Premium sound upgrade

[Ron01864]

A lot of us are less than thrilled with the quality of s550's sound, even with the speaker upgrade. I have a 13 and the sound is a lot better then the 15. Im wondering if it is simply the placement of the sub. Maybe moving the sub from the s197's door to the trunk was a mistake?

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[Markbnh1]

You might not say this after you hear mine. Personally I think it is a result of low quality components which is obviously done to cut costs. See you tomorrow!

 

[Ron01864]

:hail:

 

[Markbnh1]

:hail:

Ha ha! Have you tried it with one or both of the rear seats folded down?

 

[Ron01864]

Ha ha! Have you tried it with one or both of the rear seats folded down?

Actually i have done that. Lol

 

[mumbles]

Many threads around the lackluster performance of the S550 sub... you might as well join the crowd and just add an aftermarket amp/sub combo!

 

[Ron01864]

I like the sound of my exhaust too much to spend on an expensive upgrade right now. ;-). Plus i need wheels, first. Shhh dont tell the wife.

 

[All4ford]

Hate to ask a redundant question, but I have the shaker 12 speaker system with subwoofer. How can I replace and add my own sub and amp? Has there been a write up yet or a how to. I already have a spare amp and sub and can easily wire it up. I just do not know how to add and tap into factory system

 

[mumbles]

Hate to ask a redundant question, but I have the shaker 12 speaker system with subwoofer. How can I replace and add my own sub and amp? Has there been a write up yet or a how to. I already have a spare amp and sub and can easily wire it up. I just do not know how to add and tap into factory system

Numerous posts about this. Here is a thread I found on another forum that discusses the subwoofer wiring... use at your own risk!

Finished the installation today and I finally have a subwoofer that HITS HARD! I haven't finished dialing in the bass and treble settings, but I was able to do an initial setting with the bass lower so as not to overtax the front subs. Beforehand they would distort at even half volume, and now I have that bass you can feel yet is still crisp and clean.

As for the install itself, it wasn't too hard, just time consuming. My plan was to reuse the stock sub housing so I could sort of keep the stock look...plus it's free. The first thing I did was to cut out the cone that the old subwoofer magnet bolted to as the Rockford Fosgate P2D4-10 was almost 2" taller. I cut flush to the back of the case and used the opening to install the speaker terminal assembly. I forgot to take a lot of pics but I will add them soon. I also had to sand the main sub opening slightly to get the new sub trim ring to completely fit. I could have avoided doing so if I kept the stock protective screen, but as the picture shows, the RF screen looks much better

. The Planet Audio 1000W amp I bolted to the back of the factory amp mount. There was plenty of room, and the opening where the stock amp was mounted on the opposite side should allow for plenty of airflow / cooling. Now, as I mentioned before, the green/red wire was the 12V battery power wire, the black was ground, and the grey/violet wire the signal wire. No problems there. The two speaker wires (brown/blue+ and white/blue-) turned out to be a slightly different story. I could find no answers about what signal source type it was, so to play it safe I hooked them to the high level inputs. No matter the sensitivity setting the sound was extremely weak to say the least. So I decided to try to install on the RCA low level inputs. I sacrificed a cable to get to the wiring and then added a splitter to input to both RCA's as there is only the one set of signal wires. The sub immediately came to life! So I guess that solves the riddle - The shaker pro rear sub amp uses a low level signal. No high to low level conversion filter needed.

 

[Markbnh1]

Many threads around the lackluster performance of the S550 sub... you might as well join the crowd and just add an aftermarket amp/sub combo!

It's even worse if you don't have the sub at all with the 400A group! That "premium" 9 speaker system is worse than a Toyota! It's like a new car after adding a good sub and amp!

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