I bought a 06 GT this year and am looking to make some upgrades to my shaker 500 music system. I have read about the OEM 500 system and it sounds very good but I am not happy with the distortion it has when it comes to bass. I am looking for advice on a system that would allow me to use the same head unit, give me good performance and be cost effective. I’m open to any suggestions and would greatly appreciate any advice. thanks.

 

The distortion you are hearing is caused by cheap paper cone speakers and woofers with a head unit that does not have the RMS wattage to provide quality sound. The woofers each have their own amp, but are only rated at 90 watts peak. Go aftermarket all the way if you can. If not, at least change out the speakers. You will notice a big difference.

Also, if you change out the speakers only.....be careful of the wattage they can handle. Ford claims 500 watts but it is nowhere near that.

 

DaddyD,

I replaced my Shaker 500 with an aftermarket stereo and this is when I noticed the distortion with the bass. The stereo is 180W max. The RMS is 17 watts/45 max X 4. Is it that my factory speakers can't handle this new system? What do you think I should do?

Dawn

 

Although the speakers are not very good quality, they do still demand a certain wattage to function properly. I have asked around and cannot figure out how many watts the front and rear speakers can handle. I do know that without enough power, you will begin to hear distortion as you turn up the volume. You may want to look into buying replacement speakers and maybe an amp to match up the RMS wattage going into your speakers.

 

Thanks DaddyD. Although I don't know for sure if the noise I'm hearing is the door panel vibrating or bad speakers.