Ok so I listed everything I will be eventually buying in this thread here
Im tryin to sell some things on ebay and get some money. One question, since Im not gonna be buying everything all at once. Will I get more of a benefit if I buy the 4 type-R speakers and install them first with the factory 98 firebird head unit, or will I benefit more from keeping the factory speakers for now and giving them more juice with the Kenwood KDC-X990?

 

basically im just asking which setup would have better sound quality until I have the money to buy more parts

 

ne1???

 

I would really recommend the following to keep things simple:

1.) Do the head unit first, but go ahead and run all three sets of RCA's at the same time, your remote turn-on wire, and power wires/fuse block (1 or 2) at the same time. You don't need the fuse block right off, but keep it in the budget either here or at stage 2. This means you'll only have the radio out once and only tear the trim up once to run the wires back once. If you intend to run new speaker wires I would do this as well. Our cars tear apart rather easily, but I still prefer to take things apart as few times as possible. There are a lot of plastic tabs, screws into sheet metal, stuff like that which is best to r/r as little as possible.

2.) Do your 4 channel amp and speakers at the same time. Include costs for a proper dual-fuse block. Have you considered a 5 channel amp? It will simplify wiring. If you use two amps you should have a dual-fuse, two power wire run with each fuse being just a tad larger than the fuses on each amp. A 5 channel amp will simplify this back to a single power wire and single fuse block, most likely be more efficient, and package better. Amps are a great thing to buy used, as they generally work or don't, and are very reliable - most amps are broken due to a short at install, getting wet, stuff like that. This is a good place to both simplify your layout and save a lot of money. One the low end used 5 channel alpines (50x4+150x1) can be had for less than $100, I picked up my memphis (75x4+400x1classD) for $150. Infinity, JBL, Alpine, JL, Memphis, and Kicker all make nice 5 channel solutions that are on ebay quite often. You don't need a ton of power to make good bass in our cars, the hatch is a very good sound reienforcement.

3.) Add your sub/amp last, as they are pretty much a tack-on since you'll have the power, RCA, and turn on leads ran already from the above items.

The aftermarket amp first will do nothing except destroy factory monsoon speakers. Keep them in good shape and sell them off, they fetch good money, upwards of $100-150 if you are lucky.

 

yes it will be alittle extra work but you know how it is, when we get somethin new for the car who the hell wants to wait to install it lol. May take me a year to get everything i need since i still owe a few thousand as well haha. BTW i dont have the monsoon system, are the stock speakers still the same, or not even worth sellin. Also, even the amp in the aftermarket headunit (i think the kenwood i mentioned above gives 22 rms) would blow the stockers? If so then i will def go speakers first.

 

Or you could just start purchasing things, and then install when you have aquired all of your new toys. That would save quite a bit of headache and duplicate work.

 

and yes they will have to be re wired once the amp is put in but the extra work should give better sound over the crappy and old stock speaker wire

 

i could but most of us see working on our cars as not really "work" lol. i dunno if im just alittle dumb, but i kind of enjoy it

 

I edited my post above alot.

 

wow u did edit it ALOT lol. I def like ur idea about runnin all the rca's and things like that so i dont have to take the unit out again Since i dont have the mosoon system, i have the system in the v6 98 firebird, are the stock speakers the same ones u tellin me to sell online. Also, do u know of any 5 channel amps that give somethin like 50x4 and 300x1. i def wanna try to give the type-S sub the full 300 rms without blowin out the type-R speakers with too much rms (they are 50 with a max 250)

 

one thing i dont understand with the rms and max is what is the spaec in between for. Example: the type-R speakers are 50 rms 250 max. what happens if the speakers get 100 rms, blow up? or sound better?

 

sorry to be bombarding u with questions lol but say i get an amp that says 4 x 55-Watts + 1 x 200-Watts RMS @ 4-Ohms and 4 x 110-Watts + 1 x 300-Watts RMS @ 2-Ohms . Will the 4 ohm type-R's run at 55 watts while the dual 2 ohm coil type-S sub is running at 2 ohms with 300 watts?

 

Well, just because your car is a V6 doesn't mean it isn't a monsoon. Do you have rear hatch speakers and an amp in front of your spare? Or just straight up 4 speakers? Not all of the monsoon systems were marked with the logo, is my point. And yes the value of your speakers and how your wiring is setup is much different if you happen to just have the base 4 speaker off the head unit setup. It changes things alot.

