I have done a couple of searchs and I have gotten a lot of good info, so I'm going to post my thougts to see if you guys think it will work.

This is for my 123 wagon, the head unit has finally died, and it has stock speakers.

I'm thinking about the Sony CDXF5505X radio head unit. What we like is it plays mp3s and is xm radio ready. Oh and it is cheap 189.00 at cruchfield which claims it will fit my car.

For speakers I was thinking about Sony XS-W4021, cruchfield claims they will fit and are 4" speakers, I thinking about using them for the front and the back.

Additionally I was thinking about adding some small sub in the hatch of the wagon. I think the I can fit and 8" in this is the on I was thinking about Rockford Fosgate P18S4, but I will need a small amp to drive it. which will not be a big deal.

any thoughts?

The front speakers are only 3" speakers I believe. Watch out for Crutchfield. They tend to either say they have no speakers for the 123 or they will sell you what they think will fit, which theu don't and you wind upo returning them.
The front speakers should not have tweeters that protrude above the top of the speaker or the covers won't fit back on.
I mounted an aluminum plate just in front of the spare tire cover area, attached to it is my 12-CD Pioneer player, driven from a Pioneer head unit of course. The DEH-series Pioneer radios are quite nice with XM satellite and some MP3 units available now. Installing the radio is not too difficult.

I use a A/D/S/ power plate under the wood floor in the rear (the removable floor that comes with the NON-third seat version car. If you have the third seat I don't believe its recommendable that you use a power amplifier under there because the wires would get caught up in the process of lowering or raising that third seat. Look for a old A/D/S/ unit they are very reliable for this application. Forget those huge amps on the market now, you don't need a LOT of power, unless you have a tote box size subwoofer, and it should use a separate amp anyhow. You can mount the amp for the sub woofer on the sub box itself.

As for speakers, I have a set of small monitors made for use in a home, mounted in the back of the wagon. They are wood, not plastic. Search for bookshelf speakers or mini monitors on eBay there are many that would work well in the back of your wagon and actually sound quite excellent as long as you have 20 or 30 Watts to drive them.

There is no way the rear speakers in the 300TD will ever sound good.
PM me for more details, someday I will take pictures of the setup.

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'95 E320 Wagon my favorite road car. '99 E300D wolf in sheeps body, '87 300D Sportline suspension, '79 300TD w/ 617.952 engine at 367,750 and counting!

Dieseldiehard,

what do you think about the Pioneer DEH-P4600MP, seems like a good inexpensive one.

Most importantly it has xm radio. Do you think it will work with a sony 6 disk changer? I have an older one I never installed in a car laying around.

If I remember correctly it has a large blue plug.

I like the Pioneer. You should forget about the sony speakers. Go with infinity or jbl, they sound good.

I'm a pioneer fan myself.

Alpine has a radio that is not bad that has XM Tuner built in. that is also an option not sure if it does mp3.

The thing I like about the pioneer is that you can easily add aux input to it as well.

The 4600 is a pretty good radio. I have the 8500 in my car, I love it. Just pop in a disc with 150 songs and they play perfect.

Alon

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'92 300CE - Sold
2004 C240 - 744 - C7 Wheels - Android Radio
2002 C320 - 816 - Sport Wagon

What size are the stock rear speakers in the 123 wagon?

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'81 300TD turbo <<sold 12/05 to another diesel nut

About the same size as the fronts, butted up against the roof.

benzzy, the DEH-P4600MP looks like a real fine radio, they have improved their displays a lot.
Pioneer radios drive what they call an IP bus. A Sony CD changer won't work with this radio as it doesn't use the same bus.
I believe the XM player uses the IP bus therefore you may not be able to use a CD player and a XM radio at the same time, but you should check with Pioneeer on this. I like the 12-CD players (CDX-P1270) they hold the CD description in memory, but I hate the fact that if you disconnect the battery (to do any work on the car or engine for example) they memory is lost and you have to re-program the bloody thing. I am thinking of adding a backup battery, a small Gel Cel or motorcycle battery in the trunk to keep the CD player alive.
I used to like Alpine, their speakers are good quality, radios were great but I switched to Pioneer years ago and own four of them, a KEH-P990, KEH-P8600R, DEH-P815 and a DEH-P835RW (W for wood facia). The only problem I've had was one display slowly went out, it still works but at night you can't see the darned thing. New faceplates are almost as expensive from Pioneer as a whole new radio! I have found a couple of faceplates on eBay for $10 or $15 each, I don't know where they come from (wrecking yards presumably, I hate to think they're all stolen ) but I see people selling just the faceplates all the time.
For example, there is a faceplate for the DEH-P4600MP on eBay right now, presently at ten bucks (one bid) so if you get a nice radio I'd suggest you get a faceplate for it on eBay to have as a spare in case yours ever loses its brilliance a few years from now.
I am really enjoying the studio monitor speakers in the back of the wagon, they are AWESOME!

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'95 E320 Wagon my favorite road car. '99 E300D wolf in sheeps body, '87 300D Sportline suspension, '79 300TD w/ 617.952 engine at 367,750 and counting!

try to find new stuff on ebay. they are a lot cheaper than crutchfield. if u are brave u can buy older top of the line models for the price of a brand new lower model. thats what i always do.

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198? 300D ???K - Future DD
1989 300TE 285K - traded in '12
1984 300SD 186K - Sold in 08
1978 300SD 330K - Died in 05

Thanks, but that doesn't help. I need actual dimensions. 6"? 5"?
Just wondering because I have a pair of new 5.5" speakers sitting around and I'm wondering if they'll fit.

Anybody?

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'81 300TD turbo <<sold 12/05 to another diesel nut

I think there about 4"s., but the depth is the biggest problem. I think it's only about 2" in depth. I'll measure to make sure.

I have taken the entire trim off most of the backend and hatch, due to fixing leaks with the rear washer pump, vacuum hoses etc. While I was here, I am planning to replace the speakes, install an amp, cd charger etc.

I'm thinking about just refinishing the entire top trim to accomidate larger speakers because the stock set up is really unacceptable.

As anyone ever installed speaks in the hatch? Thoughts?

On either side of the door handle on the hatch are large holes that could accomidate a larger set of speaker, say 8" of space. Seems like a decent place.