2014 BRZ - mods and activities
 

I bought this red 2014 BRZ Limited summer of 2020. One owner vehicle, well taken care of, with only 30k miles of easy driving. Very stock at this point. Looked at some clapped out BRZs before finding this one. How many rebuilt title BRZs are out there - seemed like every other one I looked at, lol.

https://i.imgur.com/K3lmUkR.jpg

Starting this thread to document some activities and modifications made to the vehicle. In case anyone is interested, and for my own reference.

Click on "go advanced" and from there, use the image uploader. Just be wary that it will flip photos taken in portrait format horizontal sometimes

If you are using your phone make sure you copy the URL link and not generic copy. The URL link will have h ttps://i.imgur.c o m

Yeah thanks guys, I was using the generic link and not tagging correctly. Got it working now.

Recent install of a budget subwoofer/amp in the BRZ. Here are some details.

Goals for this install:

• Add some missing bass
• Maximize trunk cargo space
• Limit destruction/removal of current system
• Budget cost

On to the install:

For the subwoofer I chose the Rockford R11X10 10-Inch 200 Watt Single Loaded Enclosure. I chose this sub because of how well it fit in the BRZ trunk space. The back slope of the sub cabinet exactly matches the slope of the BRZ rear seat. The cabinet height allows placement on either side of the trunk, just under the metal body lip. This sub also fit my budget of around $100. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

You can see in these photos below, the sub fits well back against the BRZ rear seat, and allows for decent truck space.

https://i.imgur.com/45hz9mx.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/qETqGcZ.jpg

For the amp I decided to replace the stock under floor mounted trunk amp. I wanted the new amp to have the following features:

• 4 channels (1&2 for the stock door speakers, 3&4 bridgeable for the sub
• Built-in HPF/LPF filters for channels 1&2 and 3&4
• Bridgeable channels 3&4 (to provide max sub power)
• Power output sufficient for sub
• Line level inputs (for stock BRZ head unit)
• Fit under the trunk floor in place of the stock amp
• Low heat output (due to under-floor location)
• Budget cost

The amp I chose was this Kenwood Class D Bridgeable Multichannel Amplifier with Variable Crossovers mode, got it on sale for $150. https://www.bestbuy.com/site/kenwood...?skuId=6330250

The Kenwood amp just barely fit under the trunk floor, between the mounting bolts, in place of the stock amp. Below are some photos of how I located the amp on the body floor. I made a plate out of thin plywood, mounted the amp to the plywood, and the plywood to two of the stock amp mounting bolts. The height of this setup just makes it. (I’ll replace the wood plate with aluminum down the road.) Only thing I needed to cut was a small section of the stock foam trunk filler.

https://i.imgur.com/w1YLMZH.jpg

By using the amp HPF (high pass filter), I was able to remove the lowest bass frequencies from the stock door speakers on channels 1&2, allowing those speakers to focus more on the mid/upper bass. The amp provides a rated 50 watts per channel to the door speakers.

And then I bridged channels 3&4 to power the subwoofer, while using the LPF (low pass filter) to only send the lowest bass frequencies to the sub. The amp provides a rated 150 watts to the sub.

https://i.imgur.com/d8uhI1N.jpg

I used an adapter coupling to attach the stock input/output speaker wires that originally went to the stock amp (for the door speakers), to the new Kenwood amp. This avoided having to cut any wires, and allows going back to the stock amp easily if needed. Thanks to the forum members here for clueing me in on this coupler. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

https://i.imgur.com/fLZVq28.jpg

Although I used the stock speaker wiring, I ran a new power and ground wire for the amp, because the stock power wiring would have been marginal. The amp instructions recommended a minimum 10 gauge power wire. I went with 4 gauge, which admittedly was overkill. Future proof in case of upgrading the amp.

Here is where I went a bit unorthodox though. In a pinch not being able to find locally the wire, I ended up using 4 gauge jumper cable wire. This set from Walmart for $20.00: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Everstart...bles/182918724

https://i.imgur.com/162mnwD.jpg

I sliced the wire down the middle with a razor (although you could also just pull the two wires apart). This effectively gave me 40ft of wire, and I’ll use that extra down the road in my Jeep.
This wire is CCA (copper clad aluminum) wire. But seems fine for my use, was low cost, and the jacket does not smell like some other wire plastic coatings. (Hate that “skunk smell” plastic.)

Below are some photos of how I ran the wire from the battery to the amp. The battery connector is temporary until designing something better. I drilled a ½ inch hole through the firewall for the power cable. Some people don’t like drilling holes, and typically I don’t either. But this was easier than trying to fish the 4 gauge wire through the stock large grommet wire assembly, possibly tearing or messing that up. I’m happy with the location and ease of use of the dedicated power wire hole. I put a grommet in the hole to protect the wire:

https://i.imgur.com/QgJlxh0.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/oxwyMwg.jpg

I used an inline fuse holder with 50 amp fuse, located on the firewall behind the battery. There seem to be several different versions of this fuse holder on the market. This particular version (Carwires IFH-AGU In-Line AGU Fuse Holder) seems better than others. https://www.frys.com/product/7722868...romSearch=true

The fuse holder can be removed from the body mount clip, allowing for easier attachment of the wires. (Mounted the clip to firewall using high strength double sided 3M tape.) Also I was able to fit two rubber grommets where the power wired enters the housing, and this provides for a very nice weather seal, compared to not having any grommet.

https://i.imgur.com/LCWpOjP.jpg

I ran the power wire from the fuse through the firewall hole, under the carpet on the passenger side, and then under the trunk floor to the amp location. For ground I used a short 10” 4 gauge wire fastened to one of the shock mounting bolts (sanded to provide good metal contact).

https://i.imgur.com/TADnZkA.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/Khok98B.jpg

Well how does it sound? Very nice improvement in the bass department. The sub is now providing the missing low bass punch, while the door speakers are focused on the mid/high bass. I can turn the volume up to where I don’t want to turn it higher, and there is no distortion. When needed, I can easily relocated or remove the sub (for max trunk space), and everything else is hidden out of the way.

The intention here was not expensive high end audio. Rather something on a budget and quickly done. This setup has nice firm bass you would expect from a non-ported sub, but not gut punching lows you would get with a larger ported sub and more powerful amp. The door speakers are providing a surprisingly nice mid/high bass, having used the amp HPF to remove the low bass notes. But someday I would like a fuller midrange sound, which would require a speaker upgrade. Overall I can blast this stereo and the sound is nice for the price and effort. (Done in the driveway during Chicago winter.) The amp seems to run cool under the floor. No complaints so far. But ask me 6 months from now - if the setup holds up to my sons blasting the radio!

Looking good and clean. Glad it sounds good for you.

Thanks. As a new BRZ owner, I learned a lot from the forum and working on this audio project. Down the road, I can see going more "all-in" with a new head unit and speakers/amps, possibly moving things around to re-use in my old Jeep which also needs an audio upgrade. But for now in the BRZ it's a nice improvement. I do need to fasten the sub down though, because it shifts around more than I had thought it would.