2020 CrewMax - Mild audio upgrade

Hey all, been away from the Tundra world for a bit while I was in a 2018 Tacoma for a couple years. Recently picked up a 2020 TRD Sport CrewMax. I’ve upgraded the wheels / tires / suspension and added a Decked bed system. Now I’m on to the audio department. I am happy with the factory head unit in the 2020 and only added a wireless CarPlay module to round it out but the non JBL system leaves some room for improvement IMO. I wanted some better door speakers and a decent sub. I put Kicker stuff in my Tacoma and my boat and have been happy with it. Here’s the list for the Tundra:

Front doors / tweeters - Kicker KSS650’s
Front Center - Kicker KSC 350
Rear doors / tweeters - Kicker. 47KSS504’s
Sub - Kicker 47TL7T102 (L7 in sealed box)

AMPS
Sub - 46CXA400.1T
4 Channel - 46CXA360.4T

TTunes - ntune6 LOC
TTunes - Add a sub harness
SGS Amp rack for under pass seat .

planning to mount the. 4 channel and the LOC under the passengers seat in place of the factory amp and the sub amp will go under the center of the rear seat. I test fitted the sub box behind the drivers side rear seat and it just fits.

it’ll be a week or two before I get time to get going on the install but in the meantime I figured I’d start a thread.

Any thoughts, comments, questions or concerns? Hoping this all worked together seamlessly. I kinda of pieced it together quickly so any feedback is welcomed.

thanks!

 

I assume you started with the stock factory non JBL system with under passenger seat amplifier?

I have a 2020 also (with the non JBL) and have been thinking (actually started) about upgrading the audio system. I see you have the TTunes - ntune6 LOC in your list, just curious the reason you chose this over the AudioControl LC7i? Don't they do the same basic thing?

I realize it's been three months since you posted this, and I would assume you have finished the project. At any rate I am interested in your thoughts on what you did.

 

Hey there, agree, an update is a good idea.

For the LOC, I chose the Ntune6 because of the size. I think it essentially does the same thing as the LC7i but in a smaller package and the price point was a little cheaper IIRC.

I ran into a little issue with the 10" Kicker Solo Baric L7 sub. I test fit the box with the seat folded up and it fit. Once installed I realized the back seat couldn't fold down because of the hinge would bump into the box. With that, I ended up ordering the same sub / box but in an 8". The single 10" was perfect in my opinion. The amount of bass was exactly what I was looking for (most of the time). That said, I constantly was dialing it back when I had my girlfriend or dog in the car because neither of them has my same level of appreciation. Now the 8" isn't as pleasing to my ears. Doesn't quite capture the higher frequency bass. I am still trying to tune the system to my preference and I'm sure I'll get it. I haven't messed with it a whole lot.

Also, I initially wired the tweeter that is paired with the KSS 650's up to the stock location in the dash. (The tweeter and the mid range are wired together through a crossover. You can mount the tweeter in the center of the mid as a coaxial speaker or route the wiring and mount it separately but still have it wired through the crossover)
I chose to wire it separately but then moved it back to the door and added standalone mids / tweeters in the stock dash location. I did this because I had no sound from the center channel and understood that the dash speakers are wired through the radio and the doors were through the factory amp. Well, After installing the standalone mid / tweeters in the dash corners, I still have to audio from the center channel and the corner speakers aren't as nice as the tweeters from the KSS 650's were.

Again, still tweaking things to my preferences but my initial setup with the 10" sub and the KSS650 tweeters in the dash gave me the nicest sounding stereo i've ever had in a vehicle.

 

The center channel gets it's signal from the dash corner speakers. If you look at the stock corner speaker wiring harness you should see the source wires feed back to the stock plug, then on to the center channel. The stock center having a twin voice coil so using both the right and left corner speakers leads. I'm currently not using a center but will be trying the Tech12 center (consisting of two JL Audio tweeters) as soon as it gets to me.

What speakers did you end up using in the dash corners?

