Basic stereo 6 speaker upgrade..update Amp added..final update, active subwoofer installed

[Silverstar]

Silverstar, do you have a link to the Peugeot connector on Amazon please? Thanks in advance.

I think Silverstar might have missed this link i put in page 1 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/382269999366

it has a set of adapters for the footwells as well as one for either the doors or rears

Those look different to the connectors on our 6.5" I think they are correct for the 8" subwoofers that you get in cars with the upgraded hifi. I contacted a vendor selling that type and sent him photos of the connector on the 6.5" woofers and he confirmed it was different.

Hence why I used the Peugeot / Citroen type. I got it off Amazon Spain (since I am here) but you should able to find the same in Amazon UK, they were somewhat cheaper too:

https://www.amazon.es/gp/product/B00CNA ... UTF8&psc=1

[Pbondar]

Good job champ.. its a good feeling when you get those speakers running and listen to a few tracks, shows what a difference just some decent speakers make

No reason you couldn't mount a slim active sub behind the seat rather than under it, thats where i would most likely put mine provided i can make a neat install

Slim active subs behind the seats would be the easiest for installation but I like the idea of putting a couple normal subs mounted flush on the rear panel where the OEM subs normally go, it would make for a cleaner install. Rather than putting them in the OEM enclosure and mounting them behind the trim, I wonder if it is possible to just cut a hole in the trim and mount them from the front. Something small like the Kicker Comp RT 6.75" or perhaps some 8"

Saying that, the amps and subs will have to wait a while, next on order is an Apple car play MMI box. I want to see how that wires in and weather I can tap into the speakers outputs via the T Harness that will be supplied with the CarPlay box, thereby not destroying the factory wiring. I am thinking of sticking two amps in the boot where the factory amp would normally fit since you can easily get the power and earth from there.

The subs issue IMHO is a bit of a rathole...

I fitted Audison premium OE fit upgrades into the factory enclosures driven by a dedicated 500 W RMS class D amp..

https://www.audison.eu/products/apbmw-s8-4/

https://www.alpine.co.uk/p/Products/SingleView/MRV-M500

So about as good as it gets price wise...

The performance is very disappointing...primarily because the enclosure volume is very small...and the E89 cabin doesn’t let the subs ‘play’

It depends if you listen to your music top up or top down...

Top down IMHO it’s a waste of money..

You can fit a sub from the front...the issue is that the structure to support it is very weak and would likely resonate badly ...and you still have the lack of volume and neither a sealed enclosure nor a ported solution..

Space wise I don’t think you can get enough space to fit under seat subwoofers integrated solutions..

With money spent and hindsight I would focus on the front woofers and pour money and attention to that area..

[mr.tourette]

Silverstar, do you have a link to the Peugeot connector on Amazon please? Thanks in advance.

I think Silverstar might have missed this link i put in page 1 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/382269999366

it has a set of adapters for the footwells as well as one for either the doors or rears

Those look different to the connectors on our 6.5" I think they are correct for the 8" subwoofers that you get in cars with the upgraded hifi. I contacted a vendor selling that type and sent him photos of the connector on the 6.5" woofers and he confirmed it was different.

Hence why I used the Peugeot / Citroen type. I got it off Amazon Spain (since I am here) but you should able to find the same in Amazon UK, they were somewhat cheaper too:

https://www.amazon.es/gp/product/B00CNA ... UTF8&psc=1

ah okay i thought they looked very similar and assumed bmw wouldn't have that many different types of adapters for essentially the same gauge wiring and a 2 pin connection.. they cut corners everywhere else on the stereo

[john-e89]

Good job champ.. its a good feeling when you get those speakers running and listen to a few tracks, shows what a difference just some decent speakers make

No reason you couldn't mount a slim active sub behind the seat rather than under it, thats where i would most likely put mine provided i can make a neat install

