e39 Front Passenger Tweeters Not Working

[Ramoo325i]

Hi all,

I noticed both the tweeters on the front passenger side of my e39 sedan are not working. I took the door panel off and removed the speaker to test it on an amp and its working fine.

For some reason when I plug it in the door module it doesn't work. Any thoughts on this?

The main speaker (5 - 1/4") on the door seems to work but its a bit muffled.

Thanks.

[DennisCooper]

Hi,

The 'wire' that connects the door woofer to the tweeter location might both have somehow been cut.

If the car has DSP, then check the continuity of the tweeter wires from the front to the back to where they connect to the DSP amp. It's also possible the DSP amp has failed on it's tweeter output channels for the fronts. Find a known working, compatible DSP amp to test.

Cheers, Dennis!

[Ramoo325i]

Hi Dennis,

I have a non dsp system. I pulled out the amp today and checked all the pins with an multimeter and they were fine. I also used the diagram from bmwtips.com to help determine what goes where.

I took the door apart and also checked all speaker connectors and everything seemed fine. My 8 ohm tweeter is reading 6.5 on the multimeter so not sure if it's getting old. I plugged everything thing back and they started working again.

While I was driving, the tweeters just just randomly stopped working again.
I unplugged and plugged back and they're working again...they dont sound as clean and loud as the driver side.

Should I replace the tweeters?

[Ramoo325i]

Also to add to my recent post, I found a used set of tweeters today amd they sound the same as mine.

Could it be possible that my amp is shorting on that channel when its gets hot?

Also, I'm not sure if I tested my amp correctly. I pulled the entire amp out and unplugged it. I then referenced the channel diagram from bmw tips and touched the - and + for all the speaker channels and it gave me a reading of approx 130 on my multimeter. I'm also a multimeter noob so excuse the ignorance.

[MarcoZandrini]

It’s odd that both tweeters would go out at the same time. Each tweeter has its own pair of wires that run to the amp. You would think that each tweeter would have its own amp channel as high frequencies are very directional unlike low frequencies. The audio wiring runs up the left side of the car. You might want to do a quick check to make sure that there are no wiring issues.

[Ramoo325i]

So I did some more inspecting today. For some reason the .5" tweeter in the corner of the door near the mirror was installed upside down. So pretty much the sound was being blocked from coming through the mesh. I flipped it around and its much louder. The 1.5" tweeter that I switched out last night has been running fine now with no issues so far. If they dont cut off then I have solved my issue.

[MarcoZandrini]

Good job if troubleshooting.