Running wires for stereo install

[Jon]

quote:Originally posted by spoulson:
quote:Originally posted by number3:
Jsut to drive the point home bigger doesn't always mean better. Most car amplifiers have regulated power supplies. Some do not.What's the difference?
An unregulated power supply will fluctuate power (wattage) with the voltage input. Typically, these are in your higher end amplifiers. For instance, an amp will be rated at 50 watts a channel at 12 volts. At 14 volts, it could be more like 60 watts.

With a regulated power supply, the power is regulated to be 50 watts regardless of the voltage input. These are in your cheaper amps or even in the the cheaper line of amps. Kenwood and Sony both use regulated power supplies. God I'm rusty but I think I remember that if the voltage drops (like 11 volts instead of 14), then the amperage the amplifier draws increases thus increasing the work the amplier does and the increase likelyhood that you'll blow a fuse.

 

[number3]

quote:BTW I sell boatloads (pun intended) of upgrade wire.I work for Hifi House in Broomall, PA. Tweeter would like to think we are a competitor. I was hinting on their silly ad compaign "Boatload of know how".

 

[spoulson]

quote:Originally posted by number3:
I work for Hifi House in Broomall, PA. Tweeter would like to think we are a competitor. I was hinting on their silly ad compaign "Boatload of know how". So that's where you work. My gf works across the street at Brother's Electric. I'll have to stop in one day to say hi.

 

Tweeters company doesnt even phase the one im at, their prices get stomped on.

 

[spoulson]

Ok, I got all the necessary pre-outs, 4ga power, and ground connections all ready in the trunk.

I was test fitting my two amps and they seem to be able to fit on the back of the rear seat. But that panel seems pretty flimsy as it is just some kind of cardboard and behind it is padding from the rear seat.

How has anyone else mounted the amps? I have a sheet of 1/2" MDF here but I don't really want to use it unless I have to because it's damn heavy. I'd prefer not to mount it on the trunk floor because I'd still like to have storage. I also hate drilling so I'd like to use factory holes if possible. Any ideas?

 

[number3]

quote:Originally posted by spoulson:
quote:Originally posted by number3:
I work for Hifi House in Broomall, PA. Tweeter would like to think we are a competitor. I was hinting on their silly ad compaign "Boatload of know how". So that's where you work. My gf works across the street at Brother's Electric. I'll have to stop in one day to say hi. Do you still want me to ship the SSSS to you then? You could always pick it up...

 

[number3]

quote:Originally posted by spoulson:
Ok, I got all the necessary pre-outs, 4ga power, and ground connections all ready in the trunk.

I was test fitting my two amps and they seem to be able to fit on the back of the rear seat. But that panel seems pretty flimsy as it is just some kind of cardboard and behind it is padding from the rear seat.

How has anyone else mounted the amps? I have a sheet of 1/2" MDF here but I don't really want to use it unless I have to because it's damn heavy. I'd prefer not to mount it on the trunk floor because I'd still like to have storage. I also hate drilling so I'd like to use factory holes if possible. Any ideas? Mount them to the board. It does two things. The first and most important is that it help isolate them from the chassis ground (screws through the amplifiers metal mounting points to the metal body of the car can cause ground loops) second it is much neater and more secure.

Harry

 

[spoulson]

Ok, so I've made some progress since the last post of this thread, but I'm not done yet.

I ended up buying a 4x2 of 1/4" hardboard, cutting it to size of the back-of-rear-seat cardboard, then securing it with 1/4" bolts through the snap holes. Voila, secure fit for both amps, no drilling. I'm happy.

So now onto the front stuff. I have two main questions:

1) How the hell can anyone fish a wire thru the door boot? I can't get at it on either end. I can't even see the wires coming through on the inboard end.

2) My front speakers are components. I decided to mount the woofer in the door and the tweeter in the dash speaker location. I cut hardboard adapter plates for both and they fit. So now I need to find a place for the passive crossover. It's not too big, maybe 4"x2"x1" at most. There doesn't seem to be a plainly obvious place to put it so I'd like to know where others have put theirs. Again, no drilling is a plus.