Slim active subs behind the seats would be the easiest for installation but I like the idea of putting a couple normal subs mounted flush on the rear panel where the OEM subs normally go, it would make for a cleaner install. Rather than putting them in the OEM enclosure and mounting them behind the trim, I wonder if it is possible to just cut a hole in the trim and mount them from the front. Something small like the Kicker Comp RT 6.75" or perhaps some 8"

Saying that, the amps and subs will have to wait a while, next on order is an Apple car play MMI box. I want to see how that wires in and weather I can tap into the speakers outputs via the T Harness that will be supplied with the CarPlay box, thereby not destroying the factory wiring. I am thinking of sticking two amps in the boot where the factory amp would normally fit since you can easily get the power and earth from there.

The subs issue IMHO is a bit of a rathole...

I fitted Audison premium OE fit upgrades into the factory enclosures driven by a dedicated 500 W RMS class D amp..

https://www.audison.eu/products/apbmw-s8-4/

https://www.alpine.co.uk/p/Products/SingleView/MRV-M500

So about as good as it gets price wise...

The performance is very disappointing...primarily because the enclosure volume is very small...and the E89 cabin doesn’t let the subs ‘play’

It depends if you listen to your music top up or top down...

Top down IMHO it’s a waste of money..

You can fit a sub from the front...the issue is that the structure to support it is very weak and would likely resonate badly ...and you still have the lack of volume and neither a sealed enclosure nor a ported solution..

Space wise I don’t think you can get enough space to fit under seat subwoofers integrated solutions..

With money spent and hindsight I would focus on the front woofers and pour money and attention to that area..

It’s not the E89 cabin that’s the problem it’s the gear being used. You can’t expect much from the stock locations. If you want good clean tight bass you need a separate enclosure. I don’t agree with focussing on the front for bass, sound staging says get the bass behind you with the mids and tweets up front. I’d suggest money would be better spent getting an installer to make up a stealth enclosure if you’re not good with the tools or woodwork/fibreglassing. Good quality gear is wasted if it’s in rubbish enclosures, but not hugely expensive gear can sound amazing if you throw a little at getting the basics right.

[Pbondar]

Many people writing on this subject would disagree about bass being behind you... for example this wordy and excellent article.. https://www.thompsonsltd.co.uk/car-audio-explained.html

Today all recordings are made in stereo (save DVD movie sound tracks)... this is a front biased setup for all frequencies...in a perfect world both speakers would be point sources generating all frequencies in some form of equilateral triangle with the listener at one point..

You can place a sub woofer away from the centre as the sound travels in a non directional basis..so the human ears/brain cannot resolve that... the higher the frequency the better the chance to determine it’s a location..

When it comes to the subwoofer it’s a struggle...yes a large ported box in the boot would work...but with a full metal bulkhead between the cabin and boot the subwoofer will struggle to get through unlike the normal cardboard type separator in a saloon car between boot and cabin...

You could fabricate a ported subwoofer to rest across the rear ‘parcel’ shelf behind the seats...AFAIK I’m not aware of anyone who has successfully done that..

The existing subwoofer locations are hermetically sealed enclosures...just very small..about 5-10 litres..

Having a fully tweakable DSP with the ability to do time/phase/frequency sampling and adjusting I could get everything about perfect...great and precise soundstage, good smooth sound..but as I said the subwoofers contribute little..in fact I can switch them off and the difference in perceived playback is negligible..

The same playback on my mid range 3.1 audio / media system with a nice ported active woofer in my ‘snug’ shows that extended base can be had..just not in an E89...again AFAIK and IMHO..

[Silverstar]

Slim active subs behind the seats would be the easiest for installation but I like the idea of putting a couple normal subs mounted flush on the rear panel where the OEM subs normally go, it would make for a cleaner install. Rather than putting them in the OEM enclosure and mounting them behind the trim, I wonder if it is possible to just cut a hole in the trim and mount them from the front. Something small like the Kicker Comp RT 6.75" or perhaps some 8"

Saying that, the amps and subs will have to wait a while, next on order is an Apple car play MMI box. I want to see how that wires in and weather I can tap into the speakers outputs via the T Harness that will be supplied with the CarPlay box, thereby not destroying the factory wiring. I am thinking of sticking two amps in the boot where the factory amp would normally fit since you can easily get the power and earth from there.

