Stock Speakers - Just One Of Them?

[ramsesosirus]

Quote

I just addressed the speaker issue in my 1976 280z.  

I pulled the rear panels since I had some 4" Sony Xplods on hand.  

I checked the FSM, and like others have stated, it only shows 1 speaker in the whole car, on the driver's side rear.  It looked just like others have shown, with the bracket.  The other side was drilled for a bracket.  So it's also the 280z that was only equipped with one speaker.  They are at the very rear of the car, near the brake lights.  Not by the strut towers or quarter glass at all for my Z.

I installed the speaker on the driver's side in the bracket, then rigged up some metal tabs to hold the other speaker using the existing holes.

Worked pretty good, much better sound.

I look forward to listening to the engine more than anything though!  

The PO of my car must have had some subwoofers, as evidenced by the wiring I found.  I don't plan on going that route again, been there with some other cars, the only thing i accomplished was rattling my cat converter loose.  Also had a friend with some massive 15" subwoofers vibrate his engine oil seal out.  Not good.

I don't think my Z would handle the vibration very well at it's age.... 

 

Edited May 25, 2016 by ramsesosirus

[Dave WM]

I can just imagine the screws backing out or even the spot welds coming undone on some of the rides I seen at stop lights with 1000 watt stereos. My hearing is bad enough as it is (one ZZ top concert at the Hollywood Sportatorium) did damage enough.

[siteunseen]

Pretty old thread but I have a question that someone may be able to answer?

I recently installed the OE am/fm radio in my '72, it was a huge PITA too so removing it ain't happening. 

When I push the power knob off and on it makes a pretty loud popping noise but when it's on a station I can barely hear it.  Like usual I did a dumb thing and didn't bench test it prior to installing, regret that now.

Would anybody have any experience with this type issue?  Is the radio bad or hopefully the speaker?

Thanks for any help!

[Dave WM]

prob a bad coupling cap. You should check to see if there is any DC on the speaker output leads.

[siteunseen]

1 hour ago, Dave WM said:

prob a bad coupling cap. You should check to see if there is any DC on the speaker output leads.

Are you talking about the connection from the harness to the back of the radio?  It has power wire, illumination and two speaker wires?  I can get to that pretty easy since I still haven't installed the console.

That's what I'll check first then if I have to I'll pull the rear hatch panel that covers the speaker.

Thank you for a direction/idea on where to start. I'm hoping you aren't talking about a capacitor inside the tuner when you say "coupling cap", hopefully just a capacitor on the speaker if it's not the power/speaker/ illumination plug.

Thanks again.

[Dave WM]

with the radio on check the speaker leads with a VOM set to read DC volts. See if there is any, should be Zero.

[Dave WM]

this is a bit of a guess also, but maybe there are some power supply caps that may be open, allowing a surge of current, hard to say without looking at a schematic.

[Stanley]

Except for the popping, "can barely hear it" sounds normal for the radio.

I'm done with the radio. As soon as I can find one that can play mp3's from a flash drive it's out of there.

A new $20 speaker same size as original helped some. I thought if you put too much speaker on a weak radio it would cause smoke.