Friday, May 29, 2009

Replacing the rear mid-range speaker of my 325i.

About a few weeks ago, I notice the imbalanced audio sound in my car. My early thoughts was the loose contact, but it turns out that both mid-range base in the back were broken.

Considering that letting broken speakers connected could damage my amp, I decided to replace them asap. On the other side, the performance of  BMW stock mid-range speakers is really basic, I can also take the chance to do a bit upgrade.

Unfortunately, the speakers have weird size and mounting structure. It thus become hard to find a perfectly replacement. Even there are several aftermarkt or OEM products, they are over-priced to my opinion. WTF???

After some investigatons, I decide to modify some mid level products from branded manufactors and let them to fit in my car. Finally the one I went for is Pioneer TS-A1673R, a 3-way speakers.

Here is a compare picture

(left: stock BMW speaker with paper cone, foam edge and plastic frame, righ: Pioneer speaker with  injection-molded polypropylene woofer, rubber surround, and PET dome tweeter)bmw_stock_pioneer

bmw_stock_pioneer_back

Here is some pictures showing the modification

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Results:
 It's a bit pain when I try to mount the modded speakers, as it became a bit "fat". So I have to trim down the frame a little bit. But they eventually fit in the back of the car, and I can still use the original speaker cover :)The sound is indeed improved and after the work I stayed in the car for 20 mins just listening CDs. Very happy about the cost and the quality :)   

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