fishEH
Well-known member
Thanks, good to know!
New stereo
- Thread starter fishEH
- Start date
If you have a volt meter, go ahead and use the stock power and ground wires. That's what most professionals do anyway. Make sure you differentiate between the ignition and the battery (constant) when installing the head unit. The proper size of the head unit you will need is DIN. Also, you can use a 1.5V battery to determine the stock speaker wires and the location of the speaker. Touch the wires that you think that leads straight to the speaker. It will make a small static sound. If you can see the woofer, you can watch it carefully and if it moves outward first, you know you have the polarity correct. For wire size, the larger the amp and speaker, the larger the wire will need to be. Don't use too small of a wire for the amp's power and ground or you might burn your disco up. Kennith brought up a very good point of using filters for dust if you travel on dirt roads or off of the payment. We had to clean several Pot's down here just because of the dust. Pay attention to the THD% when buying an amp. The may claim 100 watts, but if it's at 10.0 % THD, it's useless.
fishEH
Well-known member
Thanks, good tips. Hopefully I won't be buying an amp, just reusing the stock sub amp for the stock subs.
How much separation? Would separate wire loom eliminate the interference?
K-rover
Well-known member
A few inches should be enough. This mostly applies to systems that are running aftermarket amps, where you have a big 4 gauge power from the battery to the amp.
Most interference comes from a faulty ground.
fishEH
Well-known member
Ugh, I hate stereo stuff. So you're saying the amp in the new head unit will work for all the speakers, 4 plus 2 tweeters, and the stock sub?
K-rover
Well-known member
The deck can power four speakers. IF you get some passive crossovers you can run the tweeters too. The sub will still need an amp. you can use the factory amp, but it will require a wiring adapter to go from the RCA out on the deck to line level input on the amp.
Crossovers can be had for cheap. http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/180988912895?lpid=82
K-rover
Well-known member
Its not wise to run 4 mids off of 2 channels. You start changing impedance and putting extra load on the amp, not to mention you no longer have fade control. There are amps out there that are 1 ohm stable, but theyre not cheap.
Bridging the other two channels works well with aftermarket woofers. The factory paper cones wont last one day with that much power. The amp on the his Pioneeer head unit has more than enough power, no reason not to use it. If you really want to, get a small two channel amp that is bridgeable and power the sub that way. But again, its overkill.
I installed car stereos professionally for several years. Ive seen some super clean installs and others that Im surprised didnt burn the car down!!:ack:
Like Brett said... KISS.. Keep It Simple Stupid!
I'm running a stocker D2 headunit to a modified pioneer amp in my disco. I had to balance the inputs on the amp or else the two would throw a bitch fit. You can put the D2 headunit onto the factory amp with no qualms. the PO fucked my harness to a new level so I had nothing left functional.
I've since added a bmw iPod adapter to it as well. At some point I'll get around to building a arduino board to chat with it and have wheel controls since its networked.
I've since added a bmw iPod adapter to it as well. At some point I'll get around to building a arduino board to chat with it and have wheel controls since its networked.
MM3846
Well-known member
Yes, the factory sub has it's own amp.
fishEH
Well-known member
Alright, that passover thing is pretty cheap. I thought it was an actual speaker but it's more like a switch or filter for the tweeters, right? Would I need two of those, one for each tweeter?
How big of a deal would that adapter be? There's only two RCA's coming out of the deck so it would seem fairly easy to make maybe?
Here's what's in the front speakers.
Here's what he had in the sub. Though it wasn't powered through the sub output, they were acting like the rear speakers.
I smell the beginnings of Netjaws...
A Discovery body is plain awful for any kind of good sound. At the very least, the roof has no support in the back, and flops up and down like a huge drum membrane. Any open window at 50+ mph, and it become one huge bass whistle (it is true for any station wagon). The sitting position is very high compared to the front speaker placement (which necessitated pillar-mounted tweeters). The door seals are shitty (I can see through the opening of one of the rear doors on one D1, and wind blows through the front door seal if another). I could continue, but the point is...
Stock stereo was very adequate, but a cassette tape is a bit antiquated. A $120-150 Pioneer unit with 4x25W output and USB and aux line inputs fits the bill really well; CD is somewhat useless - or becomes totally useless once it ingests enough dust.
The only thing I still have not figured out is how to hook up the speaker output of the VHF/UHF to the input of the head unit - and not to have any whine and noise. Even isolating the input and output with a transformer did not quite do the trick.
K-rover
Well-known member
The passive crossover acts like a filter to split the frequencies to the appropriate speakers. Keeps the lows out of the tweeters..etc.
If you only have two RCA outputs on the deck, then you may not have a sub out. If that is the case then what I would do is this...
power all four speakers and the tweeters off the deck. Get a two channel amp with an active crossover built in. then run the RCAs from the rear output of the deck to the amp.
Use the built in crossover in the amp to cancel out the highs.. A dedicated sub out from the deck would normally take care of most of that filtering..
Another option is a 5 channel amp, but those are big and pricey.
To be honest those speakers being used as woofers arent the best option. Those look like full range speakers and not dedicated woofers. They will never hit as hard or be as tight.
Just like anything, its all about how much you want to spend.. and what its worth to you..
Dude, don't you have an ipod and some ear buds?
kennith
Well-known member
These newer receivers are fairly powerful. I've got a Pioneer DEH-80PRS in the Jag, and it's pushing four 6" Image Dynamics coaxials. That thing will run you out of the car, even with the top down.
I'm still dropping the PPI amp in there, though, and adding a matching amp and 10" sub.
I'm not too enthusiastic about the speakers I'm dropping in the DII, but fuck it. They'll make noise.
If he's stuck with 5" drivers, he absolutely needs to go with components to get the maximum amount of piston area, and I'd be sure to grab units with dust caps on the mid-bass drivers; rather than phase plugs or convertible tweeter mounts. He should get a lot of clean power going to them, as well, to push the excursion as far as possible.
So, I'd suggest outboard amplification. You can get tiny little buggers now that will push the hell out of your whole system. Arc Audio makes some nice little Class D units. That will keep everything tame enough to bring the drivers as low as possible.
Cheers,
Kennith
MM3846
Well-known member
what happened to KISS? those blue pioneers suck, rockford makes 4" speakers that are like 35 a pair and are probably way better. the factory sub box is sitting in my closet in my apt and my air hose fits nicely in that spot. two RCA outputs is probably a rear out and a sub out, i've never not seen a deck with RCA pre outs and without a sub out.
for a 6.5" woofer that actually is a woofer, you need to spend some money. the cheapest would be a tang-band one, and its like 70 bucks for just one. then you need an amp, and a shitty amp is shit, so thats another 150. like said before, its all about how much you want to spend. i'm more than satisfied with the four stock speakers (no tweeters) and my kenwood deck.