Mod of Stereo System

[Soundsailor]

Since the sound systems in RVs aren't known for their high fidelity, I wasn't expecting much when I fired up the iRV62 stereo in my 2022 260RD. And I wasn't surprised either when it sounded "tinny" (to say the least).

My first step was to replace the speakers. Here's what I found:



Not surprising that the system sounded terrible with those cheap Chinese speakers.

I replaced them with a set of Polk Audio DB522 DB+ Series 5.25" speakers (Available here on Amazon, shop well and they can be had for under $50)

Here's what it looks like after the installation:



The DW isn't pleased with the black color of the grills, I may either paint them or try to find some white grills. The grills that came with the original speakers wouldn't fit over these.

However, I still wasn't completely sold with the sound, not enough base. Decided a subwoofer would fix that.



Went with the BLAUPUNKT GTHS81 8" Amplified Subwoofer 320-Watts (available here on Amazon). Mounted it on the shelf behind the TV, the unit came with mounting brackets and screws. Routed the cabling through the port already in the wall.

Now I have a sound system that I can listen to. Works great when trying to watch a movie (think T Rex in Jurassic Park) or listening to music.

The iRV62 head unit that came with my 260RD seems to work well enough for me. The manual is rubbish (surprise, not). It took some trial and error, but I managed to connect the subwoofer to a subwoofer output on the back of the unit. Connected the subwoofer power supply to the same cables as the iRV62. Adjusted the inputs on the subwoofer to get good volume without distortion. Note that the iRV62 has a subwoofer control built-in. One simply clicks down the volume control, then several sub-menus become available including subwoofer volume along with tone and balance. After some adjustments, I was in sound heaven.

Note: The subwoofer doesn't turn off when the iRV62 is put into "standby" mode. That means it is on all the time. My next move is to add a rocker switch to turn it off when not in use (don't want to drain the batteries).

[Mmullin]

@Soundsailor no mention of the IR remote control?

Our first month or in the new 260RD and I thought my wife was gong to sell the trailer and get something else because you can't use the remote from the recliner. [emoji23]

I haven't decided if I want to work on a mod (there's a post somewhere describing how to install an after market IR receiver) or but an entire replacement for the iRV62 first.

And our speakers buzz - haven't attempted to chase down that problem.

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[Soundsailor]

Our first month or in the new 260RD and I thought my wife was going to sell the trailer and get something else because you can't use the remote from the recliner. [emoji23]

I haven't decided if I want to work on a mod (there's a post somewhere describing how to install an after market IR receiver) or but an entire replacement for the iRV62 first.

And our speakers buzz - haven't attempted to chase down that problem

So sorry to hear about your experience with the remote Mike (@Mmullin), actually I don't use the remote so I don't have any experience there. All of the content I use is managed through Plex (https://www.plex.tv/). I have over one thousand movies, more than five thousand episodes of TV shows, and more than fifty-five thousand music tracks on my Plex server. I'll be posting a description of this system once I have completed installing it. A quick snapshot: the server is running on a Raspberry Pi (This kit on Amazon has everything you would need but there are many other ways to get a Pi.). My media library is stored on a USB drive (This the one I'm using but any USB drive will work). Plex has a client for the Roku TV that came with my 260RD, so I'm using the TV remote, not the iRV62 remote. And my music is mostly streamed via Bluetooth so I'm using the controls on my phone for that. There is an app for the iRV62 that works on Bluetooth, for me that did work from the recliner.

Not surprised that your speakers are buzzing. If you look closely at the picture I posted of the speakers I pulled, you'll see that the cone of the speaker is all bent up. Changing the speakers was quite easy, just twist off the speaker grill, remove a few screws, remove the leads from the old speaker and attach them to the new ones, then put the screws back in to hold the new speakers.

As for replacement, I thought about going that route but decided against it for two main reasons. First off is the conclusion that there aren't many units that are a quick replacement for the iRV62. I didn't want to have to cut out a larger hole for a new head unit. Secondly (and decisive) was that a new unit wouldn't help the sound that much. Replacing the speakers and adding the subwoofer did much more for the sound than anything I could have done with a new head unit.

[MyRVRadio]

@Soundsailor You sounds like me! Digital packrat. (You know you're never going to watch even a quarter of that stuff again!) You should look into a NAS drive. A Drobo or the like. I prefer the redundancy of multiple drives. I can have TWO drives (out of 5) fail and still recover. With 5x3TB drives I have 10 TB of space, obviously with some for overhead, redudnancy, etc.

[Soundsailor]

@Soundsailor You sounds like me! Digital packrat. (You know you're never going to watch even a quarter of that stuff again!) You should look into a NAS drive. A Drobo or the like. I prefer the redundancy of multiple drives. I can have TWO drives (out of 5) fail and still recover. With 5x3TB drives I have 10 TB of space, obviously with some for overhead, redundancy, etc.

Yes, guilty as charged of being a packrat. The NAS would be nice (on my shore setup I have about 18 TB in two NAS enclosures in RAID configuration with additional bays open for more), but I wanted something that would work well off-grid. A USB drive takes very little power to run. It's a bit on the slow side, but the Raspberry Pi I'm using to power it isn't very powerful either (also runs on USB power). Together they have just enough to play HD at 720 resolution which looks fine on the TV in the coach. At 720 resolution the files are much smaller than on my home setup, making the 5 TB drive more than adequate (so far I'm only about half full).

[cwshelnutt]

We had the same issue because the unit was mounted right by the door, which means the remote couldn't signal the Jensen unit. We cut a hole in the front, relocated the Jensen to the front (same side as the TV) facing the sofa/chairs, and problem solved. Was super easy to move the wiring and we simply went to Michael's, found a small chalkboard and mounted it over the whole left by the Jensen. Use it for grocery list, whatever, but was a cute and cheap solution. We love the results.

[Soundsailor]

We had the same issue because the unit was mounted right by the door, which means the remote couldn't signal the Jensen unit. We cut a hole in the front, relocated the Jensen to the front (same side as the TV) facing the sofa/chairs, and problem solved. Was super easy to move the wiring and we simply went to Michael's, found a small chalkboard and mounted it over the whole left by the Jensen. Use it for grocery list, whatever, but was a cute and cheap solution. We love the results.

Glad you found a satisfactory solution, BTW, welcome to the forum (looks like this was your first post).

[Grandesigner]

We had the same issue because the unit was mounted right by the door, which means the remote couldn't signal the Jensen unit. We cut a hole in the front, relocated the Jensen to the front (same side as the TV) facing the sofa/chairs, and problem solved. Was super easy to move the wiring and we simply went to Michael's, found a small chalkboard and mounted it over the whole left by the Jensen. Use it for grocery list, whatever, but was a cute and cheap solution. We love the results.

Great idea to cover the old hole. I still don't know what they were thinking on that one.

[Capn_AJ5]

@Mmullin >"... because you can't use the remote from the recliner." Yepper, the gentleman that checked us out before we towed ours home said same thing. My wife said "what good is the remote then?" And then she did her drama thing as she sat at the dinette just 3 feet away from in front of the unit for the remote to work... LOL. Note our unit came with a Jensen JWM452... not that that matters...

[Mmullin]

Thanks for the additional info @Soundsailor! All easily actionable suggestions.

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