What Are 2 Way Car Speakers and How do They Work?

Having the speakers in your car sound the music the way you want and produce the quality of sound you’re looking for can sound easier than it truly is. Yet, this is incredibly important to the enjoyment of the car. Without the right speakers, the feeling of joy that cruising can bring you seems less exciting. This is much easier to achieve if you understand the speakers in your vehicle.

What Are 2 Way Car Speakers?

2 way speakers are named as such because they are equipped with two drivers. One is the woofer, and the other is the tweeter. Depending on the setup of your stock stereo, your speakers can come in a couple of different setups. Either 2 way, coaxial, or 2 way component speakers. 2 way coaxial are more common in vehicles. Still, often 2 way component speakers will produce a higher quality of sound—these work on the same basic principles, applied in slightly different ways.

How Do 2 Way Car Speakers Work?

The 2 way speakers utilize a tweeter for high frequencies and a woofer for low frequencies. These are the two drivers, and hence the name, 2 way speakers. The way these 2 way speakers work involves a critical electrical component known as a crossover. The crossover ensures that the correct frequencies are delivered to the direct drivers. Coaxial and component 2 way speakers produce sound similarly using these crossovers.

All 2 way speakers use a cone vibrating to create sound and magnets to create the tone and character of the sound made from the cone’s vibration.

Coaxial

2 way speakers that use a coaxial connection are easiest to install in a vehicle and are usually the standard type of connection you will get from the dealership. These speakers are typically found on or around the rear doors or the rear deck. The two drivers are not completely independent and use passive crossovers that are already built into the speakers.

Component

Component speakers can come as active or passive crossovers. So they can be just like coaxial with passive crossovers, or they may have active crossovers. Active crossovers will split the signal before it connects to the speaker in order to provide the best possible audio to the crossover so that the proper frequency is achieved. These are often more expensive and much harder to install.

Benefits of 2 Way Car Speakers?

Using 2 way speakers can have benefits in your vehicle. 2 way speakers are often the default that comes with a car upon initial purchase. This makes it easier to do any kind of modification later.

2 way speakers are also fairly easy to replace in a cost-effective manner. They have fewer parts than other speakers. The main components are the cone and the magnets. The cone vibrates to create the sound that you hear from the system, and the magnets provide different sound characteristics from the speakers.

These speakers are also user-friendly at installation. This makes them better for those who want to DIY their car speaker upgrades or replace a component that fails for one reason or another.

Drawbacks of 2 Way Car Speakers?

There are a couple of drawbacks to the use of 2 way speakers. The coaxial style of 2 way speakers have been known to fail at the woofer, which becomes the weak point of the connection.

The coaxial speakers are cheap for a reason. They are not the best quality of speakers available, though the component versions of 2 way speakers will be better than coaxial, though both can be decent if you pay for high-quality speakers.

The other drawback is that in coaxial 2 way speakers that the woofer cannot produce two types of sounds simultaneously. This means you cannot get both strong and deep bass simultaneously, so it is necessary to sacrifice one for the other.

Should You Get 2 Way Car Speakers?

2 way speakers are the most common choice for most car stereos that you will find available. They are reliable and easily repaired as well as easy to understand the way the components function to make the sounds that create your music.

So if you are interested in getting a system that is easy to maintain, then 2 way car speakers are a really solid choice. You probably will be very happy with the choice to install them or upgrade to better ones.

If you are a super technical sound person, then you may want to invest in something a bit more complicated. Yet, overall, for almost anyone out there, 2 way car speakers are a good choice for good sound.