 

Can you dumb down the center channel wiring explanation for me?

As for the speakers, I ended up with Kicker KSC270s for the dash corners

 

In a non-JBL truck, this is a basic look at how the wiring goes (minus junction connectors etc.)



You may have heard of dual voice coil subwoofers. The center channel speaker is dual voice coil just like some subwoofers, meaning it has two pairs of positive and negative terminals. Each dash corner speaker is wired to one set of terminals on the center speaker so that the impedance (ohms) of each side is lowered. The factory dash corner speakers are 13 watts and 6 ohms. The center speaker is 10 watts + 10 watts and 8 ohms for each voice coil. If you wire the dash corner speaker in parallel to one side of the center speaker, that gets you a net impedance of 3.43 ohms and ~23 watts. The rear door tweeters are also wired straight to the head unit and they are 20 watts at 4 ohms, so very close to the specs of the left and right dash speakers (+ one side each of center speaker). The head unit sends signal to the factory amp, which ramps up the power to 35 watts at 2 ohms for both the front and rear door woofers.

 

There you go Tyler, Snert is one of the well educated audio experts here.

I have the same KSC 270s in my garage waiting to try in my still stock audio system.

 

Thank you for the kind words but I am by no means an expert lol! I actually just also learned from another member about how the dash is wired after he posted the actual wiring diagrams as I was previously working off of pictures I'd taken of the speakers themselves. While I can read the actual wiring diagrams, I find it easier for my brain to redraw them and "dumb" them down. At some point I'd like to make lamens diagrams of the various generations and stock audio options/wiring therein, along with common upgrade solutions like adding a sub, or a line output converter or dsp and an amp, in one big post. That will be a big undertaking though as there are a lot of variables at play like keeping a stock head unit or going aftermarket, keeping a factory amp, JBL vs non-JBL, coaxial vs component speakers, the list goes on lol. At the end of the day I'm just happy to be here helping folks out and learning from other members.

 

Thanks for the diagram and explanation, this is how I understood it. Still cant sort why my center speaker still is not working.

There are 4 wires to the stock center speaker. Crutchfield specified to use either the green (neg) / pink (pos) or the black (neg) / white (pos). I tried using both combinations and still have no sound.

 

Do you currently have any wires plugged into the stock factory dash corner speaker leads?

 

Great idea on having a set of the various models with laymen's versions of drawings...and no doubt a significant undertaking. I have a '19 SR so it's a good baseline (at least of that model year) version of the system. I'll try to set aside some time and send something over on it to add to your "possibly soon to come" library. Of course, I'll need to look at it to for sure know it myself but I don't think there is much to it.
(Some 35 years ago, I got hip deep in putting a couple of great performing systems in my cars. Man it hurts to claim that amount of time...)

 

I'm guessing that with the KSC270's in place, you just have wiring going to them and not carrying it onto the center speaker. You can see on this picture of one of the dash corner speakers that there are 2 sets of wire "going" to the speaker that I've circled. One set of wire is actually carrying the signal back to the center speaker to connect to one side of it.



I actually just went and grabbed mine again and cut back the heat shrink around the wires to confirm what my fingers were feeling lol. Inside the heat shrink, the red and black wires are soldered together so that the signal is carried to the dash corner, and then onto the center speaker.




How do you have your KSC270's attached to the factory wiring?

 

I'm going to post this link for corner speaker wire leads, not sure if it will work.
www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07VPFWLPK/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A1LAPRHCR7XHF0&psc=1

Edit: You could try buying these to connect the KSC 270s then your center channel may work.

 

It looks like those would work! At $12 worth a try vs cutting the factory wiring where I marked it/"after" the solder joints under the heat shrink.

@wityler I didn't see an aftermarket head unit on your install, and even with one, this would still probably be the same as I've not seen a 2 ohm stable head unit. If you wire the KSC270's (4 ohm) to the center speaker (8 ohm) exactly how it's wired up from the factory, you'll be lowering the impedance of each side from 3.43 ohms down to 2.66 ohms. I would probably not do this as it might risk damaging the factory head unit as I don't think it's 2-ohm stable but I could be wrong.

