Rear Speaker 1989 Reatta

[Gene Jones]

Popping noise (loud) when radio is turned on<BR>used to be few seconds now is all of the time. Speaker or radio?<BR>

[Guest]

Most likely speaker(s). My 88 has four 5.25" in the rear, and one in each door. I keep blowing the one in the passenger door for some reason. 5.25 speakers will not take much abuse. If I had to change my rears, I would probably try to make a 6'x 9" fit in the rear. I believe I read of someone else doing this in one of the postings. You will have to look back to find it. <BR>If you do something creative, please post your process and results for us.....Dan

[Reatta Man]

If your radio is on the AM band and makes those noises when first turned on, it is likely in the power antenna motor. Seems AM is more sensitive to ANY electronic noise such as an electric motor. Try setting the radio to FM, turn it off, then back on. If the noise is lower, it is due to the radio being set on the AM band when first turned on. <P>The speaker cones in those Delco speakers were very prone to falling apart from heat, especially if you live in the South. A good radio shop can recone those speakers, but most just change them over to a higher quality speaker, such as JBL, Panasonic or Blaupunkt.

[Guest]

The problem lies in your speakers. They are blown and need replaced. The only thing you want to replace them with is a 5.25" speaker. You cn do this yourself but it is hard to do. I recomend replacing them with a good speaker like infinity, polk, jl audio, or mb quart. MB Quart being the best. Hope that helps.

[TheBlackMoon]

I'm running 45watts per in 5-1/4" Sony Xplodes (in my doors). No probs since installed several months ago and I've blown everything else I put in the doors (including a Pioneer Sub in the Box rated at 250watts per x 2 - in the trunk). Put the $$ out for good ones.

[Guest jim_houston]

This is good information. I was planning on recovering my speakers, but I think I'm just going to have them professionally replaced and have the speaker covers recovered by the pros as well.<BR>A few speakers were mentioned, and I wonder if Circuit City, or some other national chain is recommended by others in this group.<BR>If I do replace all of the 5.25" speakers (with top-of-the-line speakers) and get my grills recovered, where should I go, and what should I expect this job to cost, and since it's a "hard" job, should I expect to leave my car overnight? I'm not replacing the radio, just the speakers.<BR>Thanks,<BR>Jim Houston

[Guest]

Big Jim Big

[tcams76]

Will a 1989 radio be able to use 2 ohm speakers all around?????

[sahein]

The original 88-89 rear speakers are still available. Part number 16052530.<P>The fronts are also available. Part number<BR>16072934.

[Guest]

Don't replace speakers with the stock GM ones. You'll only have the same problems in a few years as the surround on the speakers rot.<P>Get a nice set of 5.25" speakers up front, and 6.5" in the rear. You can disconnect the rear "tweeter" too.<P>If you don't plan on getting an amp for the system, then just get a nice set of Pioneer speakers. If you do plan on getting an amp, look for something that will handle more power. <P>BTW, the stock speakers are 4 ohm up front, and 10 ohm in the rear. Weird setup.

[tcams76]

Will the radio handle 2 ohm speakers all around??

[Guest]

....i'll probably catch some abuse for this but...if your system is starting to static all the time now i'd be suspicious of a bad connection. Remember that there are two different Reatta systems...'88-'89 and '90-'91. i'm trying to figure out why i have 4.25" speakers in the door panels and everyone else has 5.25" The speakers in the '90 Riv and my '88 Reatta are identical(Delco-16062214-4 ohm)and are mounted in factory housings w/ 4 hex screws. If you pull the flap out on the forward door panel as Barney suggested you can save yourself the adventure of removing the complete door panel. A short 2" phillips screwdrv can then be slipped in to remove the 3 screws that mount the plastic housing to the door frame...being careful not to damage the foam sponge gasket on the door panel. Once you remove the plastic housing you will notice a two wire strap that connects to a connector on the speaker. If you follow the two wire strap up the door frame without lacerating your knuckles you'll find that it is connected to another connector further up the line which also feeds the tweeter located by the door opening handle. This is where i had accidentally had disconnected both the tweeter and the woofer and had thought that Bon Jovi's "livin' on a prayer" had blown my channel. This was preceded by popping-scratching noises as the bass woofer slowly "jiggled" the invisably oxidized connector eventually loose. Some electric contact cleaner and black tape fixed this for good. This dispite having mis-matched 8 ohm Radio Shack speakers made me feel much better about the machine(Reatta)now.

