Delica Canada | Mitsubishi Van Club

Hello,

Finally I am slowly getting at upgrading the stereo-system in our Van... Changing the radio-deck is obviously an urgent priority - but I also want to upgrade the speakers. As I have an Exceed I have a simple 4 way speaker system (two in the front dash-board and two in the back, sort of between captains chairs and rear bench).

My question is: How the heck do I get at the rear speakers? If I don't absolutely have to, I don't want to cut the plastic paneling in which the speakers sit. Ideally I would just mount better speakers in exactly the same spot where the existing rear speakers are.. But I fiddled around back there a bit and came across some screws under little plastic caps inside of the side panel.... didn't look very promising...

How did you guys do it? Which screws need to be removed? I want to remove as little as possible to get at the speakers.

Finally I was wondering if anybody had any recommendations on where an encased subwoofer would be mounted ideally (I don't want large single speakers that need to be built into some panel or so but rather a smaller size boxed subwoofer that could be mounted somwhere as a stand-alone unit... are there any brands, types and/or sizes that you (those who mounted a subwoofer) found works particularly well?

If you maybe have a few pictures of some sneaky "subwoofer" hiding spots, that would be great...

Thanks in advance and happy motoring...

Cheers, Chris

Whew!
I attempted this a month ago and figured out a few of the screw
spots etc etc. Had pretty much all the side paneling including
the curtain rails to raise the plastic off. It was pretty hectic.
I got an infinity speaker in there (passenger side rear).
I was going to get at the right side and ran out of time. Still
haven't gotten back to it. And yes, I accidently broke a few
plastic tabs.

I have a couple amps rigged into a low lying box of sorts, a
shallow sub in a box. They are raring to go in. Was going to
lie them down under the back seat and it would still allow the
seat to fold forward. The amp box would allow stuff to be
put on top of it and still get air flow if careful. During long
travels I take the sub box out.

My ideal placement allows minimal exposure, minimal space
used and nothing that says 'break into me and steal everything'

J

I think no matter how hard you try, you are going to snap some of those brittle tabs off no matter how hard you try not to. And of course it's worse for the first time you try. It was explained to me that the reason the tabs break are the presence of atmospheric petroleum hydrocarbons, which make some plastics very brittle over time. So it would seem that the plastic panels used to make the Delica 15 years ago may have been one of those plastic formulations that did not stand up well to hydrocarbons that are present in the atmosphere the Delica lives in (hmmm, what's in those regular clouds of black smoke?).

I think when I did mine I snapped about 3 tabs, and used Tuck Tape to mitigate the problem. I recall there are some detailed posts in this forum with step by step panel removal instructions BTW.

Why not buy some nice cubes and hang them from the ceiling?

you have to remove the curtain rails first. then look all around for the tabs, and if i remember correctly, there are some hidden screws. i cracked both panels at their rear but fixed it with silicone. its not hard but requires some detective work. do it slowly...

the stock speakers suck. i tossed them. i took the round plastic speaker wire inputs from a pair of old 6x9 speaker boxes, hole sawd a hole for it just behind the grate of the stock speakers (where it kind of slopes inward to the ashtrays and that) and plugged the stock wires into the prongs inside the connectors) then i connected new 6x9s in those grey carpeted boxes to the inputs. now i can remove the speakers from the van when i load it up