The subs issue IMHO is a bit of a rathole...

I fitted Audison premium OE fit upgrades into the factory enclosures driven by a dedicated 500 W RMS class D amp..

https://www.audison.eu/products/apbmw-s8-4/

https://www.alpine.co.uk/p/Products/SingleView/MRV-M500

So about as good as it gets price wise...

The performance is very disappointing...primarily because the enclosure volume is very small...and the E89 cabin doesn’t let the subs ‘play’

It depends if you listen to your music top up or top down...

Top down IMHO it’s a waste of money..

You can fit a sub from the front...the issue is that the structure to support it is very weak and would likely resonate badly ...and you still have the lack of volume and neither a sealed enclosure nor a ported solution..

Space wise I don’t think you can get enough space to fit under seat subwoofers integrated solutions..

With money spent and hindsight I would focus on the front woofers and pour money and attention to that area..

It’s not the E89 cabin that’s the problem it’s the gear being used. You can’t expect much from the stock locations. If you want good clean tight bass you need a separate enclosure. I don’t agree with focussing on the front for bass, sound staging says get the bass behind you with the mids and tweets up front. I’d suggest money would be better spent getting an installer to make up a stealth enclosure if you’re not good with the tools or woodwork/fibreglassing. Good quality gear is wasted if it’s in rubbish enclosures, but not hugely expensive gear can sound amazing if you throw a little at getting the basics right.

From the little research that I have done you can have the subs behind you but they should be set up so that it is not obvious that they are behind you, if you understand what I mean.

With regards to cutting a hole in the trim panel behind the seats and mounting some small subs directly on that panel, I did think about it resonating. A way around that would be to have a plywood / MDF panel to fit the width and height of the trim behind the seats around 10 to 20mm thick and finish it with some matching carpet. Somehow attach that to the trim panel and then mount the subs on that MDF / Plywood board. I have seen a photo somewhere of the rear bulkhead with trim removed where the original subs (and enclosure) sit and that space / volume does look a bit small. Perhaps some subs that need a small enclosure like these (or something similar) might do the job:

https://www.thompsonsltd.co.uk/all-prod ... ngle).html

The other option would be have a custom enclosure / bass tube in the boot, my car has the parcel shelf cubby box in the rear panel which can be removed and grill fitted to allow sound to pass through or you could somehow attach a sub in the trunk to the rear panel facing that cut out into the car.

The other option like another member has done is to fit some proper subs in the kick panels like Kickers Comprt 6.75" but I don't want to be removing the rather nice Hertz woofers that I just installed.

I have had an under seat sub back in the 90's in my Celica and they performed pretty well back then although not as good as having some proper subs but better than not having any! Now with new tech maybe they perform even better? So this would be the easiest solution but they would have to be mounted behind the seats since as Pete has quite rightly pointed out there is no space under the seats in this Z4.

In the end there has to be way, you know what they say where there's a will there's a way and all that...........

[mr.tourette]

Ive already ordered an underseat sub so we will find out, I should have known I would open a can of worms once I started as i do like a clean sounding hifi I'll mount it on the bulkhead behind the seat if it won't go under, there may be room half in/out as my seat has a reasonable gap behind it. Like you say technology has advanced and I'm not looking for earth shattering performance, just a modest improvement in deep bass would be just fine and any sub is better than none..I hope, on the plus side with 30 day returns available if I'm not convinced it can go back. Will put me at £376 all in ..I still think that's a very reasonable cost to go the the full monty so to speak, and will absolutely 100% stop there

[Pbondar]

