Bentham Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 Ok, got the amp in today and the subwoofer will be here sometime during the week. I was wondering if I should have this professionally installed..,[and how much $$], or if a friend and I could do it on our own. I think we could get everything hooked up; but i'm not sure how what to set the 'dials' at. Thanks for any help -Eric Eric 93 Cad Seville 100K 95 Chev Blazer 143K [garaged summers] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ByStorm Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 I have always put sound systems in my own vehicles. I have an '01 STS that I will not touch. I also have and '88 that I did do some work in. What year is your caddy? ByStorm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bentham Posted March 30, 2004 Author Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 '93 I know a good place that can do the work - just wondering if it's easy enough to do myself. -Eric Eric 93 Cad Seville 100K 95 Chev Blazer 143K [garaged summers] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willie Hank Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 I don't trust other people,...one time I got a free installation from Best Buy, and the fader controls were all messed up and the speakers were out of phase. I really don't know what advice to give, not knowing the hardware.... If you bought an amp just for the sub-woofers, set the low pass filter at 150 hz, or slightly lower,..I think you had 6-1/2" drivers... There are many ways of wiring the sub-woofers, a lot has to do with the quantity, their impedance and the stability of the amplifier. As a for instance, I bought an 400 watt bridgable amplifier stable at four ohms, and wired two 10" subwoofers rated at 8 ohms in parallel, to net a total speaker load of 4 ohms, and each woofer will then see approximately 200 watts RMS each (they are rated 250 watts continuous power). Had I wired them in series, the power consumption, and decibel level would have been cut significantly. The key is to assure the continuous power rating of the speakers is at least as great as the RMS of the amplifier, for a given impedance. Remember, running an amp that is rated at 2 ohms will almost double the power output, but it also signiificantly increases the distortion at RMS levels (read the fine print). I would stay away from doing this, I'm am usually conservative,....although big "honker" subwoofers, say 15" and greater are much more tolerant to higher levels of distortion... If you could give me some specs, I might lend specific advice... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
67coupedeville Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 Do you have your factory radio or CD player still in? If you do, I sure can't help, but if you have an aftermarket deck its super easy. There are two RCA cable outlets (Red and White) on the back of your deck. Run RCA cables from the back of the deck to the amp. There will also be a "Remote" wire on your deck that tells the amp to turn on when you turn your deck on, run that wire as well to the amp. Run a power wire (+) with at least a 30 amp fuse as close to the battery as possible and depending on what kind of power your amp and sub will be drawing usually at least 10-8 gauge wire will do. Ground (-) the amp to a piece of chassis, and hook up your positive and negative wires with just regular speaker wire from the amp to the subwoofer. I don't think I forgot anything but I'm sure someone can correct me if I did Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lacseville Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 i'm sure you saved all our old posts..... right?? i hope! anyhow, if you simply do not think you have the mechanical inclination to do it, then no, let somebody else. you will end up with a mess that you will never get sorted by yourself. if you have an inclination to do this, I highly suggest it. you will get so much satisfaction every time it turns on and bumps like it should. it's really not too hard. a good afternoon (i say it took me 5 hours my first time) you will also get to know your car better. (not that anything is really cool under door seals and in the trunk!) it should only be about $75 to have an audio shop to run all the wires. if you are going to have them run wires, let them go ahead and hook your stuff up. it probably won't cost you extra because its easy. PLEASE, if you do this yourself, which i know you can do, let a shop set your gains on your amp. this is one of the most impt factors in longevity of your system! do not just turn the gains all the way up. it is not a volume or wattage control, contrary to popular belief! Let me know what you decide. i'm here on this board every day! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bentham Posted March 30, 2004 Author Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 Hey guys - thanks all the help so far. Here are the specs on all of the components it DOES say there are hookups on the back of head unit """And if you like massive bass, a set of preamp outputs is available for hooking up an amp and subwoofer. """ SPECS: the HEAD UNIT:: http://www.crutchfield.com/S-bRnGJ7Gwt2Z/c...a=0&cc=01&avf=N the SUBWOOFER:: http://www.crutchfield.com/S-bRnGJ7Gwt2Z/c...a=0&cc=01&avf=N The AMPLIFIER: http://www.dynadirect.com/ca-jxp340.html?A...987&PID=1358132 Thanks guys! -Eric Eric 93 Cad Seville 100K 95 Chev Blazer 143K [garaged summers] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pushinthelac Posted March 30, 2004 Report Share Posted March 30, 2004 Saves you the money if you know what you're doing. If not, hopefuly you have connections, because nothing is cheap now days.