4Tx

Hi There,

I have been reading on this forum for years but finally have a question I cant answer

I have a 2nd Gen 4Runner with factory 6 speaker stereo. The stereo and speakers had to retire due to some better stuff I installed.

It worked well but I would like to keep the factory amplifier to power the 4" front speakers. This is as I have no more space for any extra amps and the HU seems underpowered for the fronts to keep up with the rest.

The factory system in the vehicle is quiet confusing and it seems it has an amp in the dash center and also amps by the rear speakers. The thing in the front must be an amp as well.

Does anybody know:

- which are the amps inputs
- are the inputs low or high level
- which are the outputs
- what RMA wattage does this thing approximately have

Thanks!

Teac

NYChopshop

if by 6-speaker you mean the two 4" speakers in the dash and 6" drivers in the trunk sides with 1" tweeters mounted on the roof by the trunk light, than I can tell you that you're wasting your time driving 4" coax speakers with that amp. It most likely will blow out anything 4" you'd be putting in the truck. You may well have enough room under your rear seats for some amplifiers, especially JL audio's new HD series amplifiers. They're less than 2" thick, and I've seen bigger amps mounted under the seats with what the owners claim to be zero overheating problems.



I suggest you mount some 6.5" components in the front doors (4" coax speakers optional - but I like using the MB quart PVI 210 4" speakers and adding the 6.5" add-a-woofer system so they nearly perfectly match a set of 6.5" speakers for the rear), get 6.5" speakers for the rear doors, and mounting JL audio (or whatever else fits) 6" subwoofers in the factory trunk side locations. Powering those would be the JL HD900/5 amp either under one the rear seats or inside one of the trunk side pockets, giving me about 100w per channel to the 4x 6.5" speaker component sets and 500x1 split to the 2 small subs in the trunk. I'd then be adding a second amp, either on top of the HD900/5 or under the other seat depending, and using a single 10" or 12" subwoofer for the real lows. That's just me.

EDIT: added pic of my proposed system:

4Tx

Thanks for the reply Actually what I have in my 4Runner is: - 4" in dash - 4.75" (or like odd size) in the "trunk" sides part of a 2 way system - 1.5" in the very rear roof other part of the component system. I wanted to keep things simple and cheap so I got used stuff of craigslist and have now: - 5.25" JL component in the trunk sides to replace stocl crap - 1.5" JL component tweeters in rear roof - 4" Apline coax in dash - 8" JL sub in the rear side tool pocket - JL 430W 4 chan amp to drive the above The eclipse headunit drives the front 4" but you can hardly hear them. Stockwise there is some crossover/amp whatever it is under the stock stereo and there are also amp/crossovers right by the rear factory speakers. I figure the thing in the dash must be a 10-25W amp that would be ideal to drive the front 4" speakers.... I dont want to put anything in the doors. Although it would sound better I dont want to do the custom install .. getting the sub in was bad enough ... Teac

NYChopshop

well then your speaker selection is pretty flippin sweet, and I can't say much about any of that. I assume you have your JL audio amp wired with RCA's from the head unit. Do you have 3 pairs of RCA outputs on your head unit (front/rear/sub)? If so, get another small power amplifier for the subs and run it off of the low pass. Watch the frequency response and make sure that that amplifier will suit what your 8" sub can handle from the low end to the high end. Run the 4 channel speakers from the 4 channel amplifier, and consider adding mid-bass drivers to your front doors. You could also just not use the 4" speakers and get a 6.5" component set and use that instead for the power handling. You could also run 2 pairs of 4" speakers (the front pair, and cut holes for another pair in the rear doors) off of the head unit, and have the rear speakers and matching front speakers (or the component version of it since when you mount the speakers in the lower door, it's more critical that you get better aim with the tweeters than the drivers) driven by the 4 channel amp. Again, sub powered by a separate amplifier. This wouldn't be too hard. For the front drivers, get angled speaker spacers from ebay if you can find them (straight up flat ones would work too for simplicity), unbolt the map pocket from the front of the door panel, and screw it to the back of the door panel. Cut hole, add speaker, badda bing. Angled tweeter pod should just screw into your A-pillar or the top of your door as you see fit. Rear 4" speaker add-on? Just cut a pair of holes. Done.

The most important thing I said in that incoherent rambling is get another small amp for the sub. Wire it all the right way. If there is no sub out RCAs on your head unit, you can replace it on the cheap, or you can get the small graphic EQ from Kenwood that you could put in in place of your ash tray - same size. It has 4 channel RCA input and 6 channel RCA output with a selectable low pass filter for the sub channel. A little more than $100 from what I remember. The KGC-4042A. If you start blowing 4" speakers in the front, you know you need to bite the bullet and replace it with a larger diameter speaker set so you can enjoy the music you listen to the way you listen to it. I say do it now, I don't know anyone who stays genuinely happy with a 4" speaker alone forever.