With regards to cutting a hole in the trim panel behind the seats and mounting some small subs directly on that panel, I did think about it resonating. A way around that would be to have a plywood / MDF panel to fit the width and height of the trim behind the seats around 10 to 20mm thick and finish it with some matching carpet. Somehow attach that to the trim panel and then mount the subs on that MDF / Plywood board. I have seen a photo somewhere of the rear bulkhead with trim removed where the original subs (and enclosure) sit and that space / volume does look a bit small. Perhaps some subs that need a small enclosure like these (or something similar) might do the job:

https://www.thompsonsltd.co.uk/all-prod ... ngle).html


The issue with those subwoofers..great price...is they are too deep to fit in the limited depth of the subwoofer space even with a 20mm front panel in the existing subwoofer area...without an enclosure either sealed or deliberately and knowingly ported subwoofers make buggar all sound..

If you have the time and inclination by all means experiment...

[Silverstar]

Will put me at £376 all in ..I still think that's a very reasonable cost to go the the full monty so to speak, and will absolutely 100% stop there

Are you sure? if the underseat sub sounds good maybe you'll add another one?

[mr.tourette]

Will put me at £376 all in ..I still think that's a very reasonable cost to go the the full monty so to speak, and will absolutely 100% stop there

Are you sure? if the underseat sub sounds good maybe you'll add another one?

Im sure...for this year at least, maybe in next winter if I'm bored but I'm fairly sure one will suffice for now..time to move onto other projects

[john-e89]

Many people writing on this subject would disagree about bass being behind you... for example this wordy and excellent article.. https://www.thompsonsltd.co.uk/car-audio-explained.html

Today all recordings are made in stereo (save DVD movie sound tracks)... this is a front biased setup for all frequencies...in a perfect world both speakers would be point sources generating all frequencies in some form of equilateral triangle with the listener at one point..

You can place a sub woofer away from the centre as the sound travels in a non directional basis..so the human ears/brain cannot resolve that... the higher the frequency the better the chance to determine it’s a location..

When it comes to the subwoofer it’s a struggle...yes a large ported box in the boot would work...but with a full metal bulkhead between the cabin and boot the subwoofer will struggle to get through unlike the normal cardboard type separator in a saloon car between boot and cabin...

You could fabricate a ported subwoofer to rest across the rear ‘parcel’ shelf behind the seats...AFAIK I’m not aware of anyone who has successfully done that..

The existing subwoofer locations are hermetically sealed enclosures...just very small..about 5-10 litres..

Having a fully tweakable DSP with the ability to do time/phase/frequency sampling and adjusting I could get everything about perfect...great and precise soundstage, good smooth sound..but as I said the subwoofers contribute little..in fact I can switch them off and the difference in perceived playback is negligible..

The same playback on my mid range 3.1 audio / media system with a nice ported active woofer in my ‘snug’ shows that extended base can be had..just not in an E89...again AFAIK and IMHO..

Did you read the article you’ve highlighted....?? Sub bass in an Mr2 and MX5 sound brilliant behind you. Same goes for the E89. How many pro installers have you seen that ignore the rear of the car and cram everything into the front...? I haven’t seen any unless it’s been specified by the customer. A couple of years ago I sat in a 3 series from Source sounds with just an under seat sub, quality mids and tweets in the standard location up front albeit with lots of soundproofing behind them, the standard head unit running through a digital processor and an amp to suit and it sounded unbelievable....the best system I’ve ever heard. Very simple, done correctly.

I can’t understand why someone with a drop top car thinks a stereo upgrade is a waste of time, then goes ahead and does it.... The Burmester in the Porsche Boxster sounds fantastic with the roof down, easily replicated in the E89 with some thought and thinking outside the box.

