Speaker Upgrade

[TrapHouse]

Hi everyone,

Judging by the title of this thread you'll probably want to redirect me to an FAQ thread, but I've read into a few threads here on this forums as well as tried looking elsewhere and I did not get the answer I needed.

First of all, seeing as this is a US based forums, my car does not have the Hi-Fi option as, I think, all US based cars did. Which means no tweeters by the mirrors and no amplifier in the trunk - feel free to double check BC61527.
I do not have the original radio either, I have a cheap Pioneer MVH-180UB which is going to be upgraded to a MVH-280FD soon, I've got TS-2150 in the back, original Nokia 40w speakers that I assume came out of a Hi-Fi powered car in the kick panels (original ones that I had in there were 30w on the left side and 25w on the right side for some reason), TS-WX300A subwoofer in the trunk.
I want to upgrade the kick panels speakers to something better. I'm looking for 2-way coaxial ones, I have no interest in wiring or fabricating extra stuff, plug n play is what I'm interested in. I'm open to suggestions.

P.S. I looked at Ground Zero GZTF 13 speakers, but they are 3ohm, my current ones are 4ohm, I don't remember much from physics class so I guess I can't fit those in 4ohm place.

[moroza]

I can't help you with a product suggestion, but I can tell you that the ohms of a speaker have nothing to do with its physical size. Lower-impedance speakers draw more power and are louder, assuming the rest of the system is the same. They also traditionally have lower sound quality, although modern materials, manufacturing techniques, and a thousand other things can more than make up for that. They may draw too much power for the wiring, amplifier, and headunit; check the rating on whatever hardware you use before buying speakers. There's a good chance the 3ohm will be ok.

You don't have an amplifier, but what about a crossover board? How is your subwoofer powered?

[cirrusblau]

@moroza - I googled the model of his subwoofer and it does have its own amplifier. Maybe his head unit is the one that has an easy connection for subwoofers and have an internal crossover.

@traphouse - My car doesn't have hifi option as well. It originally came with 6 speaker system. Woofer on the kick panels and tweeters on the dash, then 2 coaxial speakers on the rear shelf. I've since replaced them with 5.25"s, which is the stock size, components front and coaxial rear plus wired up an amp which is hidden in a space underneath the rear carpet of the boot. Replaced the head unit with a Clarion FZ102E for a modern-ish OE look.

[TrapHouse]

Yeah, the head unit does have an easy connection for a subwoofer and seeing as I'm not audiophile I'm perfectly fine with coaxial speakers and an active subwoofer. I had plans of removing those rear 8" ones with 3-way 5.25" OE size speakers, because I kinda like the OEM look, don't want anyone to see what kinda setup I've got. I guess I'll pick those 3ohm speakers and hope for the best, upgrade my head unit to a more powerful one.

[fo3]

Problem with coaxials is tweeters are often mounted proud, IE higher up than the speaker basket mounts. You really need a flush mount coax if going that route and I couldn't find any mid price brands when browsing this thread (good ones, like pioneer, kicker, alpine etc - they all looked like they wouldn't fit IMO)
For the kick panels, I think the mounting studs are 110mm apart, so you need something like a 4.5" speaker with a flush mount facing option.
Best to take off a kick panel and go to a car audio shop.

The previous owner of my car fitted 'fusion' brand 5.25" cm50 component splits, fitting the tweeters under the dash grilles. The woofers fit in the kick panels because there's plenty of depth, and the woofers are pretty small for a 5.25" speaker (manufacturer install width is 4 and 22/32" or something, pretty small for a 5.25" speaker IMO - like I said - optimal is 4.5", not 4")

You're going to have trouble finding something that is 4.5", and if coaxial finding something with a flush mount tweeter. All the 4" speakers I could recommend all have tweeters or guards sticking up and are more designed for rear mount rather than face mount, so take your kick panel to a car audio shop. Due to face mount my PO's installation had problems with the rubber suspension ring for the woofer cone hitting the kick panel plastics - meaning the woofer rattled and couldn't move freely. I had to build spacers behind to fix that, but the good news is there's plenty of room in the chassis for that so there's a lot of options if you either look at custom spacer rings, or just shop around a lot for something that will fit if you take your kick panel around to audio shops. you may find that no coax fit when face mounted, so you'll be stuck with component/split or dual cone.

[Kingpin025]

I have 5.25" components and sub woofers in all 3 e34s. The two tourings have custom sub woofer boxes in the spare tire wells and the M5 has an Infinity Basslink. I went 100% aftermarket for head units, amps and speakers. details and some pictures can be found here. https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/s...ight=new+to+me https://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/m...291-Kingpin025

[fo3]

Yeah, 5.25" do fit, but not without fabrication or wiring. As it's face mount I found you need to space them away, otherwise the cone or rubber ring contact the grills on the back of the kick panel. And if coax then the tweeter will hit.
I took mine apart during a boring weekend to check what the PO had done and the rubber rings of the woofer cone had grill mark imprints on it. I thought for a second about hacking away the ultramarine kick panel grilles but yeah, they're more important to me than some cheap component speaker so I don't even want to cut out on the inside even if it would be invisible from the outside. I just made up some spacers and adaptors.
The other thing is if your'e buying 90db/w /80wrms/3 ohm speakers, you best be running them of an amp and not the head unit, so OP is looking at wiring and spacers imo - whether those coax speakers or any other component 5.25" ones.
If you want to run off a head unit with minimal wiring and no amp then probably need ~40wrms 91-92db/w