How-To: Replace door speakers

I thought everyone might want to know what i accidentally just discovered. There is an after-market wiring connector that fits the Cruze speaker connector. I was just about to cut the wires in my doors the other day when installing new speakers, and i noticed that the connector looked like it would fit speakers out of my old Ford Focus that were laying around. So i tried them, and they fit perfect. So i ordered some Metra 72-5600 speaker connectors on ebay and plugged them right in. One warning though, the red wire on the wire connector goes to the neg wire in the door harness, and the black goes to positive, although the speakers won't care, it could cause a phasing problem with other speakers.
One other cool thing i found out. MB Quart 25mm tweeters fit real nice were the factory tweets used to be. See pics

Ha, been playing around with vehicle audio for over 60 years now, getting old.

When replacing OE speakers with better aftermarket speakers, the speaker terminals are held on a by a rivet, drill that out and add that to the new speaker so I can use the stock connectors. The more the connectors the more the problems.

Xtreme sure hit the nail on the head with the DC resistance of speakers and power rating. If you go to a lower DC resistance, have to add an external amp or otherwise will cook your radio. With these newer radios that are part of the programming and data link, getting next to impossible to replace, but replace with what?

Generally replacing the same size speaker with another same size speaker does not show much improvement. Unless your vehicle really came with junk speakers, magnet size is one important improvement.

Power rating is a bad joke, key is how much power the new speakers can handle without distortion, besides your ear, an HP distortion analyzer helps. For a six inch speaker may learn can only hit it with 6 to 8 watts. Found Blaupunkt overdrive speakers to be better going up to 12-13 watts. Other name brand names were really bad. But admit to not trying Polks yet, $$$$ as I recall for something you are going to throwaway in a couple of years.

You sure don't want paper cones unless you can figure out how to open your door without getting them wet when its raining outside. Your Pioneer speakers sure look like paper cones. And 6 ohms is cheating, automotive standard has been a four ohm speaker. 4 ohms with a standard 14 volt supply and a bridged amplifier is only good for 20 watts RMS. 6 cuts this down to about 13 watts RMS, 2 will give you 40 watts, more you need a power amp with a converter in it to get a much greater operating voltage.

Another misnomer is more speakers are better, in such a confined space, get acoustical phase distortion. Every frequency has a different wavelength where they can ether add for double the amplitude or completely cancel out. Generally for stereo, most common, two are enough, but full range speakers, but sure limited to size depending on the vehicle.

If sound surround was available, two in the rear can greatly increase the fullness of the sound. Is also a circuit for expansion to make two closely space speakers sound further apart.

Yet another shortcoming in automotive is background noise, can be in the 50-70 dB range, sound systems sound much better when parked.

Just a couple of tips.

I wouldn't replace the stock speakers. They're quite good.
If you're replacing the speakers, you'll have to replace all of them, as the newer speakers probably have different characteristics than the older ones, causing out of phase frequencies, as well as certain resonant frequencies that sound much louder than on the stockers (hey, the whole sound system was designed by engineers, to be stock).
Polk speakers aren't the worst. They're actually known to be a pretty good speaker brand, and very affordable!
However, poly speakers always will give you flobby bass.
What's more,
A lot of those poly cone speakers, are tuned for high power and volume output.
With a car radio that's usually out putting anything between 20 and 40W RMS max, those speakers aren't even functioning at 25% of their capabilities.
Basically running high power speakers at lower wattages, will have lower efficiency, and you'll end up with LOWER volumes, not higher.

In order for you to hear some improvement in sound, you'll first need to overcome the speaker's efficiency difference from the stockers, like, most of those 200W speakers, usually have 3dB SPL lower than the factory speakers (which usually are 50-100W RMS).
Meaning that running them both on the same power, the lower power (stock) speakers, which are driven harder, will sound louder.

To overcome eg: a 3dB difference, you'll have to double the power output you put in the newer speakers.
So, if this was the case that the newer are 3dB lower in SPL, for them to sound the same in volume, you need to drive the speakers with an amp that can put out double the power, or 80W per speaker (at the rated ohms the speakers have).
Since most of the upgraded speakers (poly cones) are rated at around 200W, you can double that to 160W RMS giving you an additional 3dB over the stock speakers; although the modified speakers probably have a much deeper bass output than the stockers.

It'll be a noticeable improvement, but you'll need to drive them with more than 80W per channel amp to notice the difference.

Actually, chances are that the stock speakers won't function at their maximum rated output anyway, because of longevity and warranty reasons, so chances are that even at 80W output per channel, the upgraded speakers will be noticeably louder.
But with the stock amplifier, you won't hear any improvement swapping out the stock with the newer drivers; but lower volumes.

If your new door speakers are 8 ohms, 200W, make sure you get an amp that can drive that.
It'll mean a ~300-400W at 4 ohms output to drive 200W at 8ohms. RMS. Not the cheap chinese crap ratings of 1000W, and when you test them, they barely make 150W.

Oh they make adapters, lol. I made my own.

I disassembled stock pioneer speakers, cut and shaped housing to fit my new pioneers.

Then I hot glued excessively my speakers to modified housings and soldered in old connectors.

Then I covered the back of them with a water protection barrier because I noticed old speakers were damp. Then re-foamed the front and back to deaden vibration.

I'm just getting started.