3rd Gen non JBL sound system Upgrade Info

I ordered the B2 but they were going to bring me a black one and called me before delivery because they had one black and one gray. The handles do fit. It almost got me thinking about swapping my upper half from gray to black but I'm not going to that much trouble. Especially living in Arizona with the 115 degree plus summers we have here

 

I meant to tell you that since I believe it was me who asked for part numbers, my bad. When mine came in I was like well, guess it matches the one I’m swapping lol.

 

Just an FYI you don't have to use the JBL A-pillar trim panels to mount a tweeter. There's a lot of room on the non-JBL A-pillar to flush mount a tweeter and aim it properly. You would just need the correct size hole saw to cut the hole. Would save you the $200+ that the panels cost. If you weren't confident in cutting the holes, you could probably find a local car audio shop would help you out for less than $50 to cut the two holes.

 

Very true, I used the OEM JBL A pillars because I wanted everything to remain stock looking. Mounting aftermarket tweeters in the A pillars is a dead giveaway to a thief there's something to steal, especially with the A pillars being plainly visible.

 

visibility is exactly why I am swapping mine. Have the new panels, just no time

 

Indeed. Haven't ruled out this option. The alpine tweeters come with flush mount components (not shown in the photo above). My plan is to pull the existing A-pillar off my truck, assemble the flush mounts on the tweeters, and do a mock up to try to get feel what it will like without yet cutting the hole in the A-Pillar. If I like the look, then may roll with it and cut the hole and save a few hundred dollars. That said, I do like the 'stock look' of the jbl OEM A-Pillar with the speaker cover. Not sure if i like it 200 dollars though. T/B/D

 

Why did you aim the tweeter at the windshield? I was assuming you would mount it in the same flat spot above the vent, similar to where the JBL tweeter is mounted.

I'd be interested to hear what that tweeter sounds like reflected off the windshield. When I did my upgrades I removed all the dash speakers to rid all that reflective sound. I know some of you guys are running expensive DSPs to fix a lot of the audio challenges in the Tundra, but does a DSP have the ability to allow a speaker placement like that?

 

I used the JBL A-pillars and have no use for the originals. I'll sell you that set for $100 if you need a backup set.

 

Do people still steal car stereo components? I'm 50 and I remember that happening back in the 90s, but is that still a thing? I can understand the punk driving the shitbox or squatted truck around with an obnoxiously loud bass machine getting jacked, but on a truck like ours you think someone sees a tweeter and says to themself yeah this is the one to take a chance on going to jail.

 

some of it was room but it’s really no different than the 3in speakers in the dash reflecting off the windshield. Just takes timing correction which my system is more than capable of doing. The angle of the speakers is more inward than it is upward anyways. Even if you use the JBL equipped A-pillars you are still going to have to deal with the windshield to some extent.

 

I haven't really kept up with car audio for 30+ years, so my knowledge is probably out of date. I just remembered years ago before internet and only having magazines that every single install showcased eliminated dash speakers. I remember cars with pods built on the dash to aim the speakers more center, some cars had pods that rose up out of the dash on a motor, all of the kick panel mounts, and the crazy custom constructed door pods. But again that was before DSP and all this other tech.

My vehicle before this Tundra was a 2006 Tundra and it didn't have dash speakers, just the components sets in the doors. So when I got this 2023 I found the dash speakers to be so brash and figured it was because of all the reflection. So my upgrade went back to what I knew. I can't personally justify the cost of a DSP because my hearing already deteriorated from helicopters and gunfire, but its interesting to hear that technology has overcome a lot of problems of the past.

 

DSP's aren't really that expensive anymore. My Alpine PXE-C60-60 was only $399 and for the money does the things of many components that you used to have to buy separately. Back in the day when I was doing competitions, I had the flagship Alpine headunit with the copper chassis and the digital time correction module. Those 2 items back then cost over $2k for both. I also had multiple separate equalizers which were another additional cost. The first thing to look at for correcting speaker placement is equalization. Every vehicle has it's own specific resonant frequencies, which will boost certain frequencies. Time correction is next, which delays frequencies so that you hear them at a specified time. The nice thing with the Alpine is that it has built in crossovers which are fully customizable, a customizable 31 band equalizer which allows you to equalize individual channels, time correction, and it accepts low level or high level inputs and digitally corrects the signals before processing them. It's very compact, it fit perfectly under my power drivers seat. You can download the app to your phone and have the system do most of the work for you- equalizer. You just hold your phone and move it around in your vehicle during the test tones and it calibrates everything automatically. You can also use a PC to make fine tune adjustments and utilize the time correction feature with a separate microphone. Here is a screen shot from my set up so you can see how extensive you can get.

