The passenger front speaker went out on the '97 on Monday morning annoyingly, so I faded the stereo to the back which wasn't ideal... the other day I ordered some "Boss" 4 way 5x7" speakers from Amazon for $39ish for the pair... they got here today and I just got to the house from putting them in. Turns out they bolt right up in place. The speaker wire they came with was like 35awg and I couldn't get it to solder anyway so I came up with this:
This is the second one, the whiskey drink had kicked in a little and the ain't care level had increased... it's super easy to remove the stock connector from the stock speakers, still didn't solder great with the soldering iron I had handy... For future reference positive on the Ford connector is opposite the latch on the connector, I looked it up, whether it matters too much or not I don't know but what the heck...
That said, it sounds WAY better than it has before, I hooked the phone up to the cassette adapter and cranked it with a bunch of songs just to get some varying sounds and I'm impressed... at some point I might grab a second set for the back...
Started on the passenger side, then came up with the above method of wiring (I'd originally soldered 2" of the supplied wire to the same stock speaker connector) while I was doing the drivers side, then also remembered there was a rattle in the passenger side window when it was down driving around so I took it apart and fixed the speaker wiring then found the rattle, the top nut on the center guide post thing was sitting in the bottom of the door, from the rust on it it's been there for many years... ran a tap down the nut and put it back on, I wasn't in the mood to dig through the coffee can of junkyard fasteners I have to find a replacement...