I must be wrong though because I know the Tech 12 Volts replacement center speaker uses 2 JL audio tweeters that are 4 ohms each, and with a 6 ohm factory dash corner and 4 ohm JL tweeter wired in parallel that would get you 2.4 ohms, and I can't imagine Tech 12 volts would sell that if it could potentially damage the head unit.

 

@Snert I have the Tech 12 Volt center speaker on rout to me. I did check with James and the tweeters used are actually 6 ohm. These are the tweeters used JL Audio C1-075ct

I would be interested in hearing what the ohm rating would be with these instead of the factory center.

 

Ahh gotcha, therein lies the difference. I was looking at the C1-100CT (1") for specs not the C1-075 (.75"). The C1-100CT has an impedance of 4 ohms vs like you said the C1-075CT has an impedance of 6 ohms. That makes a lot more sense. In that case, with the factory dash corners being 6 ohms, and the C1-075CT being 6 ohms, wired in parallel that would just halve the impedance and create a 3 ohm circuit. Since the factory setup presents a 3.43 ohm load to the head unit, I'm guessing the .43 ohm drop in impedance is negligible enough to not cause concern for damage.

 

Yes, There are 4 leads from the factory speaker harness for each of the corner dash speakers. However, I followed crutchfields' installation instruction and spliced to only two of the 4 leads.

 

Chances are that's why you don't have any sound from the center, the leads you removed most likely brought the corner speaker info to the center.

However that said from what's been discussed here. I believe using the 4-ohm Kickers in the corner dash if you were to add a functioning center, you would run into an impedance total being to low for the head unit amplifier. I don't think it's worth taking the chance of damaging the amp.

Although it sounds like a lot of work maybe you should consider moving the tweeters back to the dash corners. If they were powered by the new amplifier (not the head unit) and you had the wires from the head unit hooked up to send that signal on to the center location, you could try a center speaker without worrying about impedance problems.

If you took the wires linked to in post post 13, removed the single portion with the speaker mounts on (essentially keeping a loop) then plug them into the stock factory corner leads, that should acoumplish an active center plug.

 

Like @Eaganite said and from the pics I posted, if you spliced to only 2 of the wires on each side before the solder joints under the heat shrink, then signal wouldn't be carried to the center speaker and would just be going to the corners. That said, connecting a 4 ohm and 8 ohm speaker in parallel will drop the impedance below 3 ohms and would potentially damage the head unit like Eaganite also pointed out.

It looks like from a post above your current setup has your tweeters back down in the doors mounted to the mid range.

If I were you, I would either put the tweeters back in the dash corners and return the KSC270's, or keep them, and either mount your tweeters in your sail panels by cutting a hole in them or by buying a pair of JBL sail panels.

Links for sail panels from a JBL truck ($20 a side):
67491-0C060 - Door Mirror Trim Ring (Right, Front, Lower) - 2014-2021 Toyota Tundra | OEM Genuine Toyota Parts (oemgenuineparts.com)
67492-0C060 - Garnish, Front Door Lower Frame Bracket, Left - OEM Genuine Toyota Parts (oemgenuineparts.com)

The sail panels have an included bracket and your tweeters might fit, if not, you can get some flexible plastic to backstrap them, velcro, hot glue etc. I'd probably go this route. I'm assuming you've got your crossovers mounted in the doors? If that's the case, you just route the wire from the crossover up to the sail panel where your new tweeter would mount.

You could then keep the KSC270's in the dash corners being powered off of the head unit. Since you've got a 4 channel amp for the doors and your rear tweeters wouldn't be powered off of the head unit like in the factory setup, that leaves you 2 additional unused channels of power. If you really really wanted a center channel and don't care about splicing, you could identify which wires go to the rear tweeters from the head unit, and splice to one of those to power a center channel.