[mr.tourette]

final installment..underseat sub added..technically more a parcel shelf sub as there is no real space under the seats, didn't get many pics but this was pretty easy with the vibe amp inputs and loom already in place

Firstly i purchased a Vibe Optisound 8 active sub

big sub.jpg (190.68 KiB) Viewed 1278 times

...bit of a mistake, fabulous looking bit of kit with great build quality but the thing was pretty big and not really suited to the confines of a z4 cab, it was so tall even on its shortest side it wasn't really allowing the passenger seat very far back, it was promptly returned and checking dimensions more carefully I went for the compact Pioneer TS WX130EA, discount code on ebay brought this in at just under £100 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pioneer-TS-W ... 2749.l2649
Also pick up a 3 metre set of RCA leads from the seller to connect up..4 quid, £103 total

Much more compact solution with an 8x5 speaker

amp2.jpg (214.65 KiB) Viewed 1283 times

Next up I picked up this from Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07 ... UTF8&psc=1 to tap into power on the fuseboard, good buy with shielded connectors and plenty of fuses and lots of spare taps for any future projects.

I removed three plastic panels, the under glovebox 3 screw one to access the fusebox, the footwell speaker panel and the long door trim panel to run the wires through

The sub comes with 2 feeds in the back, your RCA input and power leads..simples

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First up the earth lead (black) was a liitle short so I extended that 18 inches or so using 10 amp wire and put a crimp ring terminal on it, i connected it up to the glovebox screw, which despite some reservations did actually work fine

Yellow power lead i connected up to the Amazon fuse tap with supplied connectors and put 2 10 amp fuses on the piggyback ..there are loads of empty blocks on the fusebox so I didn't need to piggyback off anything, there was a block of 3 empty slots here hidden behind the loom in the pic and i went off one of those, they were all live

fusebox_LI.jpg (171.39 KiB) Viewed 1283 times

Blue lead for switched earth i tapped into the orange lead on the Amp loom which is the switched earth for the amp..all very straightforward.

Then just a case of running in the rca leads..originally I run straight to the RCA leads on the amp, this actually caused issues with interference that mimic the kind you would get with a bad earth..after a few back and forth with Vibe tech support it turns out there is another set of rca's (male) on the loom to bypass the amp for any such issues ..had to nip out and pick up a coupler from b and q https://www.diy.com/departments/smartwa ... 906_BQ.prd popped that on the loom males and run the rca into the other side and all my interference issues were solved and I had a working sub.

Then just a case of running the wires away neatly behind the plastics you have removed and putting them back together...very straightforward. Ill post up some pics later of the install position but its neat enough with just a few wires coming out of the plastic trim behind the passenger seat.

In terms of sound quality in all honesty I've not had much time to tweek and test let alone run it in but the little I did hear I was pretty happy with, the reviews are good enough and I trust it will do the job I want with the rest of the system brought up to scratch. Hopefully this weekend coming I will get to that and report back with a few more pics of install location

Total spend £372..more than I planned but thats always the way with our cars eh and frankly money well spent to completely transform an awful system

[Silverstar]

Total spend £372..more than I planned but thats always the way with our cars eh and frankly money well spent to completely transform an awful s

I spent way more than I intended to on the actual car!

Good tip about getting power from the fuse box. I am hoping to stick my AudioControl LOC somewhere in the glove box area so I can pull the power from the fuse box.

[ultramega]

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IMG_20201023_172058.jpg (252.04 KiB) Viewed 1227 times

I'm about to copy you. Just wondering, how have you secured the speaker to the mount? It's not clear in the photo.

[mr.tourette]

IMG_20201023_172058.jpg
IMG_20201023_172058.jpg (252.04 KiB) Viewed 1227 times

I'm about to copy you. Just wondering, how have you secured the speaker to the mount? It's not clear in the photo.

Hey buddy..honestly I'm struggling to remember now as its been a while, I think if i remember rightly this part is in 2 pieces and the speaker sits in the first piece and that piece you see in the pic sits over the top securing it..it will be very obvious when you remove it what needs done as it was a really simple install..good luck