The other day, I smelled electrical wire smoke and after a few seconds my driver side speaker stopped working. I removed the speaker to see if it was the problem. It doesn't work when I hook it to the passenger side. As a double check, I hooked the passenger side speaker to the driver side. It worked, sort of, but it was very distorted, like it had a rip in it or something. Put it back on the passenger side and it's fine. Anyone have an idea what might be going on?

Are they stock or aftermarket speakers?

Sounds like the speaker wires shorted out on some exposed metal on the chassis somewhere. Perhaps years of rubbing exposed the insulation and allowed the bare wire to get in contact with metal?

Happened to me once on an aftermarket system, where after laying the wire runs down under the carpet, I bolted one of the front seats down on top of one of the speaker wires, eventually pinching it. The result...blown speaker!

Does your passenger side speaker work okay on the passenger side now, or is it still sounding distorted?

__________________
2009 ML350 (106K) - Family vehicle
2001 CLK430 Cabriolet (80K) - Wife's car
2005 BMW 645CI (138K) - My daily driver
2016 Mustang (32K) - Daughter's car

hrm... if it is a wire that shorted, don't you think it would have blown that specific channel on his amplifier too? I think you should check the amp to see if there's anything wrong with the channel. If you have an aftermarket system this is easy, but if it's stock, finding the amp may be hard (I know for our 735i it's in the trunk under the carpeting)

The speakers are original. The radio is a Becker out of a '94. The passenger side speaker sounds fine.

A speaker blowing doesn't make a burned wire smell, does it?

the speaker itself blowing would not make the smell, but if a wire shorted, the excessive heat being passed through that point would burn the wire, causing the smell. But, to my understanding, if it were a wire shorting, I don't think the passenger speaker would work when you replaced it, so I'm not quite sure that's your problem. I'll ask my brother; he knows quite a bit about car stereo.

In my situation, the amp did not blow...it did have protection circuits however, so that may be the reason.

Burned wire is reserved for high-amperage situations, (like at the battery terminal). That is kind of how an arc welder works. Actually, some high-powered amps are capable of producing enough power to perform small welding tasks, but their power supplies are not designed to take such abuse!

The typical voltage carried on a speaker wire is very small.

If the speaker system has a crossover, you can fry the capacitor.

__________________
2009 ML350 (106K) - Family vehicle
2001 CLK430 Cabriolet (80K) - Wife's car
2005 BMW 645CI (138K) - My daily driver
2016 Mustang (32K) - Daughter's car