I got my son some of these to replace the ones he blew in his Dakota.
They have 6.5" woofers and seperate tweeters we want to mount in the door.
Was wondring if anyone has experience with Infinity components or similar speakers. Would like to know where you mounted the crossovers? In the door makes the most sense but they need to be mounted somewhere they'll be kept dry.
Open to suggestions...

 

I had a set of them (earlier model # 6001?) tough to beat for the money.
You can mount the Xovers behind the kick panels to keep them out of the weather. I used a piece of 1/4" hardboard that I cut out to cover the 6x9 hole in the door and then mounted the woofer and tweeter to the hardboard. Worked great, just try and seal up the speakers to the door panel with some tape backed foam or whatever you can and sound dampener goes a long ways in the doors.

 

THe Dakota has 6.5" speakers too, so these should be a direct replacement.
I thought about putting the crossovers upstream of the doors, but that would mean running another set of wires into the door. I haven't looked at what that involves, might not be a big deal..? (I hope?)
I'm gonna call a few install shops, maybe they'll have some kinda watherproof enclosre for the speakers and crossovers for mounting in the door?
Someone was talking about that silver backed sound dampener stuff, maybe we'll look into that too.
Thanks

 

I installed stereos for years in high school and college(through the 90s) and still do this stuff for my own cars now, so I have a few tips. I have never done a dakota, though, so I cannot say specifically what you will see. I worked in some shops too so I can tell you what a "professional installer" will do too.

Keep the crossover out of the door. Too much chance that it will rattle or get damaged by water.

Check the depth of the new woofers to the old speakers they are replacing. You might have to shim them out as most cars have very little clearance between the window mechanicals and the speakers, and I have seen lots of guys to direct relpacements with better speakers that have, by virtue of being better, larger and deeper magnets, and end up with mechanical interference. Roll down the window with the door panel off once just to make sure.

I normally used one of the springy pick up tools to run the extra wires to the doors. Snake that thing through the plastic wire tunnel from either the door or kick panel side(door is usually easier), clip the new wires into it, and then bull them back into the door through the factory loom. Too easy. Some foreign cars have actual plugs where the door has a wiring harness that plugs into a socket on the car, which means you cannot do this truck, but I think the Dakota has a full tunnel loom there. If you cannot do this, just follow this loom with the new wire and zip tie it to the existing loom. It will work fine. Put some thought into where you want to mount the tweeters. They make the high frequency sounds, and unlike the woofers, are more directional, so if they are not pointing at the listener, the sound will not be as good. Aimed generally at the mid point of the front seat backs is a general guideline.

The hardboard shim is a good trick. Used it many times.

The "silver backed dampener stuff" you mention is called Dynamat. It is great for competition sound, but probably not worth it for you. You really have to do this all out for any major effect. Just slapping a little of it on a door does little, and a properly matted door probably weighs an extra 50 or more pounds. Like one of the other posts said, just do your best to make sure that there is a good separation of the air space behind the woofer and in front of it, and it will sound fine. If it seals to the factory mount location, you are good to go.

Good luck. This stuff is not too hard. Just take your time and make sure you pay attention to properly taking off the door panels so you do not break parts of them. This is really hard to fix!

Jon

 

when i routed my wires into the front doors i used moster wire and there was just enough room to squeeze through the side of the harness plug in the jamb. for the rear doors i had to seperate the two strands and slide the around the plug. the fronts were easy and the rears a pita but i was able to leave all the factory wires in place so when i sell the rig i can swap out the speakers and plug the oems back in.
as for the x overs i dropped the knee bolster and mounted them behind and on it. it could not have been more perfect.

 

Not sure what the Dakota looks like but in my ram I put my crossovers in the door pocket. Not the prettiest, but they are out of the wetness inside the door.

 

I don't want to hijack but I have a somewhat related question....

I still use the OEM Infinity speakers with the amps on the 6x9's in the front doors....I would like to continue to use them but I also have some old 4 ohm Alpine 6.5's that I would like to put in the rear doors to run off the Infinity amps. My question is, are the Infinty amps and speakers really 2 ohm on my truck?

 

I'm not really sure, but me thinks the Infinity head unit in the dash of my son's Dakota is the EXACT same as the one in your truck.
I can only assume the amp is the same too..?
With the bigger doors of the Ram I guess they went to 6x9's?
If you pull the speaker out it might have the impedance marked on the back, (I haven't done my son's yet), but I bet someone on this forum will know for sure...

 

I just went through this when my wife's 2000 Durango cracked a couple of speaker cones. The factory Infinity speakers were indeed 2 ohm, so I wound up buying replacements from Dodge.

Rusty

 

Yes they are rated at 2ohm impedance. No harm in using 4ohm except they'll be quieter.

 

Chances are you wont notice that either since the 4ohm speaker is probably more efficient than the 2ohm one. Go ahead and toss them in and see how they sound

 

Ok, I guess that is what I wanted to hear....I'll give it a go.

Hopefully 6.5's fit in place of the 5.25's in the rear doors without too much hacking.

 

I got 6.5s in my 98.5 but I did need to do some sheet metal work.