Keeping the OEM look with a speaker upgrade (1 Viewer)

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NLXTACY

Wits' End
Joined
Dec 7, 2007
Threads
200
Messages
23,013
Location
Medford, OR
Let me begin by saying, "I know nothing about stereo systems". So don't look to me to answer your audiophile questions. I will just stare at the screen like an idiot.

I started the process ONLY because I thought all of my speakers had died and that they needed to be replaced. Up until today I still had ONE speaker working so it was good enough for me but not the :princess:

Now the issue I was having wasn't even speaker related, per se, but I kept going with the upgrade since that was what I thought it was. Turns out I may just have a crapping out Scion 1808 but you can read up about that in this thread: https://forum.ih8mud.com/80-series-tech/675618-rth-scion-1808-audio-out-issues.html

I have started on the passenger side, front and rear. I have done two of the three speakers on that side and will update as I finish up the last one. For now I will detail what I did so far. BTW, I have only read ONE thread on speakers so if any of this seems to be repeated, I'm sorry. If I did something completely wrong because I didn't read a thread...well I screwed up :flipoff2:

I started by removing the passenger right knee speaker. Not the one in the door, but the one next to the glove box. Its one screw holding in the cover and its off easily after removing the single connector. This particular speaker "looked" ok. By ok I mean that the paper cone did not exhibit any obvious issue. I have no idea how to check if a speaker works or not but it didn't matter because I was going to upgrade it anyway.

This speaker is held in by two self-tapping screws. Its a small speaker with a bracket and connector in the back. I started by removing the connector as close to the speaker body as possible because I wanted to keep the same connectors. (I know nothing about speaker wire so I'm sure there is an opportunity to upgrade the speaker wire but I'm just not there yet). Using a razor, I cut out all of the paper cone so that I could take a look at what I was working with. The first thing I noticed is that the Infinity Kappa Series 1" speaker housing is almost the same size as the diameter of the OEM speaker housing.

After the purchase of a new Dremel (I guess someone else needed my old one more than I did :rolleyes:), I got busy in cutting out the speaker/magnet from the bracket itself. After trimming it down I soon realized that there is a possibility that I could actually screw the new housing INTO the OEM bracket. I gave the Dremel another 10 minutes of grinding and then gave it a chamfer on both sides to give it the thickness I needed and viola! The housing now screws right into the bracket like it was made for it. Awesome-sauce. Screwed it all the way in, applied the back locking nut and put in the roll-axis housing. Like it was made for the Lexus.

The speakers I'm referring to:
Infinity Kappa 1" textile dome speakers

more info:
Infinity Kappa 10.9t 1" textile dome tweeters at Crutchfield.com

Some pics:
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A few more images regarding the 1" speaker.
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EDIT:As I am now combing through the speaker archives I found a thread that SKILLET did on his rear speakers. Looks like he did the exact same thing I did but he did it almost seven years ago: https://forum.ih8mud.com/80-series-tech/74011-another-quick-80-series-speaker-write-up-2.html

Next I moved to the passenger rear door. I jumped to this one because I had a bad door lock actuator so I figured I would do the speaker on this door since I had to tear apart the door anyway. I started with of course taking the door panel off and removed the vapor barrier. After looking at it for a few minutes I figured I might as well get some Dynamat installed since I'm already there. Quick trip to BestBuy (hate this place but it was the only place that had it in stock) and I had 12sq ft of Dynamat in 4 1ftx3ft sections. I found this to be perfect for doing doors.

The door lock actuator was replaced after I verified it was bad. Picked up a set from SOR and installed these first: https://forum.ih8mud.com/80-series-tech/673185-door-lock-motor-failure-confirmed.html Now that the door lock actuator was done I could concentrate on the speaker. Three screws and one connector and it was out. Same thing here, I wanted to see what I was working with so I took a razor to the cone and cut out everything I could and snipped off the connector right at the speaker so that I could reuse it. So now I am comparing the Infiniyi Kappa Series 4" speakers with the speaker from the door. Hmm, its almost the same size. So back to the Dremel where I cut off the speaker portion of the OEM bracket. I wound up modifying the wrong side or else I would have been done sooner. I only needed to do a small mod to the OEM speaker housing to get the new Infinity speaker to fit snugly on. I then snipped off the tabs and ground down the sharp edges from the Infinity 4" speaker. Some Black RTV and some rest time onto some shot glasses. Then it was just a matter of wiring it up and installing it back into the door. I did need to snip out the struts that were inside the speaker cover in order to not have the dome of the new speaker touching the OEM speaker grill. The only thing I need to do to the door was cut out a very small notch to get the speaker wire to have a place to lay without getting pinched.