Speaker ratings from reputable companies work like this:

- The RMS rating of the speaker is a good working recommendation for the RMS rating of your amp, particularly if you are dealing with equipment from the same quality levels. The problem here is that some amps are rated at 50 watts RMS - bad ones may not put out near that much (Pyramid, legacy, crap like that), while good ones (JL, Memphis, so forth) may put out quite a bit more. Same with speakers. You can buy $20 "1000 watt" subs, but they won't really take 1,000 watts.

- If you feed the speaker less than it's RMS rating, you will lose volume. On midranges and tweeters, there isn't a lot of risk because if you drive the amp into distortion - the sound is very unpleasant and you will turn it down. On subs, this distortion is much harder to detect, the subs move alot and distortion means loss of control, so over time it will damage your subs, particularly in a ported enclosure. Therefore most people recommend that sub amplifiers be at or above the power handling of the subs.

- In reality if you cautious (don't play into distortion) then it is really not a big deal. Power is not linear, either. 300 watts is not going to be twice as loud as 150 watts, but rather is a 3db improvement which is noticeable but nowhere near twice as loud. You can just as easilly pick up 3db by choosing a more sensitive speaker or using a proper enclosure. This is why a well thought out, and properly built system can sound very loud, and very good, using only modest power levels (say 40x4 + 150x1).

 

Yes, the output of each channel will adapt based upon the load it is given. Generally speaking it is good to match your speakers with the lowest ohm rating the amp can support. This is the most efficient route and gives you the most power out of your amp while giving the same load to the charging system. Especially on subs it is a shame to waste this extra power.

I highly recommend 5 channel amps if you have good familiarity with what you want out of your system up front, and are not simply looking for tons of bass. A 4+1 arrangement is more flexible, but it is more expensive and favors those who tend to want more bass than they need. The balance of most 5 channels aligns very well with a single stealth box system in our cars.

 

wow u r given me alot of information i been lookin for. I know this may take a few minutes of ur time but i would appreciate it if you could just browse through these. I looked on ebay for 5 channels and found these:

Hifonics

Crunch

Pheonix

Boss Audio

I thought that the Hifonics sounded like a great amp for my setup. 55 x 4 at 4 ohms for my speakers and 300x1 at 2 ohms for my dual 4 ohm coil type-S, plus it has a 2 year warranty which i thought was great.

 

and yes i just read your last post, i will be putting the single 10 inch in a drivers side sub box

 

and no, no monsoon amp. i just has the 4 base speakers which most likely means when they get taken out of the car they will prob be just smashed with a hammer for fun lol

 

I'm sorry I cannot get to eBay where I am right now. Brand feedback is a very difficult one, but I can tell you that Crunch and Boss are not well respected brands. Some Hifonics and Pheonix stuff is very good, but there is a wide range from them as well, so you'd have to research the specific amp.

Two 5 channel amps I can recommend wholeheartedly are:

Alpine MRV-F357 (50x4 + 1x150 all at 4 ohms) - this is a very well balanced, nice looking, and extremely clean sounding amplifier. They pop up on ebay fairly regularly, I think due to the fact that the sub channel output is kind of low for boomers' taste. But the amps have very good adjustability, and they typically sell for $75-150 used. The 150 on the sub channel sounds low but it is a very solid 150 with good headroom.

Memphis "Baby" Belle - these are also fairly common, and sell for around $150-250. At 4 ohms they put out 55x4 + 100x1, with the ability to drive 75x4(2ohms) + 400x1 (1ohm).

I've ran both of these, and the sound quality is very good. The Memphis is a much higher quality piece of equipment, but it is also quite a bit more costly.

The sub portion of the Memphis amp is class D, so the efficiency is very good. I am setup right now with it driving 2 and 1 ohm, at full blast it is putting out 900 watts rms and I get no flicker from the stock charging system at idle. If you went with a 4+1 setup at that RMS level from cheaper amps it could be a pretty heavy load on the charging system.

Outside of those - in the midrange pricing I would recommend looking for Infinity, JBL, or Kicker. Those brands with Alpine and Memphis seem to be the best balance of cost vs. performance for the 5 channel market. (just my opinion).

Oh, and if you have just the base 4 speaker/no amp system then your life is actually quite a bit simpler. You can drop in the radio and speakers at any point and not have to worry about special wiring at all. In this case you'd want to do speakers first, then head unit, then amp/subs.

Unfortunately the speakers are not the same as monsoons and are essentially worthless (I think).

If you tell people your amp budget others will chime in with recommendations, I'm sure.

 

sounds good. I will def do some research on the hifonics amp because its numbers on paper seem to fit my system perfectly. And yes, shouldnt be too tough to put the unit and speakers in the 4 speaker base model. You def have answered a bunch of my questions and have reduced the cost of the system by atleast $200 , thanks for all your help!!!