E34 Audio Upgrade

[pundit]

As I am beginning to upgrade the sound in my E34 I'd thought I'd document the procedure for those who maybe interested. My intention is not to wake the neighbors three blocks away but to hopefully increase the fidelity of the system without necessarily spending a fortune and retain as close to a stock installation appearance as possible.

Part 1 - Tweeter

[Jon K]

As I am beginning to upgrade the sound in my E34 I'd thought I'd document the procedure for those who maybe interested. My intention is not to wake the neighbors three blocks away but to hopefully increase the fidelity of the system without necessarily spending a fortune and retain as close to a stock installation appearance as possible.

Part 1 - Tweeter

As you mentioned in the last line of your write-up, the ohm load and cross over is more important than the tweeter itself for if you don't load the system enough (or over load it, eek) you will have less volume or clipping and failing amplifiers. The cross over frequency is important too because if the factory cross-overs in the amplifier are lower than what the new tweeter is designed, you won't have the high range. If it's too high, you will be overdriving the new tweeter.

[Black 535i]

Did you use the original wiring or did you rewire everything during this project?

As you mentioned in the last line of your write-up, the ohm load and cross over is more important than the tweeter itself for if you don't load the system enough (or over load it, eek) you will have less volume or clipping and failing amplifiers. The cross over frequency is important too because if the factory cross-overs in the amplifier are lower than what the new tweeter is designed, you won't have the high range. If it's too high, you will be overdriving the new tweeter.

[Jon K]

Did you use the original wiring or did you rewire everything during this project?

With my car, I wired where needed, ie. the subs and RCAs etc. The stock bmw wiring is very good. absolutely no need to re-wire

[Incantation]

lol

unless you are pushing some juicy speakers.. like my focals. stock doesn't nearly do the job for em

[Jon K]

lol

unless you are pushing some juicy speakers.. like my focals. stock doesn't nearly do the job for em

I have MB Quart Q-Series, 3 ways, with 100w each channel, and it sounds great.

[pundit]

Did you use the original wiring or did you rewire everything during this project?

The project is ongoing and I will be using the stock speaker locations with the exception of a sub firing through the rear armrest cavity. The speaker wiring will be the stock loom but will need the grounds 'un-commoned' for use with amps with floating outputs.

[pundit]

As you mentioned in the last line of your write-up, the ohm load and cross over is more important than the tweeter itself for if you don't load the system enough (or over load it, eek) you will have less volume or clipping and failing amplifiers. The cross over frequency is important too because if the factory cross-overs in the amplifier are lower than what the new tweeter is designed, you won't have the high range. If it's too high, you will be overdriving the new tweeter.

The crossovers are very important for both quality of sound on longevity of the speaker themselves. As I mentioned already I intend retaining the factory bass speakers & dash mounted mids along with adding a sub. The performance of the original bass & mid drivers can be enhanced by analysing their characteristics and choosing a crossover design that doesn't force them to operate outside of their optimum range.

[Brett619310]

Thank you for doing this! Most of the information I have found has been cryptic, with losts of wiring schematics and not a lot of pictures and step by step walkthroughs. I hope that when you are done, this is all archived on bmwe34.net.