Installing door speakers wiring

Speakers with composite or fabric cones are usually noticeably better than those with paper, and ceramic permanent magnet speakers will out-perform wound electromagnetic speakers at the same power level. Select speakers with trim packages you like. You may find many different styles and colors of trim and covers in a similar price range, so it makes sense to pick the ones that look good, not just sound good. Look at the electronic characteristics of your speakers. Some have inline resistors to prevent static and crosstalk, some allow wiring in a series circuit configuration to allow you to add woofers and tweeters where you need them, and some can only be wired terminally to maintain the correct system impedance.

Consider the power requirements of your new speakers as it will affect the wiring. High wattage speakers may not be able to perform with the factory wiring, and changing these to a larger size may mean considerable work, since factory wiring is concealed in hard to reach places. Gather your tools. As noted in the intro, there are thousands of possibilities available when it comes to after-market speakers. Because of this, any single list of tools is likely to be insufficient for installing some speakers and redundant for others.

The tools you'll need to install your new speaker system will probably include most of the following, but are not necessarily limited to these: [1] X Research source A variety of screwdrivers flathead, phillips head, etc.

Ensure that the speakers you've chosen fit your car. Many after-market speakers will fit into the spaces for the stock speakers, while others will require minor modifications, like the installation of a mounting bracket, the drilling of new screw holes, etc.

Be sure to take this into account when you buy your new speakers - the installation processes for differently-sized or shaped speakers can vary in difficultly. Note that many speaker retailers offer online tools for determining which of their products best "fit" your car. Prevent electrical damage by disconnecting your car's battery. As with nearly all types of electrical work, it's important to protect yourself and the electrical system before beginning.

Disconnecting the battery's negative terminal prevents the risk of injury from electric shock or damage to the car's electronics through short circuiting, so be sure to do so before tampering with any of the car's internal electronics. Defer to any instructions provided with your new speakers. Since there's so many different types of speakers available, it's nearly impossible to write a how-to guide that will perfectly cover all of them. The instructions below are highly generalized and may not apply to every single set of speakers on the market.

Whenever necessary, defer to the instructions included with your speakers, as these will be specifically suited to your unique product. Part 2. Take any panels or speaker grilles off. Nearly all speakers in the interior of a car will be covered with some sort of protective paneling or grill.

Before the speaker can be modified or replaced, this barrier must be removed. Pry the grill off with a suitable tool, like a flat head screwdriver, removing any bolts or screws that are holding it in place if necessary. The work you'll have to do to access your car's factory speakers will vary from car to car. In worst case scenarios, for example, you may need to remove seats, crawl into the trunk to access important bolts or wires, or even remove entire door panels to gain access to the speakers.

Remove the factory speaker. Note that the speaker is usually, but not always, attached to a wiring harness, so take care not to rip it out when removing it. If you think you'll need to re-install the factory speakers in the future for instance, if you sell the car , don't forget to save any screws that you remove!

Connect the new speaker to the car's electrical system. Usually, connecting your new speaker is a fairly simple matter of plugging your speaker's wiring harness into the car's wiring harness. For those of you who are lucky, your vehicle will already have provisions for speakers in the doors. If this is the case, you can conveniently use these locations to install your speakers. This will save considerable time and effort. If there are no provisions for speakers in the doors, you will have to select your own mounting location.

Selecting a mounting location merely becomes a matter of finding a place in the remaining area of the door where a speaker will fit and wont interfere with anything. It may seem strange to wait until this point in the installation process to select a speaker.

However, when you think about it, you can see that this is really the safest way to proceed. Because until you actually see the interior of your door, you really have no idea what type of speaker will fit. After examining the door, you will be able to select a driver based on the space available and the requirements of your stereo system.

Another equally important matter to consider is the durability of the speaker itself. Car doors will almost invariably leak when it rains or whenever you wash the car. The question you should ask is, "Will the speaker be ruined if it gets wet"? Even if the driver you select is water resistant such as a poly or aluminum cone , I would still highly recommend the use of a speaker shield speaker umbrella?

These devices, which are commonly made of plastic or foam, can usually be purchased from your local auto sound dealer for a couple of bucks apiece.

Before cutting or drilling any holes, remember, this is your vehicle. You probably paid a lot of money for it, and, it could potentially cost a lot of money to repair it if you trash it out.

To maximize your chances for success, and minimize your risk of disaster, always use the following guidelines. If you want your speakers to work, theyll need to be connected to your system. The best time to run the speaker wire is before you physically mount the speakers. In some vehicles, this will involve little more than snaking a speaker cable through an existing rubber boot between the door jam and the door.

If there arent boots in your vehicle, you will have to make your own. Start by removing the kick panels next to the hinges of each door. This will provide you with an access point on the back side of the door jam.

