GTS VTII - speaker / audio upgrade advice

[gts029]

First off as a newbie I'd like to say a formal "Hello" - good forum.

I'm not into "ice" as such but just want to bring the audio up to modern standards while keeping the interior as standard looking as possible. My car currently has the standard single CD HSV set-up with 4??? speakers (manual says 6!)

Any general advice on what works well, pit falls etc would be most appreciated particularly with regards to........

Tweeters - I'm assuming the car hasn't got any so the this is an obvious upgrade area but I'm not sure where to put them. The easiest option would be to pod mount on the dash but I'd prefer to cut into the doorcards - has anyone done this or know if they would fit?

Several head units now have an option of a rear facing camera - anyone found a good camera / mounting point on a VT?

Chris

[motomk]

gts029 said:

First off as a newbie I'd like to say a formal "Hello" - good forum.

I'm not into "ice" as such but just want to bring the audio up to modern standards while keeping the interior as standard looking as possible. My car currently has the standard single CD HSV set-up with 4??? speakers (manual says 6!)

Any general advice on what works well, pit falls etc would be most appreciated particularly with regards to........

Tweeters - I'm assuming the car hasn't got any so the this is an obvious upgrade area but I'm not sure where to put them. The easiest option would be to pod mount on the dash but I'd prefer to cut into the doorcards - has anyone done this or know if they would fit?

Several head units now have an option of a rear facing camera - anyone found a good camera / mounting point on a VT?

Chris

I am not into Ice much either! especially not woofers!! but some info for you. There are 6 speakers as there are tweeters in the car already above the dash near the A pillar inder the windscreen. I would replace all the speakers first with something a lot better! I don't think the HSV has the rear shelf items. If you look in the boot and look up under the back shelf, there is factory cutouts for 6x9's for the back shelf. My back door speakers are disconnected. I have 6x9's on the back shelf. You might have to order some speaker grills from somewhere. One tip when you are cutting the rear fabric parcel shelf do not cut along the line cut at lest 1 cm inside that! I learnt the hard way, had to purchase a new rear parcel shelf.
I do have a Clarion single DIN unit in my car and some sort of storage item below it. Any Double DIN size unit will fit in there, I am sure there would be one with a screen in it.
www.aerpro.com.au do a lot of extra accessory stuff to help aftermarket speakers and headunits fit.

[Island boy HSV]

I have a VX1 HSV GTS. I have done some audio upgrades over the past couple of years. The thing I would recommend is changing the head unit to one that has outputs to drive an amplifier. Use the amp to drive the original speakers. I have also put in a sub into the rear to give more base. I will be upgrading the speakers in the future but at the moment I am happy with the sound output of the originals, bearing in mind the high noise environment of the car. The restriction in the system is the amplifier in the original head unit which is not too good.

As Nick said the tweeters are in the dash at the bottom of the A piller, you can see them if you take the panel off that is on the end of the dash.

[anonymous-user]

you comment about Woofers and Tweeters just reminded me of this: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=dSINO6M

[Bonnie&Clyde]

wormus said:

you comment about Woofers and Tweeters just reminded me of this: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=dSINO6M

[chrispaull]

Brill, I had forgotten how good Not The Nine O'Clock News was.............

[JAG-R8]

what a coincidence...

I got my headunit upgraded on tuesday. I've got a VU maloo so not sure if it's the same stereo as you but I got an Alpine double din unit so it fills all the gap nicely. Plays dvd's, cds, IPods with optical in the back for anything else. It does have rear camera input and the screen is pretty big taking up almost all the double din space. Need to get speakers upgraded next.

the only thing I would say is that before my new stereo the aerial only went up when the radio went on - now it goes up whenever I turn on the headunit which is a bit annoying - apparently it's an 'alpine thing'.

Good luck & let me know if you want me to post a pic of the headunit

[husaberk]

On my GTS I recently had Sextons upgrade it with all Alpine kit. All the standard speakers(6) were replaced, they fitted an Alpine XDA001 head unit + amp and a 12 inch sub + amp. sorry can't remember the speaker/amp models but at the time I worked out it cost me about £250 to pay them to install over DIY. Cost me exactly a grand and sounds fabulous. wasn't bothered for a double DIN unit so Sextons fitted a small tray unit rather than just a blanking plate.

The head unit drive the Ipod just as quickly as the Pod's buttons do and you get all the album info and covers on it's screen. The only other source is the RDS(yay!) tuner. Nice and simple really easy to use.

[gts029]

Thanks for all the advice - most appreciated.

Now I've found those tweeters the speaker upgrades is going to be be more straightfoward than I thought so I reckon first base is new head unit, amp and upgrade the speakers.

Now the strategies sorted its time to do some shopping.