Tweeter Capacitor

BOSE tweeters' capacitor replacement

Here is a report from kitayama, a member of Club Atenza, who replaced BOSE Tweeter's capacitor to improve sound quality.
The original idea came from Toyota Estima Owners' Club site in Japan.

BOSE tweeters

I expected BOSE sound very much since I had good experience on Toyota audio system tuned by another famous audio manufacturer.

I was disappointed with BOSE sound on my Mazda6, however. It racks high frequency as if there are no tweeters. It does not have real bass which I expected.

I was not satisfied while I could improve the sound by adding baffles and replace fuse.

One day I checked the tweeter and found a cheap chemical capacitor in it. I immediately decided to replace it, and rush to AKIHABARA to get film capacitors.

I obtained a couple of 4.7 micro farad film capacitors for $8.00.

Film capacitor

4.7 micro farad / 250V capacitor, $4.00 each.

　　

How to replace the capacitor (photo taken by tickets)

Remove tweeter cover from door, no tool is required. Also remove connector.

　　

Two screws hold the unit.
Remove the unit from the cover.

　　

Remove as much as resin from capacitor.
You should do it carefully.

　　

Hold chemical capacitor tight with priers and pull it out gently. There should remain two wires on the board.

　　

Remove small plates on the end of the wires carefully.
The plates can not be soldered.

　　

Solder film capacitor to the wires.
It is a good idea to put tubes to capacitor wires to avoid short circuit.

　　

Put hot glue to fix wires.

　　

Film capacitor fits between tweeter cover and door.
Make sure the capacitor does not move around.

　　

Replace the tweeter connector and cover.

　　

The result

It was just great! High frequency sound was there which I never heard on my Mazda6 BOSE. How BOSE could hide them behind the tweeter panel?

To make sure that I did not cheat myself, I modified only one tweeter and left another one un-modified. Then I asked my mother to listen to the sound without telling her about the modification.
She pointed modified tweeter and asked me 'Why can I hear from this now, I can feel the music much better than before?' Yes, it works!

I modified another tweeter too and listen to my favorite tunes ...
Wow, it is completely different experience, I can feel the atmosphere now.

You should do this if you are a BOSE system owner on your Mazda6.

Thanks kitayama for introducing us new way to improve BOSE sound, I did the modification myself and found your report is true!
I am wondering why BOSE and Mazda used such cheap capacitors which spoils the sound quality that much?

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	Remove tweeter cover from door, no tool is required. Also remove connector.

	Two screws hold the unit. Remove the unit from the cover.

	Remove as much as resin from capacitor. You should do it carefully.

	Hold chemical capacitor tight with priers and pull it out gently. There should remain two wires on the board.

	Remove small plates on the end of the wires carefully. The plates can not be soldered.

	Solder film capacitor to the wires. It is a good idea to put tubes to capacitor wires to avoid short circuit.

	Put hot glue to fix wires.

	Film capacitor fits between tweeter cover and door. Make sure the capacitor does not move around.

	Replace the tweeter connector and cover.