2g stereo confusion

[unior]

ok i bought my car only a month or 2 ago

one day this car must have had a kickin' sound system in it or something cause theres all kinds of cables that head to the trunk

but when i bought the car most of the audio stuff had been stripped from it

i know i had the infinity stock because there is a factory amp underneath the passenger seat

there is currently a pos old ass sony head unit half installed half lying in the dash

it works but only out of the rear and front left speakers not sure yet why that is

the other weird thing is that it seems that the head unit is wired through the factory amp

it seems like this is unnecessary if the sony head unit has its own internal amp

this brings us to the 3rd weird thing - the radio only works when the parking lights are on - also cds are mad quiet and the volume has no effect until you turn on the parking lights - then there is a loud pop - and the volume goes up for cds and the radio comes

i am pretty confused about how head units are supposed to be wired especially with this factory amp somehow still wired into the mix.

any advice would be greatly appreciated

 

[RocketDSM]

My advice.....unhook everything and start over. You are correct, using the factory amp with an aftermarket deck is near pointless and could easily be causing some problems. Remove your rear seats and interior mouldings so you can visually check the wiring to the rears. Wire the power to your deck first. Then run the wire for the rears first. Once you get straight which wires are right, left, front, and rear you can now wire up everything. It takes me about 30-60 minutes to do this (done it five times in three cars). Also, while you have things ripped apart, this is a good time to replace the stock wiring if you plan on going high power, or just want cleaner sound. There is also that remote chance that your deck is just screwed, but it doesn't sound like it. If you need more, let me know.

Neil

 

[Mike_22]

yeah, sounds like there may be a splice somewhere that crosses the illumination wire. that could be causing the parking light dilemma. but i agree that the best thing to do would be to rip it out and start over. but if you don't know hardly anything about audio equipment like you said, then i'd take it somewhere to have it done or if you have the money, go ahead and upgrade your equipment now. it'd be kinda boring riding around with a fast car and nothing to listen to except the engine. just a thought.

 

[unior]

yeah it works but barely

so i am bidding on a kenwood head unit right now on ebay

how should this thing be wired in?

should the factory amp have anything to do with the system

 

[ENEVEL RACER]

nope, just leave the factory amp unhooked and start over, run new wires from the radio to your speakers if you need to. take the time to do it right so you don't blow anything, and you don't have to do it again in the future. the illumination wire sounds like it may be powering your fatory amp, so I would just unhook everything and start from scratch.

 

[unior]

thanks - how hard is it to run a wire to the speakers?

also how do i wire in those wee little (tweeters) on the top of the dash - are they just spliced into the same wire as the door speakers?

also does that mean the factory amp is totally useless? is it worth it to somehow wire into the factory amp from the preamp output on the headunit? or will most head units outpower the amp anyway?

thanks a lot guys!

 

[Bd1000Eclipse]

hey mike 22.. your car looks sweet.. (just like mine but with different rims.. is it lowered any?

 

[ENEVEL RACER]

Originally posted by unior
thanks - how hard is it to run a wire to the speakers?

also how do i wire in those wee little (tweeters) on the top of the dash - are they just spliced into the same wire as the door speakers?

also does that mean the factory amp is totally useless? is it worth it to somehow wire into the factory amp from the preamp output on the headunit? or will most head units outpower the amp anyway?

thanks a lot guys!

Sorry, been gone a couple of days. More than likely, the factory amp won't have RCA connectors on it, so to hook your stereo up with preamps is almost impossible. Besides, you don't know where the problem lies. It's just better to start new. The dash speakers are probably jumped off of the door speakers. If you run wire to the speakers, just take some string and tie it to the original wire, make sure that the string is long enough, cause once you pull those old wires, you can use the string to pull the new wires through the same route that the old ones came out of. You wiil have to remove all panels to access the speakers. So if you do run new wires, you might want to think about changing out the factory speakers with after market so you don't have to rip it all apart later on.