Simple speaker question

[bucket]

Are component 6.5/6.75 speakers best used in the front, or the rear? Do they need to be powered by an amp, or will it work OK just hooked directly to the head unit?

 

[78shortandwide]

They can be used in front or back and with or without an amp. I have a set of alpine 6/9 components in the front and a set of the in the back of my car. I had them hooked to an amp, but the amp blew now they are hooked to the head unit. That sounded a lot better with the amp.

 

[crazy4offroad]

I have a pair of 6's in the doors and a pair of 6x9s in the back hooked straight to the head unit and they sound pretty good as long as you match ohms. Of course in my truck you have to really crank it up to hear it over the tires. You can run them on an amp but it would have to be a mild amp.

 

[dhamp]

It does depend some on the type of mid-woofer comes with your setup. If it has the high wattage ones with the huge magnet on the back, they are better off running from a small to mid-size amp than a head unit. They will play, but won't sound as good. Those are generally the $300+/pair type setups though. Are you truly talking about components though? Or Coax? Components have the tweeter mounted seperately from the woofer. Coax is when the mid-tweet and tweet are on a plate mounted directly in front of the woofer. The main thing that determines mounting front vs back is the depth of the magnet. As long as the space behind the speaker is deep enough to clear the magnet, then it's good. I generally don't like putting anything larger than a 4" or 5-1/4" in the front because the bass from larger speakers have more of a tendency to rattle little loose crap in the ashtray, glovebox, behind the dash, etc.

 

[bucket]

They are actual component speakers with a separate tweeter. They are made by Pioneer and I picked them up at wally world about a year ago, on clearance. I'm just trying to put together the best stereo system using what I already have. It's OK if I end up spending a few more bucks for something to tie it all together.

Currently, there are some blown 3.5's in the dash and some Pioneer 4x6's in the stock rear brackets. And a Pioneer CD player in the dash. I was thinking about putting the component speakers in some boxes meant for 6x9's, in place of the original rear speaker mounts. Then maybe cramming those 4x6's up in the dash in place of the 3.5's. Or possibly making some kind of mounts down in the kick panels.

Nothing has to look show quality or sound fantastic, but decent and presentable would work just fine.

 

[dhamp]

Yeah, those Pioneers should work just fine off of stereo power. I'm not sure how the stock rear brackets are set up, but if they're like my ancient JVC pieces, they're not sealed. It's flush against the cab on the sides, but has like a 1" gap on the top & bottom at the back corner of the cab where the plate goes straight across and the cab has a curve. They've done fine like that, but never made really tight bass. If you mount yours in the stock brackets and don't like the sound, you could always get a bag of polyfill and stuff some in there behind it. Sometimes it can help fool the speaker into thinking it's got more room behind it as if it were in the the rear shelf of a car.

 

[CaliDude76]

^^ All this is excellent advice.. but remember if your going to run amps and a sub... its cool to run the compoments direct from the stereo, but always turn the stereo's bass all the way down..treble up, or you'll fry the speakers...

 

[dhamp]

^^ All this is excellent advice.. but remember if your going to run amps and a sub... its cool to run the compoments direct from the stereo, but always turn the stereo's bass all the way down..treble up, or you'll fry the speakers...

Yeah, you definitely want to avoid turning the bass up over 1/4 or 1/2 way. From that point on, you're just pumping distortion through the speakers and hurting the voice coils. You could also buy the ported 6x9 enclosures pretty cheap. You may need to lenghten the port some to get it to sound right, but they can be found cheap.

 

[CaliDude76]

Yeah, you definitely want to avoid turning the bass up over 1/4 or 1/2 way. From that point on, you're just pumping distortion through the speakers and hurting the voice coils. You could also buy the ported 6x9 enclosures pretty cheap. You may need to lenghten the port some to get it to sound right, but they can be found cheap.

Yeah... man I wish I had the room in my truck now.

When I had my 92 Silverado... they come stock with those little 4x6's... I got a set of Sony 3 way's for the front, and used the stocks in the back pillars for components. I just directed those to the deck... and amped up my 12's and had a box in the back rumble seat.. what use where those back seats anyway??? for kids and woofers... I say.. LOL anywho.. it sounded crisp and clean though

But man.... That system I had really knocked hard!!!!! I still have the same Alpine deck in my Square... but the amp and woofers are sitting lonely in my shed out back

 

[bucket]

OK, so it should sound good with the 4x6's in front and the components in the back, with no amp at all. Just don't crank the bass up? I have a pair of universal carpeted 6x9 boxes that *I think* will fit in the rear corners if I remove the original speaker brackets. I'll just make some plates to put the round speakers in the 6x9 hole. Maybe put the tweeter things on top, facing up?

 

[CaliDude76]

OK, so it should sound good with the 4x6's in front and the components in the back, with no amp at all. Just don't crank the bass up? I have a pair of universal carpeted 6x9 boxes that *I think* will fit in the rear corners if I remove the original speaker brackets. I'll just make some plates to put the round speakers in the 6x9 hole. Maybe put the tweeter things on top, facing up?

Well yeah, you should be good to go... I was just suggesting as if you were gonna amp up a sub or something. But if your not... bass it up all you want..LOL. People have a tendancy to crank up those big systems...and the only bass you should be getting is from the subs, the head unit bass really doesn't make a huge difference and will pop the components since you control the bass levels seperately anyway.. usually on the amp, or from a E.Q.
If your going direct, no subs, then adjust the bass till it sounds decent..you know..like putting salt on food to your taste.. I go for clarity, myself.. the bass usually starts to sound all distorded after too long on those head units alone.. You can only get so much from the lil built in amps they have..

 

[dhamp]

Yeah, just adjust the bass to the minimum you need for it to sound good. Definitely don't turn it above the level where you can actually hear it making a dfference. Anything above that, you're just increasing distortions. In general, if you just cannot get enough bass that way, then you need to look at different speakers, different enclosures, or adding more power via an amp. My cousin's frontier has highs & mids all run off the head unit with 2-12's under the rear seats with a pretty stout Kicker amp. It's hitting hard and sounds extremely clear. Make sure when you pick your stereo you get one that's 50watts x 4 channel MOSFET.

 

[bucket]

It says 50x4 on in, not sure about the "mosfet" part though. I just know it's a Pioneer and the PO installed it 6 years ago.

As long as I can crank it up a bit every now and again without popping and cracking and whatnot, I'll be happy.

 

[dhamp]

If you've already got it, I say go with it!

 

[stewarts]

It will be very well work without an amp, though you might want to invest in one just to give it an extra boost, and room for more speaker sets as well. I actually prefer placing 4 plates of speakers which would include 2 in front and 2 at the back. It would go very nice with a subwoofer as well, but that is overkill for some already. But if you only have 2, you have to go with placing it in front.