What's new
Ram Heavy Duty Forum

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Alpine 12” Screen Speaker Upgrades - my new set up

interested in seeing how the low profile box looks. i don't want to give up my little foldable platform behind the drivers side, but i'm willing to give up all of the space from the rear center to the passenger door below the seat.
If it's thin enough, I'll probably put it under the seat but if I want to be able to drop the seats in the mega cab, it'll be too high for that I'm sure. Since I'm removing the factory sub anyway, I'm hoping that it'll fit back there instead. Obviously, it'll stick up higher than the factory sub, but I'm not too worried about that.

I'll report back!
 
  • Like
Reactions: CFE
Hi folks!
Updates are coming. I figured I'd upgrade the sub piece of the stereo.
As it stands now, I think I'm going to remove the factory sub completely and add an amp, a low profile box, and a new 12" shallow sub.

www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01LW8V8CD/

Skar Audio RP-350.1D Monoblock Class D​


www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IFEFY9A/

Single 12" Subwoofer Regular Standard Cab Truck Ported Stereo Sub Box Enclosure​


www.amazon.com/JBL-CLUB-WS1200-Shallow-mount-Subwoofer/dp/B01KVUJWN4

JBL Club WS1200 12" Shallow Mount subwoofer w/SSI (switchable from 2-4ohm) DVC​


AudioControl 2 Channel Line Output Converter


We'll see how it all turns out.
They should all be delivered by next week at the latest, and I'll let you know what I think when I get it all installed

I have that Skar 350 watt mono amp sitting on my bench right now as we speak waiting to go into my RZR this weekend.

Ill let you know how the little guy does!
 
I have that Skar 350 watt mono amp sitting on my bench right now as we speak waiting to go into my RZR this weekend.

Ill let you know how the little guy does!
For the price and the moderate amount of wattage, it looks like a no brainer for me. I'm hoping I'm right. Also hoping you dig it for your RZR!
 
I'm curious as to how that box is going to fit. There's not a lot of room when you remove the factory sub enclosure. Even the JL and Kicker boxes designed to fit there are kind of wonky shaped and require removing the fold flat floor piece.
 
I'm curious as to how that box is going to fit. There's not a lot of room when you remove the factory sub enclosure. Even the JL and Kicker boxes designed to fit there are kind of wonky shaped and require removing the fold flat floor piece.
we gon' find out!
 
I pulled the trigger on the CDT Audio CL-69S and HD-690SEX for my doors, both in 2Ohm. If there was a way to shoehorn kappas in our doors without cutting up the door cards and using absurdly thick spacers I would've gone that route (In my last Alpine FCA Car the Kappas sounded great even though the tweeters weren't used for the front mid bass), but these looked like a decent alternative. Trying to keep the system as intact as possible, but if I do end up going the DSR1 route with a 6 channel they should also have me covered...

Now to order up the metra harnesses and some sound deadening. I was going to wait, but doing a bit of driving with just the infinity's in the dash I can't stand the muddiness from my doors (I should've known better, I've seen this movie before lol). I'll save doing anything with the sub for last.
 
I got the CDT's and the Pioneer in today (Had some spiff money come in and said the hell with it I'll do the sub too). The front CDT woofers really cleaned up the response and are nice and bass heavy in a good way. They don't go as low as a sub obviously, but they drop down fairly good without any distortion. The rear co-axials are identical with a 1" silk dome that compliments the Infinity's in the dash nicely without being over powered or pulling your attention to the back fill. The Pioneer really isn't any louder, but it is a lot cleaner. You can still get it to misbehave, but it's very rare now. Also 0 ANC issues after double checking that all my replacement speakers were in matching polarity with what came out and she's still super quiet going down the highway. Between the additional response of the CDT's and the Pioneer I'd honestly say it's on par with and in some ways better than some setups I've had/heard with a shallow/low-power 10". It falls off a little short of where I'd like compared to a 10" or 12", but it stays clean playing what it can and for most genre's it doesn't matter it can't reach super low.

I'd say, for now, it's a stopping point for me since I retained my ANC while getting a very nice upgrade in quality. It cleaned everything up, extended bass response to a small degree with a big increase in quality. Also not having that mid-bass driver trying to poorly play highs in the rear door really got rid of an annoying distraction from the drivers seat. While it's nothing like the 4th gen with 2x12"s and aftermarket everything, I wasn't looking for that in this truck. I just wanted to clean up the accuracy within reason and add some additional noise isolation.

Some of the quality increase might be some of the sound treatment I did, but I didn't really go over board. I used a low-medium/moderate amount of mass loading, a bit of CCF, and a bit of egg crate foam to fill gaps. I'll probably start a post with some pics after I wrap up some finishing touches since I did have to do minor cutting to fit the CDTs, but all in all it was worth it. If I do anything else it might be to replace the ceiling tweeters with something smoother that isn't over powering, but since they don't bother me from the drivers seat it's a very low priority.
 
Last edited:
E5CFA6DE-EA30-4D82-8389-DD1925E935AA.jpeg

So here’s the final product. Audiocontrol LC2i Pro, Skar RP-350 amp, JBL Club WS1200 12” subwoofer, American Sound Connection 12” ported truck sub box.

Removed the factory sub and ran those wires to the LC2i Pro. Tuned it all and… IT… SOUNDS… FANTASTIC!

Only issue is that the opening on factory flip covers over that storage area is just a little too narrow to put back on with the sub in place. Not a big deal for me, but it might be for you. Also, slightly redneck resolution to keeping the box tight in the storage area, used a pool noodle cut in half and stuffed both pieces in the front of the bottom of the sub.
 
I didn’t do anything with the ANC so I can’t speak to it.

If i were going to do it again, I’d probably go with a kicker or the pioneer shallow sub, but for the price the MB Quart does a pretty good job. It’s definitely not “competition sound” but for daily driving it does the job.
Did you just replace the sub in the stock box? I've been looking to either add a sub or upgrade existing in my stock alpine system
 
Did you just replace the sub in the stock box? I've been looking to either add a sub or upgrade existing in my stock alpine system
Originally I did that, but the 8" didn't do much for me. I ended up doing what I did above a few months after replacing just the factory sub in the factory box.
 
I could understand that. Is there a way to either piggyback off the stock sub inputs to a modular sub or do you think I could buy a connector for the stock sub and wire in a replacement sub to the stock harness? Trying to get more bass while not deleting storage under the seat or run additional wires
 
Back
Top