Infinity speakers foam surrounds failing at record rates...

Foam speaker surrounds do not last forever, especially for my 2000 3ooM with 35,000 miles.

In the past month the foam surrounds tore away from the speaker baskets on both 5 1/2 inch front door speakers. This is not due to abuse. They just plain wore out. Foam surrounds weaken with age.

Until recently Chrysler did not have ANY replacement speakers in USA inventory. My sources tell me in April they received a shipment of qty 1,400 of these speakers to the USA.

Now the kicker. A replacement at the dealers parts counter will set you back about $150, which from what I hear is at least DOUBLE the wholesale price.

A blog post reports these speakers as being 2 ohms, only on the bass channel, which could make it difficult to find a replacement in the aftermarket world.

My temp solution was to run a bead of GE RTV silicone around the outer edge of the speaker foam surround, reattaching the remaining foam surround back to the basket and outer gasket. Seems to work, but it may reduce freq response?

There are companies like Parts Express that will replace the foam surrounds on your speakers for around $35 plus shipping, YMMV.

Have fun, Steve

Reply to
Steve Stone
Loading thread data ...

sorry, that should say 6 1/2 inch round speakers.

Reply to
Steve Stone

Interesting.

I have the exact same car (2000 300m).

I have the balance control (or fader control?) set so that only the rear speakers get used.

There is something wrong with one (or maybe more than one) of the front speakers. I don't recall (or don't know) if it's the speakers set low into the door or the smaller speaker(s) mounted to the front corner of the doors.

I was assuming that ALL the speakers were "standard" size (just as oval

6 x 9 has been a standard size for the rear deak speakers for 20+ years). I was assuming that when I get around to taking the door apart and getting at the speakers, that I'd be able to easily get aftermarket replacements.

Are you saying that these front speakers are (a) non-standard size, or (b) non-standard impedance, or both?

When-ever I have the radio on, it's tuned to CBC news/talk or (on long highway trips) I'll scan through the AM band for anything interesting (coast to coast with art bell, art levin, WJR Detroit, etc). I don't really put any emphasis or even try to seriously listen to music. I have my Paradigm studio 100's and 40's connected to my Denon AVR 3300 for that.

Reply to
MoPar Man

My 3ooM has the base, 250 watt Infinity system. (I think it was 250 watts) There was a higher output system available as an option.

The size is "standard". 6 1/2 inch round speakers are easy to come by.

2 ohm speakers that can handle that bass output are a bit harder to find, unless maybe you check out a local music shop that handles guitar amps.

The closest I found online aftermarket were a pair of 3 ohm Pioneers that once installed, could not handle the output of the system. The Pioneers are now sitting on a shelf in my shack attached to an ICOM IC-746 PRO HF transceiver. The morning 80 meter rag chew sounds alot better with these speakers than the dinky thing ICOM put into the radio.

I feel your pain. Most of my long distance driving is accompanied by CD's burnt with my choice of noise or an aftermarket IBOC tuner that plays back on 107.7 I bought at a Radio Shack fire sale for $9.95 USD... not that the end result of IBOC is anything to crow about, just gives me more choices of what noise to listen to. Some of the sub channel programming reminds me of early FM radio, a horse of a different color compared to mainstream top 40.

Steve

73 de N2UBP
Reply to
Steve Stone

From the LHS/300M/LH service manual:

DESCRIPTION AND OPERATION / AUDIO SYSTEMS

There are four different system combinations available on the LH models.

They are a Base, Midline, Infinity l, and Infinity ll system.

BASE SYSTEM The Base System includes:

² AM-FM stereo radio with cassette player. ² Two 6.5 inch round, full-range speakers in the front doors. ² Two 6 x 9-inch, full-range speakers mounted in the rear shelf panel.

MIDLINE SYSTEM The Midline System includes:

² AM-FM radio with cassette player. ² AM-FM stereo radio with CD/cassette. ² A compact 120 watt power amplifier with four output channels. ² Two 2.5 inch, round single-cone speakers in the lower front corners of the front door windows. ² Two 6.5 inch, round single-cone speakers in the front doors. ² Two 6 x 9-inch, coaxial speakers mounted in the rear shelf panel.

