"This weekend I have mostly been..."
Upgrading my Focus MK2 stereo
. Anyone who has a MK2 Focus will know that the standard system is dire. Strained, muffled, flat with enough bass to resonate the doors without actually making anything much like music.
It seems that information on MK2 Focus speaker/headunit swaps is quite sparse on the web compared to the plethora of forum posts and guides for the MK1 so I thought I'd post this in case it's of interest. Rather than write an essay I thought a few succict bullet points would be more appropriate.
I must admit I'm quite pleased. I probably would have achieved a better result having it done professionally but I enjoyed the experience having never set up a system myself.
The question now is do I...
a) Amp the fronts or
b) Add a subwoofer or
c) Add 2 subwoofers
d) Do all 3
Upgrading my Focus MK2 stereo
. Anyone who has a MK2 Focus will know that the standard system is dire. Strained, muffled, flat with enough bass to resonate the doors without actually making anything much like music.It seems that information on MK2 Focus speaker/headunit swaps is quite sparse on the web compared to the plethora of forum posts and guides for the MK1 so I thought I'd post this in case it's of interest. Rather than write an essay I thought a few succict bullet points would be more appropriate.
- Standard MK2 Focus stereo is ****, flat/muffled mids/highs yet with enough bass to resonate the doors without making anything which resembles music
- Standard MK2 stereo near impossible to remove with Halfords supplied keys. Get better keys or ask your dealer. Start a swear jar, it'll pay for Christmas.
- Cheapo eBay fascia adapter looks totally crap but I have a cunning plan for this - if it works I'll post pics
- Alpine X305 headunit (car audio direct) is bloody brilliant. It uses its own DAC rather than the iPod/iPhone's built in DAC which helps it not to sound ****. Track selection brilliant. Equaliser/bluetooth require addon modules.
- Alpine G series 6.5" components are pretty good. Tons of bass once fitted properly. Still positioning the tweeters. I can't help feeling that spending £300 rather than £100 would have achieved better quality.
- Focus MK2 door speakers are RIVETED in!! Had to drilll them out and use bolts/washers/nuts to fix speaker adapters. I wasn't expecting that.
- Cheap eBay speaker adapters are cheap and flimsy
- On the test fit, the new components rattled the doors like hell all the way through Firestarter. Ended up adding a layer of flashing tape between speaker adapter and door as a buffer. Job done.
- Tons of flashing tape (or Dynamat if you want to pay 4x as much for the same thing) in the door cavity massively improves the sound of the system. Don't miss this out on a modern car with doors made of tin foil. Don't use so much that your electric window fouls it!
I must admit I'm quite pleased. I probably would have achieved a better result having it done professionally but I enjoyed the experience having never set up a system myself.
The question now is do I...
a) Amp the fronts or
b) Add a subwoofer or
c) Add 2 subwoofers
d) Do all 3
.
.
???