[Guest]

It should be noted that your replacement speakers...if you go that way should be 4 ohms only. Greater ohmage will cause the speaker to absorb more power and less will cause the power amp section to provide more power and over heat the power transistors and eventually damage or fry the amp(in some cases trip the protection circuitry). In any case sound quality will suffer.<BR>If you want to experiment...just remember that larger speakers give better bass. A bass note(100-125hz) is approx. 16 feet high and a little speaker can only reproduce resonant harmonics of this tone. Professional reinforcement systems will either over equalize or use various folded horn and reflex configuations to compensate for this. This can't be done in your car so....bigger is better(refering to woofer only). This is contrary to Dolby's brain washing us into believing that your home theater is top of the line with an upside down sub-woofer 10" speaker and 4 or 5 car speakers mounted around the room ( i guess they call this farce "surround sound").<BR>Typically a 4" speaker would require about 280 cubic inches and @ 15w would produce from 30-17,000hz with a sealed back. 17,000hz would be impinging on the tweeters jurisdiction and you'd probably want to crossover much lower depending on your tweeters capability...say around 500hz. So what you must do is choke out the unwanted highs(500-17,000hz) from the woofers to prevent "crosstalk" overlap with the tweeter which will take over @ 500hz providing a smooth transparant transition and eliminating "listening fatigue". How can you do this? You can place a coil inline with the woofer. Without being too technical ...if you can get some 18-14 ga. enamel wire and wind it into a coil with an "air" core(metalic cores are too unstable for this application) and check it with an inductance meter to get say around 2.5-5 henry would probably be a good place to start. This should sufficiently taper the highs and depending on tastes you could live with some overlap. Now to feed the tweeter...which is a weak point in these systems...you need to place a capacitor inline (series with) it's loop. Be sure to place its connection pre-woofer choke. If you feel you want to over engineer your little project then you can place another capacitor in parellel with the woofer circuit(across it's terminals) to bleed off(shunt) any excess highs and to prevent loud transists from menacing your tweeter.Try anything from .05-5 or 10 mfd.<BR>Various factors from free air resonance to speaker eficiency(db @ rated wattage)and personal tastes will influence you design.<BR>One of the most important factors is speaker phasing. Make sure that the positive and negatives on the speaker connections are correct. Red is usually + or positive. If you're not sure or the replacement speakers are labeled funny or not at all...take a little 9v battery and touch the speakers terminals. If the speaker "pops" outward then note the positive end of the battery connection and lable the terminal +. In the Reatta application all positives and negatives should be the same...if not the sound will be flat and without bass. This alone is reason to remove and rewire the speakers. Also more power is good. If the volumne level is at 2...then that's better than 8 or 9. A bad analogy would be a car gas pedal @1/10 as opposed to flat out all the time. In this situation you could be supplying constant voltage to the speaker...even without program material and a 20w amp could fry the voice-coils on your 250w speakers.

[Guest]

Lets cut to the chase. My speakers are bad too! Money is basically no object, but lets be somewhat reasonable. How do I replace them and what spec. speaker do I put in and where? Thanks, What a great forum!

[Guest EDBS0]

Try Crutchfield at <A HREF="http://www.crutchfield.com/whatfits/S-3rUEUIsh2n5/index.html?lp=/cgi-bin/S-3rUEUIsh2n5/ProdMenu.asp?c=10&s=0" TARGET=_blank>http://www.crutchfield.com/whatfits/S-3rUEUIsh2n5/index.html?lp=/cgi-bin/S-3rUEUIsh2n5/ProdMenu.asp?c=10&s=0</A> for direct fit replacements.<P>I dare say that everything they have will sound better than stock speakers.<P>Robert

[tcams76]

88/89 had 8 speakers 5.25 plus tweeter in front 4 ohm. Rear same speaker size, but 10 ohm, so not to over power the fronts due to their low door placement. 90-91 had 6x9 in the rear, not sure of the ohm.<BR>I when with Infinity Kappa 50.3 up front, and 60.3 in rear which are 6.5".<BR>Key thing up front is the mounting depth;<BR>I thing we have 2-1/8" exact-fit.<BR>I'm going to install a amp for a cleaner sound.

[tcams76]

Too much wine: <BR>I went with <BR>and I think

[tcams76]

Update:<BR>Looking at the service manual again....the '89 rear stock speakers were 6"mid-bass 10ohm, and a 1.5" tweeter 7 ohm.<BR>The front 1.5" tweeter was also 7 ohm to go with the 5.25" 4 ohm.

[tcams76]

I was told the radio amp section would not be stable at a 2 ohm load. Too bad since I have been wanting to reinstall a set of 6.5, 2ohm Gold Sound speakers I purchased in the late eighties maybe 1989. Those bad boys I had in a 1988 Honda CRX Si in the rear in a similar position as the Reatta.... they must have a 10 lb magnet, I kid you not. I have never seen any other speakers like them at 2 ohm to boot. They sound great!