INFINITY l SYSTEM The Infinity l System includes:

² AM-FM stereo radio with cassette player and 4 disc in-dash CD changer. ² AM-FM stereo radio with CD and cassette player. ² A 240 watt Infinity power amplifier with six output channels ² One 2.5 inch, round single-cone, spatial imaging speaker in the center of the instrument panel. ² Two 2.5 inch, coaxial speakers in the lower corners of the front door windows. ² Two 6.5 inch, round single-cone speakers in the front doors. ² Two 6 x 9-inch, single-cone speakers mounted in the rear shelf panel.

INFINITY ll SYSTEM The Infinity ll System includes: ² AM-FM stereo radio with cassette player and 4 disc in-dash CD changer. ² A 360 watt power amplifier with nine output channels, one for each speaker location. ² One 2.5 inch, round single-cone, spatial imaging speaker in the center of the instrument panel. ² Two 2.5 inch, coaxial speakers in the lower corners of the front door windows. ² Two 6.5 inch, round single-cone speakers in the front doors. ² Two 6 x 9-inch, single-cone speakers mounted in the rear shelf panel. ² Two 2.5 inch, round speakers mounted in the rear doors.

=================

So basically, do you / we have speakers mounted in the rear door panels. Off hand - I don't know if I have those or not.

Also from the manual - a table showing speaker impedances:

MIDLINE 2.5? FRONT OR WINDOW SPEAKER 13 - 16 OHMS INFINITY 2.5? FRONT OR WINDOW SPEAKER 3 - 5 OHMS MIDLINE - ALL OTHER SPEAKERS 6.5 - 8.5OHMS INFINITY - ALL OTHER SPEAKERS 2 - 3 OHMS

According to a diagram, the rear door speaker is located immediately infront of the inside door handle.

There's no drawings showing the speakers themselves.

I think that it's no big deal to use 4-ohm speakers. Impedance is usually a function of frequency - so you're not going to find any speakers that have a flat impedance profile anyways.

Reply to
MoPar Man

Thanks for the details,

The front door speakers are labeled Infinity Spatial Sound System on the magnet.

Steve

Reply to
Steve Stone

My 99 Chrysler 300M Infinity front speakers had suffered the same foam rot = and rattled BADLY. I tried good quality 4 ohm speakers but they didn't soun= d good. Poor impedance match may be the cause but I'm not certain. I went b= ack and used silicone sealant to repair the OE 2 ohm speakers. They now sou= nd a lot better than the 4 ohm ones but not as good as they (the OE 2 ohm s= peakers) originally sounded when new. The rattle is 100% gone but the bass = is weaker than when new. I think the cone is more constrained by the silico= ne sealant repair than it was with the original foam. Still, its a dirt che= ap fix for front speaker rattle and the rear speakers give me enough bass. = BTW my 99 300M still runs great. Just keep an eye on those steering bushing= s and replace them with OE Chrysler parts when you experience the slightest= bit of steering free play. Most aftermarket bushings are trash, they wear = out in 5000 miles. They are subjected to high heat from the engine and the = Chrysler ones last a long time. If you ignore these bushings in a high mile= s 300M you are risking a TOTAL loss of steering control.

Reply to
boeing377

(...)

It's bad enough that you top post.

It's bad enough that you top-post while fully-quoting a previous post.

But when you double-space the quoted material, that is just stupid.

I'm seeing a LOT more door-knobs posting from google-gropes where their quoted material is posted in double-spaced format.

Anyone know why?

Reply to
MoPar Man

It wasn't double spaced on my newsreader, yours must have a problem. And there was nothing wrong with that being top posted. It worked just as well, just as this one does either way.

Reply to
Ashton Crusher

This is what I see. The following (below) was the quoted material from boing's post - I'm copying it exactly as I see it.

Note the double-spacing, and note that all lines (even the blank lines) begin with the quoting character ">"

Look at how the original looks on google-gropes:

formatting link
You'll see the double-spacing there.

==========================

(etc)

Reply to
MoPar Man

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