 

It's definitely still a thing, people are more opportunistic these days. People walk out of drug stores, Wal Mart, Target with merchandise and no regards to consequences. My Tacoma was vandalized at an airport parking garage. Someone cut the wires and took my hood mounted ditch lights while I was on a 3 day trip.

 

Did a dry run. Removed the A-Pillar and got a visual with this set of tweeters (without drilling hole in pillar).

This particular set of tweeters tad too large to fit well and look clean as flush mounts. I may purchase jbl A-Pillars. The second photo is tweeter size without flush mount hardware, smaller, but still over an inch wide. Wonder if they will fit in jbl a-pillar enclosure, don't know.

 

How wide is the tweeter without the housing? My JBL (aftermarket tweeters) were 3/4" and they fit down into the opening with a little bit of wiggle room. I'm guessing the OEM JBL tweeter housing is probably 7/8" opening. You will still need to have something to hold them in place, I held my tweeter in place and then hot glued it in. The good thing with hot glue is that it's strong enough to keep it in place but if you ever need to remove it to replace it, the glue will peel off

 

Inch and a half (1 1/2") diameter without the housing. 5/8" depth. Kind of wide but not deep.

 

Are those S Series? Alpine lists them as 1", are you measuring just the tweeter without the housing in the 2 nd picture? If they are significantly larger you can always use a dremel tool to cut the OEM mounting tabsand still hot glue them in place. I've had to do that before as well. You want to get them to be as close as possible to be behind OEM grill. I didn't look at mine close enough but I'm pretty sure the OEM grill has folded tabs that you can straighten out to pop it out to make your adjustments

 

Correct. S Series and 1" when measuring w/o the housing and have a dremel if needed, good tip! I think they will fit with some encouragement. If not, they will not go to waste, will put them in other car and circle back with a set that will. appreciate all the info!

 

So I did a little light reading about the DSP available. Wide range of price points. My question is...Unless each speaker is on its own DSP controlled channel how can its frequency response and timing be controlled? For instance if you have a 3-way component set passively crossed over with a woofer in the door, tweeter in a-pillar, and midrange in the dash how could a DSP effectively adjust the response for each driver since they are all on the same channel? With the woofer at shin level, midrange straight up reflecting off the windshield, and tweeter shooting across the front of the dash how would a DSP be able to correct the frequency band, phasing, and timing of each driver unless they are all separately amplified?

 

Very good question! There are different types of Time Correction Response (TCR) in DSP's. Remember, the main object of time correction is to account for speaker placement. A basic time correction or time alignment processor is going to delay the entire signal. This will delay all frequencies, but most are going to have a couple of adjustments such as time in milliseconds and a Q factor (which is a multiplier for laymans terms), sometimes the Q has a selectable or a preset frequency range. Frequencies travel in various speeds and some are highly dependent on the direction, so the frequencies you really care most for time correction are midrange and high. Other TCR's are going to allow you to select the frequency as well as the time delay. That's why it's also important to have a good equalizer and crossovers for your speakers. I haven't had the chance to mess with my TCR on my unit because I am waiting for the microphone for it to come off backorder. The Alpine unit that I got is highly configurable, and it can be used to process signals as if each speaker had it's own amplified channel or full range. So to answer your question, if you had a DSP with a basic form of TCR, it will most likely have a preset frequency range or a selectable range. If your 3 way component set has a good crossover then only the speakers with the midrange to high frequencies will be affected. There is a potential drawback to using TCR in that it's really going to work best for one seating position in your vehicle. There are variables of course that play into this. If you are "staging" the sound from the driver's seat, the speakers closest to the driver are going to have the delay. This is so that the speakers farthest from you on the passenger side are heard first (in the center of the dash). So when someone is sitting in the passenger seat, they are going to get a more pronounced bias of sound from the passenger side. When I used to compete, most smaller events only had one sound judge that sat in the drivers seat. I had a preset in my processor where I set my TCR and everything was perfectly centered in the dash. At the larger shows where there were 2 judges, was a different setting and I couldn't delay as much and sometimes the sound would be just left or right of center. Either way, if you are interested in using something I can help you set it up. Before doing any TCR though, you should have a decent crossover and equalizer. Although most components are going to come with a passive crossover, they are pretty inefficient and rob power. They are likely only going to be a -12 db or -6 db crossover. -18 to -24 db is the preferred slope for a good system. If you look at my screen shot you will see that I am also using the built in active crossover on my processor. My front speakers are high passed at 76 Hz at -12db. I'm not using the crossover built into my amp but I am also using the passive crossovers in my 3 way set so I'm at -24 for most low end frequencies.