Select a location towards the center of the door jam and away from the courtesy light switch the push-button that turns on the interior lights whenever you open the door. After drilling, install a rubber grommet into each hole. This will prevent the wire from being damaged on the sharp metal edges of the holes.

Plastic wire-loom tubing or rubber hose will also work equally well. To snake the wire, insert it into the grommet or tubing from the back side of the door jam. Slowly pull about five feet or so of cable through the hole. Next, thread the same wire into the facing grommet on the door and carefully pull the cable out of the speaker hole until the slack is just taken up between the door jam and the door.

To protect the speaker against possible damage in the event that something were ever to pull on the wire, I always install some form of strain relief inside the door. A dull blade or too much haste might rip the fabric. Cut your metal using a jigsaw, but be careful here.

You need to wear eye protection, and cut very carefully to make sure you don't damage the surface. Don't cut through the door panel and metal at the same time. If you try to cut both layers at once, you might rip the panel covering.

When cutting exposed metal or metal covered by a plastic panel, wrap the base of the saw with electrical tape to prevent marring. Also, keep the blade clear from the car's exterior, where it could cause pockmarks. Vacuum the debris when you are finished. You might need to do a little extra work to connect the speaker you've installed in a non-factory location in your door.

Start the wiring process by using the factory rubber tubing between the door and the door jamb to run speaker wires from the door into the car body. If needed, you can get some from the car dealer or a junkyard. Make sure the hole gets you to the desired speaker location. Sometimes, structural steel supporting the hinges will isolate this edge of the door.

Protect the wiring from the sharp edges of the holes with a rubber grommet or flexible tubing run between the two holes. This will keep the insulation from getting damaged when you open the door. Also, position the wire where it won't be pinched by the hinge or a portion of the door jamb.

Leave enough slack so the door can open all the way. If your new speaker is designed to be top-mounted, you can replace the door panel after you run the wire through the jamb. If you're using bottom-mount speakers, attach the speaker to the panel before you reassemble the door. When the door panel is properly positioned, push the friction fittings back into their seats and replace enough of the screws, armrest, etc.

Do not clip on the window crank, since you might have to remove the panel again. Hold the speaker in its new home, mark the screw holes and remove the speaker.

Drill the holes. Crimp quick-slide terminals onto your speaker wire and connect the wire to the speaker, noting the proper polarity. If you can, use "speed clips" over the new screw holes. Speed clips are slotted pieces of metal through which you drive the screw. They give the screws something extra to hold on to, providing support when the door is slammed. After you've attached both speakers to the panels, connect your wires to your receiver or amplifier and listen to some music. If they work properly, finish re-attaching the panels, window cranks, door handles, and trim pieces.

The ease or angst of replacing a set of rear speakers varies wildy, depending on the type of car you have and the way the manufacturer designed the interior. In some cases, all you need to do is pry up the grilles and swap out the speakers.

In others, you need to crawl into the trunk and disconnect them there. And in some cases, you'll need to remove the back seat and most of the rear trim pieces. It all depends on your car. Thankfully, our Crutchfield MasterSheets can walk you through the process with step-by-step instructions. Let's take a look at a speaker installation to get an idea of what's involved. We'll be going step-by-step through a component speaker installation in the doors of a Ford Ranger pickup.

Disconnect the battery — Your car doors are going to be open while you install the new speakers. Disconnecting the negative terminal of the battery prevents you from draining your battery and getting stuck without power. It also safeguards you against a dangerous short circuit in your vehicle's electrical system.

Prep your parts — Remove the new speakers and hardware from the box. If you're installing full-range speakers, you'll typically have the two speakers, speaker wire, mounting screws, speed clips, and instructions. Some aftermarket speakers include grilles as well.

If your speakers do not come with grilles, use your factory grilles. If you're putting in component speakers, you'll also have the separate tweeters, the tweeter mounting hardware, and crossovers.

We'll include your free Crutchfield wiring harnesses, speaker brackets if necessary , and MasterSheet instructions with your order. We recommend purchasing speaker baffles with your new speakers as well — they improve sound, especially bass, and help dampen unwanted resonances and vibrations. If you are installing component speakers, start thinking about where to install your tweeters, and what type of mounting you want to use angled, flush, or surface.

You'll want to locate the tweeters above the woofer and "aim" them up at your ears to achieve a realistic soundstage and stereo image. But you don't want to install the tweeter too far from the woofer — ideally, the tweeter should be no more than a foot from the woofer to maintain a unified sound field. Of course, the dimensions of your door and aesthetic considerations will also factor into your decision.

Door disassembly — Depending on the factory speaker locations, or where you've decided to custom-mount your speakers, you can now begin to remove your old speakers.

Your MasterSheet instructions will show you how to remove the factory speakers. In this example, the Ranger's speakers are located in the doors. The first step is to remove the window crank. Like we said above, some vehicles would require a window crank removal tool to release a spring clip, but in this truck, the crank is held on by a screw.

