Can Sun damage rear deck speakers?

psychohistory

Howdy! Thanks for all the great info I've received so far. Very helpful forum. Now for a (probably) dumb question:

I recently put in MM691 in the rear deck, but my factory grills won't fit. Can the sun do any damage to the speaker sitting bare naked like that?

On a random note, I'm finally going to take the plunge and buy SR5250s for my fronts! (probably in 2 weeks) Everyone recommends them, and polk has yet to let me down. Everything is driven by a PDX5.

I had been told that I shouldn't have anything in the back, and just use the SRs for the front, but I've been getting mixed advice, so I'll just try all 4 for now and experiment (unplug the rears and compare). I'm very new to car audio, and I have no idea what I'm doing, but I love clean sounding music.

But yeah....can sun/heat damage speakers? Thanks again!

MacLeod

If your goal is the best SQ you can get, then you dont want to use rear speakers. Theyll just smear detail, cancel out low frequency response and pull your stage to the rear.

The sun can and will damage the speakers over time but theyd do this even with the speaker grills on. Its normal and wont wear them out overnight. Itll take years and its going to happen no matter what speakers you use. By the time they get badly damaged, youll probably have traded the car or at least swapped out for some new shiny gear.

psychohistory

Thanks for the info. I'm less worried about about my speakers frying now ^^

Well, now MacLeod, arun, and Dskip say "ditch the rears". That's good enough for me. The mm691 were only $200, so I don't feel too bad about this experiment. I'll take your word that when I get the SRs in, I'll be content with just the fronts. And yeah, I'm getting them @ fry's.

Hopefully I can get the SRs to sound immaculate. Thanks for the tips!

arun1963

Yep, I spent about 250 for the MM691. I ran them exactly for a month. They're installed but disconnected for the last couple of years. Will sell them when I'm ready to buy a processor.

Bi-amp the sr's of the 4 ch's, run active if your hu allows that. Run the sub off the 5th channel.

PoweredByDodge

... if you have a back seat, and regularly carry passengers, then it's not a bad idea to leave the rears in, and just crank the gain way down on them, something on the order of (for example) say 10 to 3. If you're driving 100 watts to the front, dump 20 or 30 on the rears.

... it will sound like crap otherwise in the back.

... or, if you honestly don't care about your passengers (like I don't -- I figure it's my vehicle, they can go pound salt for all I give a damn), then just delete em all together.

... sun won't necessarily 'hurt' them. They're all marine / auto grade speakers. They're sunlight / UV resistant, but ya, eventually it'll take its toll. Believe it or not, the best thing you can do for rear deck speakers (and I've never done it because I'm just lazy) is to get some aftermarket cheapie black mesh grilles (the ones that look like stock or like total K-Mart ****) and paint them white. That'll reflect a lot of the light before it actually hits the speaker. It won't solve the problem, but combined with the high durability of the speakers, it should be enough to get you years and years or whatever out of them.