 

Thanks for the education. Interesting topic and seems like it could be an interesting hobby. I'm not in the mindset to go any further with audio modifications in the truck. I have a pretty robust Klipsch Reference Premier home theater system that is DSP tuned with an external microphone. It is so enjoyable in the "sweet spot", especially with some cannabis in my body. It's eye opening to hear the same musical track played on different sources. There's sounds and effects that just cannot be reproduced correctly in a car.

 

Back to a simpler subject... harnesses. So, I will assume that there is no way to get pre-amp outputs from the OEM head unit and that the harness would pull out the line outputs to go to the amps. But then how to get the main left/right front and rear outputs from the amp (if it is behind the rear seat) back to the head unit area to feed the factory speaker wiring? Or does the harness have both paths built in? Which harness specifically would I need to make this work? The sub amp output wouldn't be a problem since that will be direct wired from that amp locally.

 

Most aftermarket harnesses are not going to have the pre-amp or low level line outputs built in. If you get the aftermarket speaker only harness that plugs into the radio, depending on what your doing it's pretty straightforward. There was one posted earlier in this thread. If you just want to add a sub amp, you will only need to run 2 sets of speaker wire (left and right front) to your amp in the back, leave the harness intact and tap into those wires and run those wires to the high level input of your sub amp. If you are adding a 4 channel amp then you would have to run (8) sets of speaker wire from the radio to your amp. You would then cut the aftermarket speaker harness in half. One set of (4) speaker wires would be the out from the radio to the high level input of your amp or other converter. The other set of (4) would be the output from the amp back to the radio to the other half of the harness so you provide power back to your OEM speaker locations. There is (9) conductor speaker wire you can buy to make it easier to run, you'd only have 2 larger wires to run instead of bundling 8 sets of speaker wire together. Have you decided on if you are running a sub amp only or a separate sub amp only? Once you decide I can post some part #'s of things you'd need to get.

 

What he said. Here's the best visual representation I found.


Here's what the 17' harness looks like before you wrap it and route it.

 

That harness is 18g from headunit to line level processor. Then 16g from the amplified output to the speaker plug behind the dash. Here's the two harnesses installed in the sill plate.

 

There's lots of different manufacturers for line level converters. You can do anywhere from 2-8 channels. Here are just some of the ones Audiocontrol has. You could essentially just feed two channels to a converter and get 8 outputs but lose fader control.

 

That helps, guys. I was not thinking about the line level converter but maybe it is easier... and better... that way. I need to have a look behind the seat on my double cab... there might not be as much space there as on the crew cab.

Maybe do a 5-channel instead of 2 separate amps.

 

Keep in mind that a line level converter is not always necessary. Some amplifiers will take a high level (direct speaker wire) or low level (RCA connector) input. JL Audio even has a wired RCA connector (speaker wire to RCA) XD-CLRAIC2-SW that you can use with some of their amps that don't have a built in high level input. A 5 channel amp is going to have a larger single foot print. If you are using Class D amps, they are pretty small footprints so it gives you more flexibility in mounting options. I'm using a JL Audio RD400/4 and a JL Audio JD500/1 and have them mounted on the back of my back seat so that when the seat is in the upright position, they fit in the cubbys/cutouts of the back wall panel. Others have them mounted in the cubby's. The JL Audio RD400/4 has a "pass through" RCA connector that is nice because you just have to run a set of RCA cables from that into the RCA connectors on your sub amp. I also bought the wired sub controller so I can independently adjust the bass volume up front when I need to.

 

One issue if you don't use the line level converter is how to wire the sub input into the amp. It looks like the line level converters sort that out for you and give you a sub out to take to the amp. So, if you don't have a LLC, and the amp does take line level inputs, I guess I'd need to tap the right and left front speaker positives, gang that together and put that in the amps sub + input, then tap one of the front speaker negatives for the sub - input?

 

It depends on the type of amplifier you get. Take the one I'm using as an example- the JL Audio RD 400/4. It will take the front and rear high or low level inputs. The amplifier comes with a built in pre-out, so if you were using this amplifier or one similar that had a built in pre-out, you just run a set of rca connecters from the pre-out on the 4 channel amp to the low level input of the sub amp. See the yellow circled part on pic below.