Hey Everyone,

I just had the stock radio (2002 Sunfire) replaced with a Kenwood head unit. Everythign seem to be working corectly but i dont seem to have much bass comming out of the speakers. I have Kenwood 6x9's in the back and Clarion 4x6's in the front. I am not expecting a great deal of bass but before i had more low end with stock unit and speakers. I have a sub but am trying to tune it all in before i move onto the sub.

Just wondering if the speakers were conected opposite would this cause the bass to disappear or would i have no sound at all?

Thanks for all the help.... complete newb when it comes to this.

Yes, if you have just one of your speakers wired backwards, your bass will be cut in half.

2002 Cavalier 2200 5spd

how would i go about testing to see what is wrong. I had the deck put in by a guy at a stero shop and i am pretty confident its done right as the guys are good. Bu tthe speakers maybe somethign got mixed up there.

Any ideas or suggestions as what to look for or test?

Thanks again.

a good hu wont send alot of bass to thte speakers..

I had the same thing with my monsoon unit, when i switched to my alpine deck. The deck doesnt send as much bass to the smaller speakers. I assume its because theres a subwoofer line out, and thats where it send most of the bass. Id hook up the sub and make sure everything is wired correctly. Because odds are, when you tune it to sound good with decent bass w/o the sub, then when you add it and crank the volume a bit, they might distort easier, depending on the setup you have. (all the headunits that ive done crackle at high volume, with no aftermarket amp)

Id put that sub in and get less bass to the 4 corners, and pump it all into the sub, this way itll sound better, and clearer at higher volumes as well..


first Id make sure everything is wired correctly, especially if youre questioning it.

good luck with the setup!

Thanks guys. Thats kind of what i was wondering about.. if the aftermarket head unit was just sending less bass as it was designed to be connected to a sub. I know that the fronts and rears are hooked up in that adjusting the fade and balance its all correct to left/right/front/rear but if i am checking the polarity of the connections to see if this is the problem how would i go about this? I know that high notes are all celar and good but the low end just doesnt seem to be there that much. Would this be true if the polarity was wrong (just the bass affected) or would i notice that somethign was wrong at all levels?

Thanks again and sorry about all the dumb questions.

the headunit will send out every frequency it can, it wont cut bass out unless the installer set the crossover on the unit to keep bass out. and this is if your headunit has a built in crossover. now. take one of the speakers wiring and reverse the + and - then give it a listen, if the bass appears great, if it doesnt flip it back and see which way sounds best. the old unit may have had more bass because the unit may have been designed to give it more bass. but if you have a sub your going to put in, dont waste time looking for bass out of 6x9's that you dont need. put the sub in and concentrate on getting the bass OUT of the 6x9's tht would be more productive.


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easy way to check if they are wired incorrectly is to use the fade and balance together and fade it all to one speaker......hear how it sounds and go to the next....after you check em all you will know if one of em is wired incorrectly....i think you should do this before you do what sndsgood said to do....