 

[Scott Y]

I mounted my tweeters in the dash using plexiglass, and I cut the door mounts to fit 6.5" drivers. I ran the wires through the door harness, and it was no fun at all. I used a wire coat hanger, and I poked through from the door into the car. It took a loooooooong time and I had to have some beers and a ton of patience, but I was able to run the wires through. On the drivers' side I mounted the crossover on the bottom of the plastic vent tube (you'll know which one I'm talking about), and on the passenger side I used velcro with super-sticky tape and stuck it on the inside of the dash, beside the glovebox.
It took a long time to install the speakers, but I wanted it to look completely stock, and I'm pleased with the results.

 

[Scott Y]

Sorrry, I didn't mean to double-post in this thread - suffering work induced brain fade.

 

[spoulson]

Well it looks like I'm about done with the install. The system is running and sounds great. I will just have to tweak the gain/crossover settings over time, but it's pretty good now.

Incase you haven't seen, I have a picture of the amp rack here. I probably should've taken pictures of the adapter plates I fabricated for _every_ speaker. They're not beautiful, but they all fit well.

I did not run speaker wire into the door. I felt that was too much work and I'm anxious to get the car back on the road. Instead, I used the factory speaker wire starting at the stereo harness. It was a compomise. The factory wire looks about 18ga, but it looks like each speaker only gets about 4' of this, and the rest is 16ga wire that I ran. This also gave me some room to put the crossovers. I zip-tied all the wires into groups and then put the crossover boxes in the very front of the console, just right of the accelerator pedal.

For a day I thought I somehow toasted the head unit, but it was really a dead battery. For some reason Alpine CDA-7995 head units emit lots of interference to the subwoofer when it's running at a low voltage (9V), perhaps too low for the processor to fully process the audio. Then it promptly turns off. A new battery put it back in action.

 

[Hertz]

You blocked your rear seat pass through -- where are you going to put your skis?

 

[spoulson]

Sorry, I left out a small detail. I have a condition of patella subluxation in my left knee. I couldn't ski even if I wanted to for fear of tearing more tissue in my joint.

A sled will fit just fine in the trunk.

 

Sorry to resurrect this post; I found it while searching for details on running battery cables to the trunk. I'm running 0 gauge, and a few posters on this thread are as well, but didn't really say how you got this huge mofo through the firewall. I had a 10 gauge wire for the fuel pump going through the ECU's wiring harness grommeted hole, but that is WAY too tight for 0 gauge. I found a plug down by where the charcoal canister is, and tried shoving it through, but it stopped and I couldn't find the end of it, plus I didn't see any other holes up under the glovebox.

I'm sure the solution is there, but after a few days in the garage on only a few hours sleep it all starts to look the same.

 

[number3]

Mine runs under the car but mine is not a daily driver anymore.

Harry

 

[Hertz]

Hmm.. trying to remember... YMMV

Dig around on the passenger side foot well, right at the door frame, under carpet area... there's a covered hole (fairly decent size) that passes through the frame, momentarily in the spot where all the tree debris gathers -- from there you can pass through to underneath the wheelwell (remove the plastic lining to see) and then there is another access panel that takes you to approximately the stock fuse box (under).

 

[turbowop]

Take off the inner fender lining on the front passenger wheelwell and you will find a rather large plug in the firewall. Go thru there. You will come out right behind the glovebox. There is a more detailed explanation somewhere in the mess of threads on this site.

 

Cool. Yea, I'd seen that thread about the fenderwell, but didn't like the idea of the wire going "outside" the car. I did end up using that hole in the fenderwell; just drilled a hole in the middle of the plug to pass the wire through. I didn't want it go all the way across the fenderwell though, so I had it come up & out the unused 4th hole in the strut tower. Much easier and simpler IMHO. Thanks for all your help guys!

 

[Hertz]

Jon, that almost sounds worse -- think it would be prone to a lot of vibration there, good chance of grounding out!

Be very careful passing wire through anything metal -- got to have grommets or some type of protection there. I'm sure we can dig up some Galant-on-fire photos from the archives if you're interested...

 

I know, don't think that hasn't occurred to me. I did enlarge the hole with the dremel, and used that foam rubber stuff that covers the stock vacuum lines for insulation. I may go back in there and do something else, I dunno, enlarge the hole some more to put a real grommet in there.

Why would the vibration be worse there? It's only like 14 inches from the other hole where other people routed theirs, and it's the same piece of metal.