[russellsdad]

Regular reader, but a long time since I last posted on Bimmerpost. But I guess I haven't had any questions or comments on my F30 for some time. Anyway, after 8 mostly great years, it is time to replace my 2014 335i with something new and shiny. That new and shiny will be a 2022 M3 Competition xDrive in Sao Paulo Yellow. Ordered the car way back in September 2021 and the car is finally on a ship heading to CA. That means it is time to start thinking about replacing my Bavsound speakers and go back to the stock HKs which fortunately I held onto these past several years. This was my plan all along when I first installed the Stage One system in my car way back in 2014 and the time has now come.

My original plan was to remove the 14 Stage One speakers and 2 Ghost subs and then sell them separately to some other lucky F30 owner. But then it occurred to me that Bavsound sells what looks like the same Stage One speakers for the G80. So my question is whether anyone has actually taken the Stage One speakers from an F30 and installed on a G20/G80 before. Are they the same speakers?

Note that for both my F30 and upcoming G80, I have the HK system. And I definitely have seen several folks complaining about the poor quality of the G80 HK audio. So either way I am likely to upgrade the speakers once I have the car. But definitely if I can re-use the existing Stage One then it would be a no brainer for sure.

Appreciate any insights from anyone, and good to be posting again.

[rgrovr]

The G20 kit from Bavsound is 100% match to the G80. I'm not sure the F30 is tho.

[hockeygoalie35]

I just picked up a set, will let you know how they are!

[russellsdad]

So in case anyone was wondering, I finally got around to installing my old Bavsound Stage1 and Ghost subs (the original version and not the revised model) on my G80. I can confirm that the HK kit for the F30 fits and works great with the G80 also with HK. The only speaker that was not the same between the G20/G80 and F30 was the center channel tweeter. The F30 center channel tweeter has the bezel with the 2 screw mounting points whereas the G20/G80 needs the round (no bezel) tweeter same as for the doors. So I just left the center channel with the stock HKs. But every other speaker I replaced with the Bavsounds.

Install overall on the G80 was actually easier IMO compared to the F30, no need to remove door handle trim panels. I thought the door panel removal was more difficult as it seemed to be attached very tightly. But once you do pop the panels off, the rest was definitely pretty easy. The only other challenging part would be the center channel in the dash as the mount underneath the plastic grill appears to be glued on. But since I realized the tweeters were not the correct one, I didn't bother continuing further.

Lastly on the quality of the sound, it is definitely a great upgrade over the stock HKs. It still doesn't match up to the Burmester in my Macan GTS. But I still highly recommend it if you are willing to do the work. While I didn't think the G80 HK audio quality was as bad as the F30 (at least with B&W coded), it definitely lacked bass and always felt... lacking. I can only assume the latest Bavsounds with 2nd gen Ghost subs would sound even better. But at least I didn't have to spend another $1500 again.