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willie Hank Posted March 31, 2004 Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 Bentham, Sooooo you decided to buy a head unit. I think I remember telling you if your '93 Seville is a non-Bose system, you have an "odd-duck" stereo (like mine), which will make the installation a bit more challenging. First off, the non-Bose OEM stereo is odd in that it does not have a conventional DIN-style head unit, the in-dash unit is nothing more than a tuner control panel with a cassette player. I have never removed mine, but you will note it is about 2-1/2" as tall as a standard height DIN mount, so it may be very shallow. What this means is you will porabably have to fabrictae a custom bezel and custom mounting hardware. The actual OEM amplifier is in the right rear trunk panel. Basically, you will end up "gutting" evrything, and running patchcord back to your rear amplifier. Now comes decisions,..decisions. I noted your Blaupunkt reciever is 27 watts x 4 channels (front & rear). I assume you plan on using the powered outputs to run your front & rear interior speakers. So what pre-amp outputs are you going to run to your bridged amplifier ? If you use either the front or rear pre-outs, or a combination of both, your front and rear fader controls will affect the output of your woofer. Thats why some head units have just a sub-woofer pre-out, or the reason you consider buying a cross-over unit. A cross-over box takes 2 pair of pre-ins and creates 3 pairs of pre-outs, for your pair of front speakers, your pair of rear speakers and it then electronically mixes the front and rear signals to create a pair of low-pass pre-out signals that will not be affected by either side-to-side or front-rear fader controls. I bought an MTX RT-X02A electronic crossover about three years ago, seemed like it was $ 150. Now if you do not want to spend the extra cash, you can use either front or rear pre-outs, just don't use fade the pre-out pair you select. Your Jenson amp is rated at 170 watts RMS at 4 ohms "bridged" and your Bazooka subwoofer is rated at 300 watts RMS and has 4-ohm impedance, so your amp is very conservative. Always start with the gain set at 50% (halfway), to test the unit, but I suspect you will end up increasing it, based on its ratings. You have a lot of work to do, but I have a feeling because of the head unit installation, and running all the speaker wires from scratch an installation shop will hit you for over $ 400. Your looking at a 10 to 14 hour job by the time you mount the head unit, fabricate a bezel and run the wires. Remember to run your power lead to the amplifier directly from the battery, to reduce noise. The manual should state what size gauge wire to use, your looking at 8 - 10 gauge for the red power lead, go with 8 gauge. Because of this strange stereo in my STS, I made it simple and tapped off the speaker wires coming off the OEM amplifier in the trunk, used a turn-down amplifier to get to a pre-amp signal, and fed that back through a much larger amplifier, to power my inside speakers. I then purchased an Infinity powered sub-woofer that took high-ins from the same amp outputs, it took the front and rear signal and mixed them like a cross-over, so the fader would not affect the sub-woofer. It was a very easy installation as I used the original speaker leads, but had to compromise with an RF CD changer (that was disappointing). Good luck, whatever you decide to do, and don't say I didn't tell you... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willie Hank Posted March 31, 2004 Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 but you will note it is about 2-1/2" as tall as a standard height DIN mount, so it may be very shallow. OOps, meant to say it is about 2-1/2 TIMES as tall as a standard height DIN mount, so it may be very shallow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bentham Posted March 31, 2004 Author Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 Quick note: The head unit is already installed! The shop, as I remember, ran 6-8 wires from the trunk up to the head unit. Thanks -Eric Eric 93 Cad Seville 100K 95 Chev Blazer 143K [garaged summers] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willie Hank Posted March 31, 2004 Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 Quick note: The head unit is already installed! The shop, as I remember, ran 6-8 wires from the trunk up to the head unit. Thanks -Eric Wow, that was quick,..what did they charge ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bentham Posted March 31, 2004 Author Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 I think it was only around $75 .. Took 'em about 1 1/2 - they had 2 guys working on it. -Eric Eric 93 Cad Seville 100K 95 Chev Blazer 143K [garaged summers] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willie Hank Posted March 31, 2004 Report Share Posted March 31, 2004 I think it was only around $75 .. Took 'em about 1 1/2 - they had 2 guys working on it. -Eric Good deal, .... that was money well spent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.