OEM will be as good if not better than any comparably priced after market speakers.

HOW AND WHY TO UPGRADE YOUR MK.4S SPEAKERS

 

Thanks for your response, appreciate it.

I'm going to go with a full re fit. A 4 channel amp and 4 speakers. this package here http://www.caraudiodiscount.com/complete-door-speakers-upgrade-kit-17cm-speakers-p-14453.html

Can you clarify if this is suitable for my GOLF MK4, I would buy those plastic spacers too off ebay. all the dimensions ok? Good to go? that would be helpful. Thanks.

 

You can get rear door wiring looms on e-bay from between £9 & £15 a piece, but not sure they'd be any good, as some of the wiring between the door & the head unit would more than likely be missing. You'd probably need to buy the door card innards, that house the window motor & the speaker too, to get everything like OEM. I've seen them for about £25 a piece, which kinda blows the £50 budget...

 

i've done an OEM rear speaker install on my golf. It to had a beta unit from new and now has a gamma until I can afford something better. I added the rear speaker wires to the ISO plug on head unit end then ran the wires round through the sills to the b pillar. I used some b pillar connectors takes from a scrapped gti and cut out the speaker connections and fitted into my existing b pillar connector (there are blank sockets that the pins go in to) then fitted new rear door looms that had the speaker wiring and finally OEM speakers and tweeters. This now is identical to an,OEM setup so in the future if/when,I want to upgrade I can just get the conversion wires and speaker spacers to fit aftermarket kit. There's a brief description on my build thread and if you need a hand pm me. It probably cost about £30 all in with some parts from eBay and some from scrappy.

 

The stockers will sound a LOT better than those Edge speakers will.Pointless changing the fronts as well if you're on such a tight budget.These won't need any special mounting hardware,just a few metres of twin core speaker wire and you'll be good to go.

 

Hi thanks a lot for the replies really appreciate it. sorry forgot to mention. Budget has changed Change of idea. fresh install. 4 speakers, (2 front, 2 back) and an amp in the boot. The package I linked to seems adequate, and for that price decent. If nothing is holding me back.......Im going for it! what you think?

 

...Im going for it! what you think?

I think as I already said they'll sound worse than what you've already got in there.Amping up the stockers will sound good.Or another idea will be to buy some GOOD components for the front (say £150) and put the old fronts in the back,just amp the fronts though if you're looking for any sort of real sound quality and run the rears at a low level as rear fill.

 

I think as I already said they'll sound worse than what you've already got in there.Amping up the stockers will sound good.Or another idea will be to buy some GOOD components for the front (say £150) and put the old fronts in the back,just amp the fronts though if you're looking for any sort of real sound quality and run the rears at a low level as rear fill.

thanks I'll have a long hard think about it

 

I've been think about upgrading the front and rears with Focal polyglass components speakers.
I think this would be a nice upgrade and of course using decent gauge OFC, wooden pods to mount and a power pack amp for the alpine head to power them.

 

I think as I already said they'll sound worse than what you've already got in there.Amping up the stockers will sound good.Or another idea will be to buy some GOOD components for the front (say £150) and put the old fronts in the back,just amp the fronts though if you're looking for any sort of real sound quality and run the rears at a low level as rear fill.

Well, 9 months down the line and still no progress! but xmas is coming... so im getting it done. Imagewerx this i am going down your recommended route. I am going with 2 components in the front, and put the current front OEM speakers in the rear. and just amp the 2 front components with 2 channel amp.

The components I'm going to get are these: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/251592243349?_trksid=p2060778.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Looks like they come with the spacing adapter things. (SAK-3103)

Not found an amp yet but the speakers are 80watts RMS each, so that makes 160watt RMS total for them. So I'm looking for an amp of between 75% - 150% of 160 RMS if that's correct? 75% = 280watt and 150% = 400 watt. So somewhere in-between there.

Now a question when doing the rears. I will obviously have to buy some new speaker wire that is long enough to run from the rear to the headunit. I am just wondering whether i will need some of the adapters (SAK-3103) as well even though they will be OEM?

Hope I'm heading in the right direction. Thanks...from an obvious first timer...!

 

Quart speakers are not too bad for sound quality,but tend to be lacking in any real bass (as most sound quality speakers do) so only really work well when high passed and used with a sub.Too much maths is making my brain hurt this late at night :wacko: ,but a 400 watt amped turned down will always be better than an 80 watt amp turned all the way up.I have 80 watt RMS horn speakers in the front of my car and they're driven by a Kicker 2 X 250 watts RMS amp,so massive amounts of headroom and almost impossible to drive into distortion.

