Need some clarification/help on installing an amp for the door speakers

I am alittle confused how to run an amp with the door speakers over the factory wiring, I know your suppose to run wire from the amp directly to the speakers though but that would mess up the tweeters since there wired in parallel with the lower door speakers up front. Are there any install guides on doing this? I have aftermarket speakers and head unit but have everything run over the factory wiring.

 

Anyone?

 

Subbed for info.

 

Roll of speed wire from the amp up to the factory wiring behind the radio. Use

$5 Metra 70-1761 Radio Wiring Harness For Toyota 87-Up Power 4 Speaker

Metra 70-1761 harness to make plug-n-play connector

 

What do you mean by this? Run the left and right speaker bank from the amp and splice inline on the left and right bank supply wires on the back of the radio??

 

How I did it...bear in mind I have an aftermarket head unit and only a 2 door single cab.

RCA Cable from head unit to amps (which live under the seats).

I ran new (better) speaker wire from the amp outs to the front doors.

I then used a passive crossover on each door, which I connected the other end of the new (better) speaker wire to.

I then ran the out wires from the crossover to the new tweeter and the new 6x9 separately that I installed.

Any questions, ask away..

 

That makes since, I'm curious to know if it is possible to run over the factory wiring though instead of running all completely new wire for everything, and if so how?

 

Possible, sure. IMO not worth it. You'll be doing just as much work to use the factory stuff with an amp as to just run all new wiring..

One big reason is with better speaker wire coming off the amp, you'll have a better sound versus the thinner stock stuff.

The "tweeter" they use stock is a piece of junk anyway so not worth keeping. I'd have to look but if I recall right it might have a capacitor on that wire for the factory, but you'll need to really use an external crossover in my opinion to get the most from what you're doing.

Don't get me wrong, if you just wanted to use the stock unit I would say stick with the factory wiring..but think of this as the chain and weakest link theory. Plus you'll have to get from the amp to the door anyway with some kind of wire, since you already are feeding new wire why not just drop an extra 12-18 inches into the door and do it the easy way?

I'm running a Pioneer head unit..for the doors I have Rockford Fosgate 1" tweet and 6x9 in each door running off a crossover. Feeding it with a Megaloud 100x2 amp..Megaloud was a local shop and a friend of mine was a distributor for them, stuff was good. I'm using 2 12" MTX subs and a JBL 600x1 amp there too. Thing is plenty loud especially for a single cab.

 

Are you going to wire in a sub? Is the sub going to be powered or are you going to run a separate amp for that?

The easiest way to do it, is with a single 4ch amp and a powered sub. You can absolutely use the factory (speaker) wiring for anything up to 100 watts per channel, but honestly, unless you are going to troll the local mall with your windows down and want every one to watch your license plate frame bounce off your bumper, then 40-50w per channel to the doors is more than plenty for 99% of the people out there.

So, how do you do it?

You get 18-8 shielded wire from a reputable source, that has a (bare) ground inside the shielding as well. The ground inside the shielding needs to be tied to a ground on the head unit and a ground on the amp (NOT one of the speaker +/- leads). This grounds the shielding in the 18-8 and keeps any potential noise out of the system and prevents a ground loop. Super easy to do. It makes the shielding in the 18-8 an active part of the signal path.

The 18ga wires in the 18-8 bundle are bigger than the OEM speaker wires that come out of the factory head unit and head off to each speaker, so no worry there.

You run shielded RCA's from your head unit to your amp, then use the 18-8 bundle to get all of the speaker outputs from the amp back up to the Metra harness Destin mentioned, which will tie directly back in to the factory speaker wires right behind the head unit.

Make yourself a little diagram on paper so you can keep the wires sorted out for FR/FL (+/-) and RR/RL (+/-), and tie them into the Metra plug accordingly.

Done.

If you are going to run a sub, the HU will have a sub pre-amp out that you will run a (shielded) RCA from, then you can use regular speaker wire from the sub amp to the driver. OR if it is a powered sub, then you are done. (shielded) RCA from the HU to the powered sub and DONE.

The cool thing about the 18-8, which Destin calls speed wire, is that it is shielded and (provided you get the right stuff) has a ground traveler that solves a lot of (potential) noise issues.

Just remember, you will need to run a amp turn on wire to both the sub and the amp you install, so you can either run a separate wire, or just get 18-9 (shielded) ("speed wire") and call it a day.

This (link below) is what the 18-9 I am talking about looks like. The (active) ground I reference in my description above is called a "drain" wire and it is designed to "drain" off any EMI or RF interference so that the cable run doesn't become an antenna. It gets hooked to a ground on both ends to achieve that.

Hopefully this makes sense.


https://adcable.com/images/industrial_catalog/ADC_XLP-CPE_Shielded_Tray_Cable.pdf

 

Awesome! Great info here. Thanks as I’ll also be using this knowledge as soon as my rear speakers arrive with my kicker key

 

No problem... Let me clarify something in my previous post. You do NOT need to ground both ends of the "drain" to get the desired results. One end should definitely be tied to ground for sure tho, otherwise the shielding itself is not grounded. If you are going to ground both ends, just make sure you use a DVM (digital volt meter) to check for continuity between the first ground and the 2nd ground BEFORE you connect the drain to either one of them. TO do that, check whatever ground you use at the head unit side against whatever ground you use at the amp side to see if there is continuity, again, WITHOUT the drain connected. IF there is continuity, then you are safe to bond the drain to both ends as I mentioned in the previous post.

Just wanted to point out that the drain does not necessarily need to be connected at both ends to ground the shield in the speed wire you choose.

 

So basically it's just running the RCA cable from the radio to the amp and then running wire from the amp back behind the radio and spicing that inline with the speaker output wires off the back side of the radio to keep it simple

 

Just ordered a small amp and everything else needed to do the install, this weekend should be fun lol.

 

Well don't keep us in suspense, what are you adding?

 

Highly recommend focal isc 165 to anybody and they’re on sale at Crutchfield for $80 at the moment

 

Ordered a Boss 4 way 400 watt 2-4 ohm amp to try out, nothing super fancy just want something to boost my pioneer head unit alittle more

 

The amp is 100w RMS at 2 ohms x4 or 50w RMS at 4 ohms x4

This should pair well with my speakers that are 100w RMS max 80w RMS normal

If it ends up not being all the great I'll spend the extra money on the rockford fosgate amp to go with my speakers

 

Damn it. Decisions decisions. I picked up a really good deal from Skar audio for a 400 watt 4 channel amp (https://www.skaraudio.com/products/sk-m4004d-car-amplifier) and two 6.5" components (100w a piece) and their aluminum dome tweeters (https://www.skaraudio.com/products/spx-65c-6-5-inch-component-speaker-system). It was an impulse buy. Now I'm looking at adapter plates and "how the hell do I do this". Previously I've only ever just replaced speakers on a stock head unit, then changed the head unit without adding an amp or a sub. Now I'm looking at an amp and possibly a powered sub on the stock head unit (with the idea of an aftermarket head unit later). Any advice, really? Do you think the factory wiring will handle it without issue? Or do you think I should run new wiring?

 

So I installed everything and have a ton of static sound when I turn the volume up now?

 

It can but I think it's just simpler to run your own (better) wire off the amp.

Adapter plates, simple. @Mrmarv makes a good plate, I've used them in mine with great success.