brunnhilde's sound system's final touch

I had thought that the tiny 4" speakers in Brunnhilde's cockpit would have little contribution to the overall sonic performance of the sound system. Last year I replaced a number of elements of the sound system except the front speakers. While the Mercedes' factory front speakers with paper cone sound quite poorly, I just assume putting better after market ones would only contribute to marginal improvement. I have been relying on the bigger rear speakers to carry the load by biasing heavily with the "fader" setting towards the back.


For the front speakers I been putting replacing them off because the difficulty of getting to the speakers. To gain access to the speakers you have to pull out the trims on the A-pillars. To remove the trims on the A-pillar you have to fight with the headliner. Also removing the A-pillar trim many owner ending up breaking the foams inside into bits.

I had set my eyes on the Boston Acoustic. One day I realize it was being discountiued so I search the web to find them before they all disappear. I managed to bought a pair at slightly higher price.

I finally got around to install them after nearly six months.

4-inch is indeed tiny

 pulling the trim is a royal pain and i was racing against the impending dusk

 the cheap factory one with paper cone

 

The new Boston Acoustics 4" speaker performs beyond my expectation. They actually put out pretty decent mid base despite their diminutive size. Instead of setting the fader to -6 (towards to the rear) I can set it more neutral now. The sound stage is much improved for the front passengers. The speakers make a dramatic difference and I am pleasantly surprised.

I am very happy with the approach I took with the sound system. I retained the stock appearance of the speakers and didn't cut or drill any new holes. The compact subwoofer resides behing the base of the driver seat and it is the optimal location. I originally was wishing for a 8" subwoofer but the Kenwood turned out to be everything I wanted and comes in a perfect dimensions for the chosen location. Installing an eight-inch subwoofer would require at a location that will cause unacceptable negative impact(s).

the kenwood subwoofer has nearly the same width and height of the seat box

once i set the crossover frequency, volume, and phase i just tuck the control behind the cover which protects it

The rest of the sound system:

 alpine cde-133bt

 supports bluetooth devices with integrated handfree calling

 alpine sps-510 5.25" speakers for cabin

the stock appearance is maintained but the sound is much improved

The not so obvious use of the sound system is for use with watching Netflix movies with the iPad. The sound is transmitted wirelessly via bluetooth in digital form.