argh, i wrote a reply to this and somehow lost it...
[ref]Fady[/ref], Thanks, and no problem - TBH I was quite enjoying the ride with this - unfortunately, I don't have a garage so have to wait for weather / free time to line up and would quite like it done, its been months - Its quite fun sharing the journey and hearing about others in the same place!
I've read that the amp is the best upgrade with normal speakers, and better speakers with the standard amp are the best upgrade - it's impossible to know what's actually the greatest improvement, but both is no doubt better than either. The standard subs definitely improve with a better amp, and the Match ones are an improvement over the standard (when powered) - it all adds up but presumably is incremental after a point.
I followed the Simple Car Guy video you linked to, that's the quicker way - it's almost exactly as he describes - quite a methodical job more so than many.
In his video, a few things required a bit of extra thinking, and some clips needed replacing (for me at least, you may have more luck). The panel that holds the speaker (not the grill, the actual panel) was quite tricky to get off - it requires a bit of force and encouragement but pops off. The other two things circled in the picture are the clips that needed replacing - I can supply the part numbers if you are unlucky, mine are on order - even send you some of the ones on the far right, I had to order 20, but only need 3! The wind deflector added to this, and required replacement screw covers - it is impossible to remove them without a little damage, but probably not seen when back in place. The netting on the parcel shelf was quite tricky too.
And a hair dryer is good enough to separate the speaker from the enclosure, no need for a heat gun.
Given the clips are on order, the car isn't fully back together, but the hard part is done. All in, it's probably a 3-4 hr job (minus what still needs to be done). The good thing is, the car is usable without the trim parts - it's a bit of a jigsaw so can't add back all the parts without replacing the hidden fixings.
I had a bunch of issues fitting the door speakers - more on that another time but it took 4 hours to do one door that would still need more work, two visits to the local electrics shop as the crossover was broken out of the box - I got annoyed and pulled the trigger on different gear.
Given the car is half in pieces, and half upgraded, it's quite simple to step back and redo a few things. Now I have a full set of Focals to install - subs, back shoulder and door speakers as I found a decent price for them (a shop called RoadRadio) - not cheap but cheapest I've seen.
So a few steps forward, and a few back. I should have all the clips and speakers come the weekend and will see if this is the final stretch.
To answer your question - replacing the subs arent the horror story it looks like, it's somewhat time-consuming but not hard, and was surprised in a good way. I'm impressed with the Match subs, worth the effort - the about-turn to Focal is just because of issues in general with the Match set-up, it's definitely not plug and play... the Match amp is definitely staying though!
If you've done it twice before, thats twice more (maybe 1.5 times more?) than me! I assumed the benefits of using a Technics harness would be that it's fully wired for the Z4, given you choose the car model and the installed stereo option - shame thats not the case, kinda defeats the point of it!
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