Rear Speaker

[amarshall]

Fronts are 3.5" and take a bit of effort to get out of the plastic housing (there are 3 clips glued around the edge of the speaker which need to be levered off (aka broken) to get the old one out.

My fronts are as bad as the rears so I've just fitted a pair of these :

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0329552034

by bending the brackets on them and gluing them into the old housing. They're fractionally deeper than the originals and the separate tweeter means the old mounting brackets won't fit. Just waiting for the Araldite to go off now.

[fitz]

I have inadvertantly found I've had the same issues. While i had the door cards off i thought i'd look at replacing the front speakers they are very bad, got some "vibe Slick" ones for two reasons, they were a high enough wattage not to cause issues with modern aftermarket head units, and they are very plain and simple black design.

After looking at the door cards again, I got slightly impatient and was going to replace the rears anyway and found a hole in one of the speakers, they sound very good after a run and make a lot of difference!

Which leads my to my query, the fronts are 3.5" but it looks that if you remove the grill housing that the speaker is inserted into from there, you've got enough room to sqeeze a 4" speaker in, but what I am concerned about is damaging the door card leather removing the grill housing, has anyone done this successfully - looks like you break the 3 plastic prongs and it should push out the front?

[ttedj]

Seems we are all doing speakers at the moment. Just done mine. There is a large plastic ring on the back which unscrews off. This ring has the tabs on it which tighten against the door card. It should just be a case of pushing out the cover then but it was a tight fit.
Removing actual speaker from is discussed earlier (3 glued metal clips)
Hope this helps.
Ted

[amarshall]

DON'T BREAK THE PLASTIC ON THE FRONTS - the housing is in two halves and unscrews! It may take a bit of effort to get it started, but it DOES unscrew, eventually.

[fitz]

Don't worry Angus!, i noticed the screw mechanism but couldn't get it undone, and decided to replace the rears for the moment, Whilst i'm not too bothered about them (as long as the replacement grills / speakers look appropriately OEM and plain) I'd like to keep the front speakers so that they can be refitted in the future if required, i've also kept the standard grills from the rear for this very reason.

When i get round to taking the front door cards off for Leather cleaning + conditioning i'll have another attempt at unscrewing perhaps with the aid of some wd40...

thanks for the heads up - i wasn't sure if those where the clips referred to as having to be broken but can now see the ones inside the housing

[Tanz]

Fronts are 3.5" and take a bit of effort to get out of the plastic housing (there are 3 clips glued around the edge of the speaker which need to be levered off (aka broken) to get the old one out.

My fronts are as bad as the rears so I've just fitted a pair of these :

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0329552034

by bending the brackets on them and gluing them into the old housing. They're fractionally deeper than the originals and the separate tweeter means the old mounting brackets won't fit. Just waiting for the Araldite to go off now.

Angus - were these speakers any good? Was the fact they are deeper a problem?

People are asking what I want for my birthday so this could be a good idea!

[amarshall]

The only problem with them is that they don't fit a neatly into the front housings. The "Legacy" speakers are designed to be screwed onto something so have a couple of metal tabs fitted. Because the tweeter projects, it is not possible to use the original lotus speaker brackets (if they survive the dismantling process), so my solution was to bend the tabs back and glue them onto the front housing. They've survived a good few thousand miles now - and lots of use of "The Chain" to help me arrive on time

Sound quality is excellent too.

[fitz]

if it helps you can fit 4" speakers into the hole in the door card, but you do sacrifice the original grill. I had to look long and hard to find a speaker that had a nice simple design at this size (IE no luminious colours silly shapes etc etc), I've got Vibe slick 40's in the front and rear of my car now. You do have to screw into the door card at the front, but they mount within the outer lip of the original grills, so if you are careful you can retain the ability to go back to stock.

As far as sound quality goes, i put them in the rear first, found one of the original speakers had a hole in it, drove around for a couple of months as is if the band where playing in the back seat, replaced the front ones and its a little better, but i guess due to a) wind noise b) your head being closer to the rears its always going to sound baised..

[MrCoolA]

these look allright in my eyes, they are Pioneers

[shaunw]

For Fitz really; how are you finding the Vibe speakers?

I'm keen on these as the spec looks good but also the looks are in keeping with the car.

How do they sound?

Also interested if anyone else has replaced the OEM front speakers and got better sound

Shaun

[amarshall]

Fronts are 3.5" and take a bit of effort to get out of the plastic housing (there are 3 clips glued around the edge of the speaker which need to be levered off (aka broken) to get the old one out.

My fronts are as bad as the rears so I've just fitted a pair of these :

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0329552034

by bending the brackets on them and gluing them into the old housing. They're fractionally deeper than the originals and the separate tweeter means the old mounting brackets won't fit. Just waiting for the Araldite to go off now.

Angus - were these speakers any good? Was the fact they are deeper a problem?

People are asking what I want for my birthday so this could be a good idea!

Very very good and no problems with the depth, they just need to be set back a bit in the mounting pod.

[fitz]

Shaun,

I've found them very good, my only annoyance is the square rubber surround which holds the grill in place. It looks ok in the back but a bit odd at the front, I'm tempted to swap the front ones out for some jvc / pioneer ones with a normal circular black grill - it seems impossible to find plain looking speakers of a high quality these days..

However as has been noted elsewhere in this topic i think, i'd remember about the wind noise before buying expensive speakers , i've had to re-adjust the fade on my head unit in favour of the front. Otherwise when traveling above 40 it sounds like the band is in the back seat

hence I found the vibe's a nice price / performance compromise rather than a very expensive setup.

[shaunw]

Thanks guys

Fitz, I thought from reading up on them that the square mounting frame was optional, I might have that wrong.

I don't seem to get much wind noise............ or it could just be that it's drowned out by the road / exhaust / cam / induction noise Joking aside, at a steady cruise she's not too noisy actually. The standard front speakers are truly awful though and its nice to have music on long journeys, but like Fitz says its hard to get something that doesn't look like an extra from Transformers.

Shaun

[Steve C]

Take a look at the pics I uploaded of my car for sale for an audio upgrade ... 5 1/4" pioneer front component speakers, hidden high end pioneer 6x9 rears, 12" kenwood sub set into a replacement MDF spare wheel well cover and a couple of 4 channel amps in the boot for good measure!

http://www.lotusexcel.net/phpbb/viewtop ... f=2&t=5096

Oh and there's a Kenwood 5 band EQ / Front - Rear fader in there too.

[shaunw]

Nice installation Steve.

Do you happen to know the total size of your front speakers with the grill? I didnt think 5.25" speakers would fit as the grill normally adds at least another half inch. Yours look like they just about fit

Also, how does the rear speaker trim panel (the bit you've recovered) come out?

Good luck with the sale, looks to me like the car is worth the asking price in parts alone.

Shaun