference, it really fills out the sound.

I've heard people say they like the sound coming from in front of them but I prefer to be IN the sound. I want to be surrounded by sound not on the outer edge of it. If you are like me, you'll want decent back speakers but you might want to face them up towards the roof or back towards the hatch.

.

tmb

Bummer. JL Audio makes nice stuff. I have used them in other cars in the past and was never disapointed.

Is part of the problem that the door area,which serves as the speaker baffle, is so narrow that nothing will work well in there?

You know what I mean - the most expensive speaker in the world will sound like an AM radio speaker if it is in free air.


I wonder if I am out of luck with this car. As I said,however, sound is NOT why I bought this toy.

Paul350Z

iTrader: (1)

Always ready to take a low lying fruit.

The rear speaker area has two steel boxes with lots and lots of holes with in them. I've lined mine with "fat mat" front and back closing the holes up. Only guessing here the sizes are about 1.5 liters worth of volume.

The speakers fire into the rear of the seat so you're not going to be looking for these things to have much high's any who. They are good for 6.5" mid-base speakers.

I replaced the rear two speakers and the wimpy-@ss sub-woofer with quality Infinity parts. The front speakers are waiting for the change out of the head end.

The choice of a speaker is very personal - your music, your ears, your volume, your choice! I set up my building's auditorium with the literal top-of-the-line JBL professional speakers on all four corners, using a pro-logic surround processor, two White Laboratories 1/3 band octave equalizers, feeding 2400 watts worth of Crown amplifiers - into a professionally designed room equalized with white noise to within 3 dB across all frequencies in a 156 seat theater ... and had one of my bosses b!tch about the sound loudly.

Have a listen to several brands of speakers before deciding on a line and then listen to the speakers that fit (6.5" and 10"). Look at the speakers with your ears - not your eyes, not your friend's ears, and not with my ears! Don't buy the name, buy the sound!

Kaitain

iTrader: (3)

Good point Master Chief. I would also add that a speaker can sound great in the demo room and sound terrible in your car but I think my real problem is not having a good amp on those front speakers.

Daewoo

Since u want to keep cost low don't replace the rear speakers. There are a lot of people on the site that think the rears are not necessary. A LOT!

Get a decent set of front speakers, a decent 4 channel amp, an alpine HU, and a 10" sub. if you go the e-bay route I would imagine it wouldn't cost more than $700

Infinity Kappa Perfect 6.1 $200
4 channel amp (MTX, Pioneer, alpine) $150
alpine HU $175
Sub (MTX, PG, etc.) not the best but will give you boom $100
Supplies (mdf to build the box, cables, etc.) $50
Shipping $30

I always believe doing thing the right way. Band-aids just seem like a waste of time to me.

FCallender

Everyone here has good points, but here's what I did.
since the fronts are component I left them alone. The rears are really cheap and, although require some work to get to, you can improve the overall sound with a set of coax speakers. I bought and installed the Kenwood Excelon's (around $110 on the internet) with the movable tweeter adjusted towards the back of the drivers head. By adjusting the front/back to favor the rear by just a hair I get a nice clean spacious sound when I'm stopped or parked. Frankly, to get nice sound while driving you would have to add many pounds of sound deadening material to get optimal listening. I put in about 20 and succeeded in damping the high frequency road noise in the back. A good time to do this is when you take the trim out to get out the speakers.
No flames please - you did say cheap and dirty.

tmb

None intended - I did say cheap. I just want a reasonable sound quality like I gave up with the car that this Z replaced.
Not interested in making a kid's thumpa,thumpa car audio.

I am familiar with those kenwood's as I put those in another car I had 3 years ago and I did like them.

Any chance you took any photos when you had that rear area open?

I see that the trim ring on the rear speakers are not screws but look like rivet's so I assume you have to drill them out?

Thanks for all the great ideas

tmb

Maybe you all already know this but I did not.

I went onto Crutchfields website and their auto fit guide only showed speakers for behind the seat.

Not understanding why that would be the case, I emailed them.

Here was the response (The xxx was really my full name):

"Hi xxx,

Thanks for your e-mail, and for shopping the Crutchfield web site.