Infinity Kappa 4" speakers
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more info: Infinity Kappa 42.9i 4" 2-way car speakers at Crutchfield.com
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Here's what the door looked like after I added Dynamat to both the inside of the door and the outside of the door, the side behind the panel.

I don't have a lot to add to what has already been detailed in previous threads but I will say that its a bit of a pain when you don't have a wood roller. I did this all via my thumbs. Ugh. The Dynamat itself is actually pretty forgiving and easy to work with. I was concerned about working with it in the past. Now, eh, its easy. To do just this door probably took me about 90 mins.

In total, the front speaker, the rear speaker, the Dynamat and the door lock actuator took me a total of 9 hours. I just took out the the front passenger door speaker so I will be playing with that tomorrow. I need to get another box of Dynamat which I will do tomorrow. In the meantime I will work on replacing the speaker and also on trying to figure out what is wrong with my Scion head unit.
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Very nice work, really clean! I like the idea of putting down Dynomat.

-Daniel Kent
 
Looking good! Are the front door speakers gonna fit behind the stock grills? Nice to see some new options that fit.
 
Looks great. Adding Dynamat to the doors is definitely on my list.
 
Looking really good! I got stalled on my speaker install after doing one rear door with dynamat and getting the speaker in place, other stuff trumped it, lol. I tracked down some extra front door grilles to cover the 6.5" speakers I'm putting in the rears, then on to the fronts eventually. Love infinity speakers, I've had them in past vehicles and they never disappoint.
 
For someone who claims that they don't know anything about stereo systems
That looks like a professional job to me.......great job!
 
Great job and write up/pics. I can envision doing this now...I need an excuse to break out the dremel. Keep it up. Thanks.

I am thinking of moving some JL audio component 2-ways from my 60 to the front of the 80, using the same front tweeter (knee-speaker) technique/location you did.

Happy and safe New Year everybody.
 
Looking good! Are the front door speakers gonna fit behind the stock grills? Nice to see some new options that fit.

This one may be an issue. I am still playing with it but the Infinitys that I have are almost 1" taller than the stock speaker. This could spell trouble for the fronts. I will experiment but I may be stuck going with a different brand for the front. Sucks.
 
For someone who claims that they don't know anything about stereo systems
That looks like a professional job to me.......great job!

I said I knew nothing about stereos. I never said I didn't know how to mod :D
 
This one may be an issue. I am still playing with it but the Infinitys that I have are almost 1" taller than the stock speaker. This could spell trouble for the fronts. I will experiment but I may be stuck going with a different brand for the front. Sucks.

Please do not go with a different brand, it would be very hard to find a brand that sounds similar to the Infinity speakers you have, do however find within the same brand a speaker that will fit and has a 93db sensitivity so your tweeters blend with the new speaker seamlessly.
 
Does it display green?

Installed pics, yet?

It's installed and I didn't need to do it :)
They installed the stereo, installed the mic, installed the Sirius components and sat with me to go over everything for $110. Worth every penny :flipoff2:

On this you can change screen color, light color and background color or image.
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Please do not go with a different brand, it would be very hard to find a brand that sounds similar to the Infinity speakers you have, do however find within the same brand a speaker that will fit and has a 93db sensitivity so your tweeters blend with the new speaker seamlessly.

Advice taken. But now I have an issue. The speakers are doing things I don't understand. For example:

• front knee speaker
Before the Infinity crossover: 10-13mV/40-80ohm
After the Infinity crossover: 0mV/.2ohm

• front PS door speaker
Before the Infinity crossover: 11-12mV/50-80ohm
After the Infinity crossover: 0mV/.2ohm

Umm, again I'm no stereo expert but something is very wrong and I just don't understand the issue. I'm only running the amp built into the new head unit. Do I need to run a separate amp?!?!

Frustrated.
 
No only if your speakers worked :doh:

Got nothing to help there other than tracing wires and testing, or running new speaker wire :(.
 
Advice taken. But now I have an issue. The speakers are doing things I don't understand. For example:

• front knee speaker
Before the Infinity crossover: 10-13mV/40-80ohm
After the Infinity crossover: 0mV/.2ohm

• front PS door speaker
Before the Infinity crossover: 11-12mV/50-80ohm
After the Infinity crossover: 0mV/.2ohm

Umm, again I'm no stereo expert but something is very wrong and I just don't understand the issue. I'm only running the amp built into the new head unit. Do I need to run a separate amp?!?!

Frustrated.


Is the stock amp completely removed/unplugged? To my understanding using the grey plug it will only power four of the speakers not the 9 that are in there unless you add a little do-hicky.

If the shop installed it how did they not notice the speakers not working?
 

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