Hello all,

I've got a '98 XJ8 Vanden plas, and I'm looking to pretty much overhaul the sound system. I know the basics but not much else about audio.

It has the premium harmon-kardon system, but the door speakers were blown so I replaced them with used Alpines from (I think) a 2001 version of the car. But now the little 6x9 sub is blown, and I think either some of the Alpines or some of the tweeters are blown. There's a ton of rattling even with the bass at -5, and the sound quality aside from the bass isn't that great, I'm using a casette adapter because there's no aux jack. I'm going to go to a good custom shop to get a new system on a budget of under $1000, but I have three questions for you experts first.

1) What are the specs are of the head unit, the amp, the sub, the speakers, locations and # of the tweeters, etc.? I can't find a good set of specs anywhere, they'd be really useful.

2) With a budget of less than $1000 should I replace the original amp or not? i really don't know if it's good by modern standards or not. Should I get a new head unit/amp and everything?

3) I'll probably get a new sub enclosure in the trunk, but what would I have to do to get open a hole and get the sound into the cabin? I heard that removing the original sub is a pain in the ***, would I have to remove the whole rear seat to get good bass?

Thanks!!

Johnny

 

yeah the 6x9 sub in the "parcel shelf" is quite a pain to remove, you do have to take out the rear seat back and bottom to remove the parcel shelf piece and then finally the subwoofer.

because the gas tank is between the rear seat and the trunk in this car it is hard to get the thump from the trunk to the interior, so taking out the 6X9 sub and putting the grate back gives a pathway from the trunk to the interior

couple o' good threads on the issue:

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...-repair-57883/

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...peakers-51118/

 

I have the same harmon kardon suatem and everything you want to do I've done already. Replacing the factory sub really isn't that hard. I replaced it with a sony xplod 6x9 and it actually thumps harder then when i was running 2 12" p1 rockfords in my 97 buick lesabre. I wouldn't recommend doing the line in using the adapter method. It wouldn't work for me but what did work was the hacking the CD player method. When you do it right and take your time using proper soldering and heat shrink it will work guaranteed. Instead of using a trunk mounted sub setup you should really consider a single bad *** 10" sub mounted behind the drivers seat.