Paper speaker cones (usually found on stock speakers) die after years of sitting in a car being exposed to hot cold hot cold situations. They become old and eventually crack.

If your the type of person to crank on that stock stereo, you can be sending a clipped signal to your speakers which results in the voice coils heating up and eventually getting hot enough to seperate and poof, white smoke, bye bye speaker. Sounds to me like the cones are cracked/old and they need replacing.

Also, I thought that with the stock systems, they have a built in attenuator once the volume hits a certain point to prevent the stock speakers from blowing. Thats why I think the stock speakers are just old and cracked.

This is an indication that the frequency response is not flat. I have a similar issue with mine. The bass is boomy and muddy. Booming bass is usually a peak in the frequency response around 120 Hz. The muddyness is probably the distortion in the amp or crummy speakers (or both). Another common issue is the midrange around 1kHz needs to be attenuated or the music sounds harsh.

I am in the process of adding passive equalizers to the front and back channels so I can "characterize" the system to generate a flat response curve (given the acoustics of the car and components installed).

Maymybonnieliveforevr: You are using the stock deck right? Did you connect to the sub amp by tapping into the rear speaker wires? If you used the high level speaker inputs you can buy a 'Line-Output Converter' that you tap into the rear speakers and then plug it into your amp using RCA cables. The benefit of this is that a LOC has a gain control on it so you can turn the subs completely off so you can set the sub volume to whatever you want.

There may be a solution to your problem with the subs, but first let me ask you some questions to find out about how you did your connections and how things are wired.

I'm pretty sure that you did some sort of high level tap off of the back speakers.

Which option did you use for getting the signal to the amp;

A) Used a high level input plug that comes with the amp and extended those wires to the back speakers ?

B) Did you use a line level adapter, in which case you would have tapped the rear speaker for signal, and used a part that gave you RCA output into the amp ?

If you used option B you could upgrade to a vairable line level adapter. Both of which should be available online, at BestBuy or the like.

SALOC
http://stingerelectronics.com/prodDetail.asp?strID=46

or

SLOCII
http://stingerelectronics.com/prodDetail.asp?strID=175


You could also use an Active crossover.

Also if you wanted no Bass at all you could cut the remote wire at the front of the car and put a toggle switch on it this way it would kill power to the amp.

Just a couple of options to consider,
Dutch

I actually tested this a few weeks ago. I took some stock 6x9 speakers with paper cones and blasted music through them. They started distorting heavily, but I just kept playing stuff through them. Mainly loud bass. I then took a butcher knife and started cutting the cone as the speaker distorted. I kept this up for as long as it took to cut the thing like a freaking fish. Not that fish cut speakers, but that I... you know. I turned down the volume, and strangely the 13 year-old speakers sounded just fine. I'll never understand that. They're thrown away now, though.

I disagree with Mick because the speakers wouldn't blow so easily from that. I played highs through some very old component woofers, and they worked fine for a long, long time. Probably not a good idea, but I was testing to be able to have an interesting opinion rather than to have long-lasting paper cone speakers.

treble doesnt hurt woofers, but bass hurts tweeters.

Were the tweeters pumping bass?

Not to my knowledge. Just an update, Mick was up late yesterday installing the door speakers and although he did mention that it was alot more difficult a fit then he expected, I do believe they have been installed. Not sure how much of a difference it has made yet.