I read before on one of the threads you can add an amp to the actual factory stereo. I was just wondering before I mess up my car would I have to sacifice the back speakers to make the speaker wirre connection to the amp and subwoofers or can I add separate wiring for the amp only and still keep the other speakers. Another question just wondering, does the silver face of the stereo harness just come off by pressure or what? I'm a beginner and don't want to mess up my car. Thanks for any tips.

 

if you take the panel off that separates the front and back doors, you will find a bundle of wires. find the wires that are for the speakers and splice into it. then run the input wires to the amp and you are done. the hardest part was getting the damn stereo out. it took three people for me. but the rest was easy. you can easily run the wires under all those interior panels along the door and you'll have a very clean install. you can't see any wires in my car till you get to the hatch. it took about 3 hours to splice, solder, tape, and run the wires. it took 3 hours to get the stereo out cause we couldn't figure it out for a while. oh, the power cable that goes to the battery can be easily hidden along with the rest of the wires going through the firewall as well. then run it along the side down to through the fuse box, push it against the left side of the car, then down the side panels. you'll see what i mean when you get there.

 

Thanks for the tip I will try it tomorrow or on the wekend. Let me ask you how do I get the factory stereo (HU) out of there?

 

hey Ongo and Welcome to our happy little corner of the net, and to our Club. There are TWO BIG fridge'S in the corner with anything you can think of in them...help yourself...of course only take what you can LEGALLY have.

make yourself at home on one of the big fluffy couches, kick your shoes off, put your feet up on one of the tables, yes we are allowed to do that, mom don't care....and take it easy.

oh...btw....every once in a while a food fight breaks out...so you may not want to wear nice clothes here.

Welcome!!

YES you can amp the stock head unit....I did it with wonderful results as well...and yes I added a sub. you can do this a few different ways....personally I wanted to keep the rear door speakers and wanted to amp them as well. What I did was get an Alpine V-Power series 5 channel amp. Alpine isn't making it at the moment but there are still plenty of them around if you will look. the model number is MRP-F320. this amp accepts speaker level inputs thus no converters are required. it also allowed me to amp ALL the speakers plus add the sub, as there is a specific single 125 watt RMS channel for the sub. I added a JL Audio 10W0 Powerwedge for the sub....I upgraded all my door speakers to Rockford Fosgates. 5 X 7's in the front and 6 1/2's in the rear. I tapped into the speaker wires behind the head unit and routed them down the center of the car through the console to the amp which is mounted under my drivers seat...then ran the output speaker wires back the same way and hooked them back up to the wires going out to each speaker. then I ran a new speaker wire from the amp to the back of the car for the sub. HERE you will find a thread I did a while back on the removal of the stock head unit and the tools I made to do it with.

STOCK HEAD UNIT REMOVAL

the other way of doing this would be to use a 4 channel amp, power the front door speakers from the amp and then tap into the rear speaker wires for a signal to the amp and then bridge the other two channels to power the sub.

below you will see a pic of my amp install.....the only difference now is that the power, ground, and sub speaker wire are hidden under the carpet and can not be seen.

Hope all this helps.

 

NUKE:
becarefull where you have that amp ..
I had my amp in the same spot and you could see the wires from the window, slightly ...
well someone busted my window last year after carlisle and took my damn amp and tools and sheged up my damn steering wheel column ,, friggas tried to steel my car...

just be careful bro
Bruce

 

Thanks Nuke I really got the grasp of it now. I will do this thing tomorrow. Just one more thing I'm not too sure about. Can I connect the amp's system control to the red 12V cable that goes into the stereo or where should I connect it? Thanks.

 

The remote turn on lead for the amp should be connected to a switched source. There is no 'amp turn on' lead from the factory deack, so you either need to a) connect this lead to an ignition switched (i.e. accessory) lead, b) a physical switch that you wire into a 12 V lead so you can manually turn the amp on and off, or c) use a current sensing relay to turn the amp on when there is signal on the speaker wires coming from the deck.

I personally chose option a). I don't have the wiring harness details in front of me, so I can't confirm whether the red wire is the ignition switched one or not. You should be able to confirm with a quick search though.

As far as security goes - Nuke did a nice clean install. When I did my own, I actually mounted the amplifier to the seat. This install is a little bit more fiddly, but i cannot see any part of my install unless I put my head down on the floor and look under the seat from there.

 

Thanks Bro...but as I stated....since that pic was taken, all the wires for the power/ground/sub speaker wires have been rerouted under the carpet.....just like Dales install...its totally invisible from outside the car...the only way you can see the amp is if you open the rear door, and then put your head in the floor board and look up under my seat.....the pic was taken with the seat run all the way forward....when its in its NORMAL position it WAY back... :{D

 

well....as long as you are in the dash hookin up the speaker wires...there IS an accessory wire going to/from your stock headunit that you can tap into (as in cut the wire, then remove the insulation from BOTH ends, then connect both ends and your amp on/off wire all together). to use to turn your amp on and off.....I know I did it myself. its PIN #10 on MY 2002 the wire is Pink/Black, but it may be different on your car. but to the best of my knowledge the harness nor the head unit has changed from 2002 to 2003...the colors may have...but now where they go to and come from.

here is a pictrure of the pinout....and this is looking INTO the connector after you unplug it from the back of your headunit.

and here is what each pin is for:
Pin #: Wire Color - Use

Pin 1: Green / Orange - Rear Right Speaker (-)
Pin 2: Green - Rear Right Speaker (+)
Pin 3: Brown - Rear Left Speaker (-)
Pin 4: Brown / White - Rear Left Speaker (+)
Pin 5: White - Front Right (-)
Pin 6: Red - Front Right (+)
Pin 7: Black / White - Front left (-)
Pin 8: Black / Brown - Front Left (+)
Pin 9: Black - Ground
Pin 10: Pink / Black - Switched power, Auxilliary, can be used for amp on/off
Pin 11: White / Blue - Dimmer
Pin 12: Green / Black - Illumination
Pin 13: Blue / Red - Contasnt Power aka Battery aka Memory,

 

Just look at Sir Nuke - becoming quite the Protege audio guru, aren't ya'? .

I must say however, that yours is one of the simplest and cleanest systems I've seen. It just doesn't look like much - which I know is your full intention! Stealth kicks ***, and you've got it nailed.

Anyone looking to upgrade while keeping the stock deck and without a lot of "flash" need look no further than Sir Nuke!

~HH

 

Oh sure, Nuke gets ALLL the credit . I actually looked for that pinout info for another thread a couple days ago and couldn't find it using the search function.......



OK I feel better now. Sniff.

 

Nuke,

Would it be possible to make a sticky thread with all the pinout, speaker size info, etc. as there is on the other board? There seem to be more people than before going the stock deck route with their systems, and I can't seem to find some of the really good stuff any more using the search function.

 

thanks dude for the props......all I can say is I KNOW what I KNOW....but that is it.....however.....I can do research like a **** and come up with answers....which is how I came up with the system I have...and how I did the complete install alone, the first in MANY MANY years.....and never had a single problem. :{D

 

ya know dale...I think that is ONE HELL OF AN IDEA....and I bet I can take care of that...

as for finding the image....I saved it on my harddrive a long time ago..as you may know the original site where we found it is no longer there.....and all the good stuff that was there is gone. BUT I GOT THE PINOUT!!! :{D

 

Thanks Nuke!

It's good that someone was smart enough to save that info!!

I saw the sticky, good stuff.