Oh and more or less any old speaker wire (16 SWG is about right) for the rears as they're not being amped,and from a distant memory the speakers should just go straight in without any other mounting hardware.

 

Remember to look for speaker sensitively too, theres a huge benefit to be made from getting a 90db sensitive set over an 80db set.. this especially helps when running from a low power source (>300rms) IMO, that kit doesnt give you RMS figures either, I cant see it being 1200RMS

(didnt read the last few post my bad )

They seem a tad expensive for the specs, maybe because of the "vw" custom gimic, i agree you should just amp the OEM speakers, maybe do that first before you spend an extra £100 on the rears and see how you like it, a lot of people dont think it is (myself not included but each to their own) a decent amp will make it crystal compared to before.

 

Great help as ever. Just trying to choose an amplifier now that will do the job. Any suggestions would be welcome! Found this, seems like it would work. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pioneer-GM-A5602-2-Channel-Bridgeable-Car-Audio-Amplifier-900W-/350936740883?pt=UK_In_Car_Technology&hash=item51b575b413

It's 2 x 150W RMS (4 Ω). Thats good as the speakers are 2 x 80W RMS (4 Ω).

 

It's as good as any,so why not?

 

It's as good as any,so why not?

Yeah fair, i'll go with this. Thanks for the advice. onto fitting now. should be fine

 

Sorry to be annoying and asking instead of checking inside myself, (but its a bit nippy out at the moment!). I am wanting to move the front OEM speakers to the rear in the vacant space for them. I am assuming i cannot just 'pick them up and move them to the location' as the wiring will not be long enough to do that?

How will i get around this? thanks

 

Run new wires from the headunit to the rear doors

 

Run new wires from the headunit to the rear doors

Do you mean run wires from the brown ISO block that connects to the headunit, to the rear doors?

 

Do you mean run wires from the brown ISO block that connects to the headunit, to the rear doors?

Yes,you can use the unoccupied positions in the ISO block using standard VW repair wires.Or you can just splice into the green and purple pairs in the new unit's loom.

 

Yes,you can use the unoccupied positions in the ISO block using standard VW repair wires.Or you can just splice into the green and purple pairs in the new unit's loom.

I will use the unoccupied position. And the vw repair wire goes into the ISO block (just clips in?) and then the speaker wire connects to the other end of that? Will have a look on ETKA in a bit to find part number for vw repair wire. couldn't see any in ebay. Thanks for your help, starting to be clearer now

 

The new speaker wires connect onto the repair wires.

 

The new speaker wires connect onto the repair wires.

Couldnt find on ETKA. Just buy 2 of these then and they'll fit right into the ISO block? http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-VW-VOLKSWAGEN-REPAIR-WIRE-0-63-000979009E-/330921841542?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item4d0c7a9386

there are so many variants of the repair wire here tho! not sure which to get http://www.passatplus.de/umbauteile/stecker/stecker.htm

 

Couldnt find on ETKA. Just buy 2 of these then and they'll fit right into the ISO block? http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-VW-VOLKSWAGEN-REPAIR-WIRE-0-63-000979009E-/330921841542?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item4d0c7a9386

there are so many variants of the repair wire here tho! not sure which to get http://www.passatplus.de/umbauteile/stecker/stecker.htm

They're for different types of plug and without having both in front of me I can only narrow it down to half a dozen or so.You could also take a trip to the breakers yard and cut off the relevant ISO plug from a car that's got rear speakers,cut off your two way,and join on the new front wires to your existing ones and then the rear ones to the new wires.

 

They're for different types of plug and without having both in front of me I can only narrow it down to half a dozen or so.You could also take a trip to the breakers yard and cut off the relevant ISO plug from a car that's got rear speakers,cut off your two way,and join on the new front wires to your existing ones and then the rear ones to the new wires.

Just got some pics to help me explain and hopefully you might be able to identify the type of repair wire i need. because i've found another version of it on ebay now. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-VW-REPAIR-WIRE-PART-NUMBER-000979133E-/380941074004?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item58b1db7e54

Thanks

 

The 'what's this?' is the lighting plug for the original single CD player.But as I said above,I can't tell from small 2D photos like that if it's right or not.Why not try what I suggested earlier and get yourself a 4 way speaker ISO,you could even take the pins out and put them into yours if you want to keep it neat with less soldering.