I will be happy to help with your question on speakers for your Nissan 350Z. Our site does not show any speakers for the front doors since we don't carry any that fit. While the best fit would be a 6-1/2" speaker, all of the 6-1/2" speakers we carry have too large of a magnet to fit the cavity. Your allowable magnet diameter is only 2-1/2", and the 6-1/2" speakers we carry have magnet diameters ranging from 3" to 3-1/2" or more. You may want to check with a professional installer. Sorry I did not have better news there.

I know this isn't the best news, but I hope it helps. Thanks again for your e-mail. Please let me know whenever you need anything else!

Loren
Crutchfield Product Advisor
solutions@crutchfield.com"


So how are you folks fitting speakers in the front? I have read up on the issue with deep magents hitting the window and hwo to solve that but this is the first I have heard that there is a magnet diameter issue also.

I am not going to rip my dorrs apart to see so if anyone as a link to a photo of what that area looks like, I would appreciate it.

The search engine on this site is kind of squirly - sometimes it does not use one of my search words because it says that the word is too common.
Hence, searching is a tedious process.

dannichols

You will need to use a spacer of sort to fit just about any quality speaker in the front. I've had three sets in there. The first had the smallest depth and I got away with using the stock speaker housing as the spacer (see posts), the second had the deepest depth (Diamond Audio), for those I crafted a spacer from two sheets of MDF glued together (a little over 1"). The third set (Phoenix Gold Elite) were thinner and so I used a single sheet of 3/4" MDF for the spacer.

Using MDF is the way to go as it allows you to move the speaker slightly up and to the rear (so the door panel won't block a good portion of the sound. Just offset the hole you will cut. Only problem I've found with MDF is that the screws can become loose after inserting and removing them a few times..this can be saolved by putting nuts on the aft side and recessing them into the wood wiith a dremel..

Kaitain

iTrader: (3)

Forget all that, I was full of poo. I added a JL Audio e4300 4 channel amp and some JL TR650 CXi's to the back. The e4300 is fantasic with those speakers.

So, NOW the audio sounds amazing! Go figure. Oh! I know some people say, "Just turn off the back speakers, don't waste money on them." But they are wrong. The back speakers make a huge difference. They really fill out the sound, they help envelope you in sound.

I can't wait to get my subs in there...

FCallender

Here's some basic info on getting to the rear speakers. It would help if you had the 350 Z manual, available on the web if you search. There should be something in the archives also.
At the bottom rear of the hump holding the speakers are some plastic rivets. Pop those out and remove the plastic. Then you have to remove the side plastic and the plastic that goes around the little windows and down to the the floor. The storage areas must also be removed, as I recall.Then the piece that covers the speakers and the top of the hump can be removed. As you will see, those "screws" are not real. There is lots of room for 6 3/4" speakers. Have your sound deadening material handy as it can be applied easily while all the plastic is off. When you're done carefully replace all the plastic.
Several others mentioned that the head unit wasn't that bad and better speakers gave a nice increase in sound quality. I concur.

greatniz

Well I have the pioneer avh-6600dvd with the avic-88dvd navi... I also dynomatted the stock sub compartment then build a custom box in there and installed one 10" Alpine type-R with a Alpine mrd-m301 v-12 mono amp which supplies 350 watts, which is more than enough for the 10... For this car it is more than enough bass... I also have XM which is most recommended... the sound quality is superb with this setup even with the stock speakers and no extra amps... all you have to do is tweak the EQ a little to get the sound you like the best... plus instead of burning CDs I just burn music video's onto a DVD and let them rip... but if you have to change the components I was looking into changing all mine to alpine type-s with custom fiberglass housings for the doors and rear (would have used type-r but my car is Daytona Blue and if you know alpine then you know what I am talking about )… and change my amp to a 5-channel… but I thought that the 2000 would be better spent somewhere else… only because the sound quality will not improve great enough for it to be justified… just my 2¢… spend it how you’d like…

tmb

I will search for the manual but I am curious.
Is there enough room in that back section (I assume it is hollow due the speakers and the 2 small compartments) tom fit an amplifier?

dannichols

In the upper section (which houses the rear speakers, there is not enough room for an amp. If there was, it would be a bad place to mount one becuase of access issues. The area below (cubby) would be better. I removed my glove box and kept the glove box door to mount other equipment..also an option.