Tuesday, April 03, 2007 - 05:45 pm, by: Kyle Wathen(Cspot)
I bought my Soarer a few weeks ago its a GTTL with factory sub, amp etc and aftermarket headunit.
So currently the only speakers working are front left and rear right. The rear left crackles (so i guess thats gone ), the front right just doesn't work (no sounds at all form it) and of course the factory sub is no longer working.
Im thinking that the guy who installed the head unit may have had no idea how the soarer stereo works when its got the factory amp etc and as a result had no idea how to wire it, hence the front right not working at all due to incorrect wiring?
Big stereos isn't my thing so my plan is to have a decent sounding system at a reasonable price (anythings better than 2 speakers )
Headunit: I am keeping the aftermarket headunit that came with the car - Pioneer DEH-P4850MP specs below;
Tuesday, April 03, 2007 - 06:01 pm, by: Brian Timms(Turbo_brian)
Are you trying to power all speakers plus sub, or just front speakers and sub???
Best option for you at the moment I think would be to plan on front speakers plus subwoofer, as I know the Pioneer DEH 4 series only has RCA for front and subwoofer, no RCA for rears....
Get a decent Amplifier wiring kit, and then get what ever 4 channel amp you can afford with the left over money from that.
Run a dedicated power from the battery to the boot (or where you want to install the Amp).
Run your 4 channel RCA leads, plus remote wire form head unit to the amplifier (run the RCA on the other side to the power cable to avoid interference).
Ground the amp at the section where to Stacker fits, remember to scrub the area with some sandpaper first so you have a good clean connection.
Then look to run new clean speaker wire from the Amp to your speakers.
You can Mount another 10" subwoofer back in the stock position (I have an MTX 10" in mine, fits nicely, but some have monster magnets that dont fit) and then run the cables for that back to the amp as well.
If you connect it all up properly, you will have a very nice sounding system.
And for the rears, if you get rear speakers, you can run these off the rear feeds from the headunit, as the rears are only for fill unless your looking at a 5.1 surround, in which case an amp for $250 wouldn't be worth looking at.
Question 1 - The best you can afford! Question 2 - It's best to do this, and much more reliable. Question 2 - Best way to test is to pull the door trim off, inspect the speaker, and connect a sound source to it without the Soarer system turned on.
Thursday, April 05, 2007 - 08:21 am, by: Brian Timms(Turbo_brian)
Bang for Buck, Jaycar amps are the better alternative.
They hold very decent build quality (haven't heard a single complaint on power/quality about them), and they dont look to bad on the eye either.
Yes, you can spend mega bucks and buy a brand name, such as Kicker, Pioneer, Clarion, Rockford, Schnieder, etc but power/dollar, the Jaycar are at the top (they just dont go as high as some of the other names do).
Dont forget, the amp is only a section of the installation, there is also the proper running of the cables, the correct earthing (otherwise you will get engine buzz), and setting up the amp to sound right on your headunit.
I cant stress enough the importance of grounding the amp and the headunit as well, because if not done properly, it wouldn't matter if it was a $30,000 setup, it will still sound ordinary.
Thursday, April 05, 2007 - 01:16 pm, by: Kyle Wathen(Cspot)
Any recommendations on the best point to ground the headunit and amp too?
I was thinking of running the power down the driver side of the car and the Speakers/RCA cables straight down the middle under the console then into boot through passenger side of car.
Then once its all connected i will have to spend a bit of time playing around with the settings.
Brian Timms TryHard New South Wales TT Soarer Goodness.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007 - 03:59 pm, by: Chris Wright(Extremelanos)
Sorry to bring up an old topic, but I just installed a new headunit, and my old Kenwood unit had a wire going from it for a remote antenna wire, which was attached to a blue wire. My new headunit doesn't have one, and so I left the blue wire unconnected. Now I have been getting bad reception in places, and I'm not sure if it's because the blue wire isn't attached to anything? Can anyone help me?
The Remote/Antenna wire (usually blue) is generally used to turn on the amplifier when the car get switched on. The only "antenna" cable you need to plug in to make the radio work correctly is the thick black one.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007 - 06:53 pm, by: Chris Wright(Extremelanos)
I have that blue wire which is wired to my amp, the remote wire. But I also have another blue wire for a remote antenna wire, so I'm at a loss as to why it was plugged into my old headunit and I had good reception and now my reception isn't so great with this new headunit because the wire isn't plugged into it.
Rob Andreacchio Goo Roo Victoria Supercharged VT Calais & 1991 JZZ30
Thursday, September 06, 2007 - 06:14 am, by: Matthew Sharpe(Madmatt)
Did you adjust the reception screw? Don't know about the current generation of head units, but they all used to have a screw on or in them somewhere that you had to turn to adjust to get the best reception.
Friday, September 07, 2007 - 06:32 am, by: Matthew Sharpe(Madmatt)
The screw is there to adjust the receiver to the properties of your antenna - I believe its basically a signal gain adjustment. Take a look and see if you can find it and turn up the gain (clockwise) and see if that helps.
Of course its so many years since I installed a stereo that maybe they use an automated system these days.