Hi all,
I have a '99 1500 club cab with the "premium sound" package and a pioneer head unit. Last night I replaced the front speakers with a pair of Alpine 6x9s. I had to run new wire straight from radio to the speakers in order to bypass the factory amps, and also because the left front speaker and tweeter wasn't recieving any signal from the radio (there must have been a break in a wire).

Obviously the tweeters were bypassed when I rewired the 6x9s so they're silent right now. Can I simply splice into the wires going to the 6x9s in order to feed the tweeters?

Also, for some stupid reason my rear speakers no longer work. They must have been tied into the front speakers somehow. What do I have to do to make the rear speakers work? Do the rear speakers have their own factory amps? Any help is appreciated, I'm extremely frusturated right now!

 

You can wire in the little speakers in the door, but, you need to put a 'choke' on the wires, as sending a full signal to them (including the bass) well blow them in short order.

As for the rear speakers...... No clue there.

 

Hey,

You can splice the wires going to the 6 x 9's, but I wouldn't do that because you will be changing the impedence of the radio on those channels. I seriously doubt that it would be enough to hurt anything but then again I'm sure that those 6 x 9's are hungry and are hogging all the wattage that the Pioneer is putting out on that channel. The tweeters don't require much, but they do require a clean signal to sound good. I'm not saying it can't be done, but I will say that I've witnessed people who have overloaded a stock channel and completly blown that channel by wiring in multiple speakers.

The prefered method of wiring these tweeters into the current system is to always have them on a seperate channel via an amp or have them on a crossover from the existing channel that you are using. The crossover will create a seperate channel that will be in the correct hertz range for that tweeter and will cancel out any bass that will go through it. Like HeyYou said, if you have ANY bass going to those tweeters they WILL blow very quickly.

If you must splice into the existing channel without a crossover or amp, then I would strongly encourage you to go to Crutchfield and purchase some in-line bass blockers that will tie into the wiring before the tweeter.

The way some factory systems are set up will amaze the most experienced technician. They can make the most illogical fabrication work and I don't mean this in a good way either. It's amazing that some of these set ups don't catch on fire, but hey.. it's whatever is the cheapest to produce and sound halfway good.

It's very possible that the rear speakers were tied into the front speakers being if they were using an 8 ohm speakers all tied into the factory amp.. who knows.. who cares... the pioneer is probably putting out cleaner and more wattage than the factory amp did anyway. One of my Mustangs were like that and I had to completely rewire the whole car to have a decent stereo, but it was worth it.

You should have two remaining channels left on the Pioneer if you are using two channels for the front.. just take a day and rewire the rear into the two remaining channels or add a clean amp and your done!

Hope this helps you. and keep us informed

 

I am mecp certified and i will also say you can connect them but you will be dropping the ohms from 4 down to 2 assuming the tweeters are also 4 ohm speakers by dropping from 4 to 2 ohms you will cause the head unit to run hot on your front channel amps and will decrease the life of your head unit.. Check your tweeters see if they have what looks like a mini capacitor attached if so they already have a bass blocker attached if not ask at your local store even auto zone has them for "bass blockers" put them in line on the positive wire going to the tweeter. any other audio questions let me know

 

oh almost forgot connect you remote wire on the harness to power antenna on the car harness that turns on your amp and will power your rear speakers!

 

all good information above, but let's be realistic and make this simple for the OP.

1. I am also MECP certified, advanced cert to be precise.
2. Lets make an assumption here that his new Alpine 6x9's are not midbass driver (which would be rare) but they are a full range speaker, probably a 2 or 3 way speaker.
3. If the assumption above is true, then completely forget about wiring in the door tweeters, which will be rated much less than a new aftermarket H/U would supply.
4. I suggest to wire each of the four speakers directly to the H/U
5. I don't know if you have a power antenna, but I think none of us do. But, if you do, you'll need to wire the power antenna wire from the H/U to the power antenna wire in the car. If the H/U doesn't have a power antenna wire, then the remote control wire will do too, thats the solid blue wire.
6. One last thing I forgot to mention, if the rear speakers are OEM, and they are a different impedance than 4ohms, you need to replace those also when you wire all speakers to the H/U. If you do not, and you have 4ohms up front and 8ohms in the rear, than the rear speakers will receive half the power to the rear speakers than in the front.

any questions?

 

Thanks for the great info guys, it's appreciated.

Here's a link to the speakers I bought...
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Alpine+-...&skuId=8704217

And here's the specs...
◦Handles up to 260W peak power (85W RMS)
◦6" x 9" poly-mica woofer cones with high-grade strontium magnets and Santoprene surround deliver rich, deep bass; stamped steel frame for high rigidity and minimal resonance
◦1" wide-range silk soft-dome and 5/8" dome tweeters with ultralow distortion magnets for crisp, expressive highs; tweeters swivel up to 10° for custom positioning
◦Frequency response: 65Hz - 23kHz
◦Sensitivity: 90dB/W (1m)
◦Impedance: 3.6 ohms
◦Mounting diameter: 5-15/16" x 8-3/4"
◦Mounting depth: 3"

Ok, so I need some kind of "bass blocker" wired in line with the tweeters before I splice into the 6x9s wires. Either that or wire in a "crossover", but that sounds complicated...

And for the rear speakers, does it matter whether or not the antenna is plugged into the back of the HU? I was in a hurry last night to get my truck back together before going to work, so I never bothered to plug it in. Would that make a difference?

 

shouldn't matter unless your ground is bad but the head unit wouldn't work if the ground was bad... you will have horrible reception obviously. Those speakers have tweeters you can aim so i wouldn't bother with the factory tweeters (just a suggestion) Alpine speakers have great sound quality

 

^ agreed.

You won't want to connect the OEM crappy tweeters anyways, you couldn't handle the load unless you bought a passive crossover set, which is rare to come separately with buying a set of components.

so to recap, DO NOT SPLICE INTO YOUR 6X9 AND CONNECT TO YOUR TWEETER!!!!

go connect your antenna too.

 

how are the rear speakers connected to the headunit??

through the factory wiring harness??

If so then you need to connect the power ant or remote wire to the light green wire in the factory harness to power the "choke relay"