We used our panel tool to pry off the window crank cover. Then, we removed a Torx T screw and removed the crank. There was one more Phillips screw beneath the door pull cup, so we removed it, then slid the door panel up and off the door.

Removing the Factory Speaker — The factory speaker is secured to the car door with four Phillips screws. We removed them, then pulled the speaker out of the opening. Using a flat head screwdriver, we popped off the factory harness and removed the factory speaker. Prepping the crossovers — Component speaker systems use an external crossover to divide the frequency bandwidths between the tweeter and woofer, so we needed to solder the free Crutchfield wiring harness to the crossover's input wires.

We cut off the wiring harness' quick slide connectors and stripped the wires. We also stripped the crossover's input wires and placed some heat shrink tubing on them before twisting them together with the wiring harness wires. After soldering the wires together, we used the heat gun to melt the heat shrink tubing and protect the connection. Then we connected the crossover to the factory wiring with the quick connect wiring harness.

Note: If you're not comfortable with soldering, use a set of Posi-Products connectors. It's an easier way to do the job, plus these connectors will give you a solid, long-lasting connection. We used the factory speaker screws to secure the mounting bracket to the factory opening. Then we placed the baffle in the bracket and screwed in the woofer.

If we had been installing full-range speakers, we'd now reverse these steps, re-attach the door panel, and be done. Installing the tweeters — We chose to angle-flush mount the tweeters. Acoustically and aesthetically, this is usually the best way to mount component tweeters.

However, angle-flush mounting requires you to drill a hole in your door panel large enough to accommodate the entire tweeter cup. We decided where to mount the tweeters, then used a pencil to trace around the outline of the tweeter cup.

With the aid of a hole saw kit, we drilled out a hole for the tweeter, then trimmed the cutout with an hobby knife. Each manufacturer has a different system for securing the tweeter to the mounting surface — this one used a spring clip that attaches to the back of the tweeter with a screw to achieve a tight, secure fit. We angled the tweeter up and in towards the driver's seat for optimal imaging. Completing the installation — We connected the woofer and tweeter leads to the crossover with the attached quick slides.

We used the included wire ties to gather the excess cable and routed the speaker wires around the window crank. Then we dropped the door panel back onto the door. The crossover fit snugly between the door panel and the door frame, so we secured it there. Then we replaced the screws, the door pull cup, and the window crank. Now we have full-bodied, detailed sound, a deep and spacious soundstage, and vibrant stereo imaging — what a difference!

Everything in this content is surely noted! Thank you for sharing your knowledge regarding car speaker installations. My car has aftermarket speakers installed and the factory connections have been removed. I'd like to reinstall factory connections to install upgraded plug and play speakers I just bought. A great way to mount your 4 channel amp is by using a board mounted to the car, covered with speaker box carpet or other material.

Considering buying an amplifier? I bought one of those really cheap miniamps but fortunately, had no idea how to install it. Thanlk you sooo much! But ye, as far as connecting to factory speaker wiring you can do it where the factory amp is located usually.

Hi Steven, I had an alpine 4 channel amp hooked up to all 4 door speakers. Im guessing the speaker outputs are backwards. I appreciate your feedback as I work quite hard to put out helpful articles.

Connected in bridged mode while also using left and right speakers, one per channel, for the front. Any bridgeable, lower-power 2ch. You can get those for a good price used on eBay or also some similar Pioneer models. A center channel is normally derived from the stereo signal for the front channels rather than just adding them together which can mess up the front staging. Hi Marty, thanks for the info, that is very helpful! If at all possible, I would really like to keep the front center mid as it does enhance the overall sound.

However when connected that way the front center speaker is louder than the door and rear deck speakers. To your point above, I think that is why it is louder when it is plugged in. Option 3… purchase a different Amp that supports the 5 speaker setup I have. Does one even exist since the front center speaker is a mid range speaker.

Option 4… something else. Hello there Farrell. Based on what I get checking with my speaker L-pad calculator here. Hopefully this helps. Hi Marty, what about adding a subwoofer into the mix? I have a multi channel amp, but my head unit only has front and rear. The amp has a sub channel, will this automatically filter out the non bass tones?

Thank you for the great article. Hi, if the amp has a built-in low pass crossover then yes. I assume you mean you have a 5 channel amp? Or some amps also have pass-through RCA jacks to do the same. But how do you hook them up? Contents Infographic — How to hook up a 4 channel amp tips and general guide Basics first What is a 4 channel amp? Line level converters 2. Speaker level inputs 3. RCA jack line-level connections 4 channel amp signal connection diagram Connecting and running signal wiring Speaker-level connections Making connections Connecting RCA cables Connect the remote-on amp wire How to connect a 2 ch.