Cheapest way to get better bass

[pancake]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

The harness came with it. That amp is actually made for motorcycles. Physically small amps like that will always have a harness instead of embedded RCA connections because it takes less space. The other amp I was looking at for my doors and surrounds, an Alpine KTP-445U, had the same setup.

Here's an example of an amp/sub boxed combo. If I get an all-in-one setup like this, I will not need an LOC, right? Because Iwould just stick the R+ R- L+ and L- into the amp where it says high-level input?

[gramicci101]

Originally Posted by pancake

Here's an example of an amp/sub boxed combo. If I get an all-in-one setup like this, I will not need an LOC, right? Because Iwould just stick the R+ R- L+ and L- into the amp where it says high-level input?

Powered subs are a great way to go. The optional Subaru OEM sub is a powered Kicker 10" with a 100 watt amp. I wouldn't get Dual, because that's Walmart quality for Walmart prices, but there are others available.

https://www.crutchfield.com/g_51000/...ml?tp=114&pg=2

From that list, I wouldn't hesitate to get Rockford, Memphis, JL, Alpine, or Kicker. The others are probably just fine; those are just the brands that I like. Focal is too expensive and unnecessarily high quality for car audio.

As long as the amp has high level (speaker wire) inputs, you don't need a LOC. If you don't need a LOC, you can pull the trick with the Metra harnesses and connect straight to the amp's inputs. You'll still need to run power from the battery and ground to a ground point. The remote turn-on will come from the harnesses.

[pancake]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

Powered subs are a great way to go. The optional Subaru OEM sub is a powered Kicker 10" with a 100 watt amp. I wouldn't get Dual, because that's Walmart quality for Walmart prices, but there are others available.

https://www.crutchfield.com/g_51000/...ml?tp=114&pg=2

From that list, I wouldn't hesitate to get Rockford, Memphis, JL, Alpine, or Kicker. The others are probably just fine; those are just the brands that I like. Focal is too expensive and unnecessarily high quality for car audio.

As long as the amp has high level (speaker wire) inputs, you don't need a LOC. If you don't need a LOC, you can pull the trick with the Metra harnesses and connect straight to the amp's inputs. You'll still need to run power from the battery and ground to a ground point. The remote turn-on will come from the harnesses.

Thanks so much for the help . I think i'm going to go with one of the Rockford powered setups. With your help here , and the pictures in your other thread, I think I'll be able to get this done without too much difficulty. Thanks again!

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

Powered subs are a great way to go. The optional Subaru OEM sub is a powered Kicker 10" with a 100 watt amp. I wouldn't get Dual, because that's Walmart quality for Walmart prices, but there are others available.

https://www.crutchfield.com/g_51000/...ml?tp=114&pg=2

From that list, I wouldn't hesitate to get Rockford, Memphis, JL, Alpine, or Kicker. The others are probably just fine; those are just the brands that I like. Focal is too expensive and unnecessarily high quality for car audio.

As long as the amp has high level (speaker wire) inputs, you don't need a LOC. If you don't need a LOC, you can pull the trick with the Metra harnesses and connect straight to the amp's inputs. You'll still need to run power from the battery and ground to a ground point. The remote turn-on will come from the harnesses.

This is one of my projects planned for the spring and I understood three words you said there. I am screwed!

[gramicci101]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

This is one of my projects planned for the spring and I understood three words you said there. I am screwed!

Do you know basic wiring theory? I'd imagine so, if you've ever worked on your house. It's very similar, just use crimps or solder instead of wire nuts.

Your power wire (don't lick this!) needs to have a fuse within 15 inches of the battery terminal. There's a big gasket right behind the battery that you can fish the wire through to get it inside the car. From there just peel up the edge of the carpet and feed the wire all the way back to your amp. Your ground wire needs to be as short as possible; I routed mine to one of the screws holding the door amp down. Just get some sandpaper and buff the paint off right around the screw hole so the ground will make better contact. Your power and ground wires need to be the same size.

Any amp wiring kit that you buy will have all the fuses, wiring, and connectors that you need. Size your wiring kit off the size of the amp you buy. If you have a 200 watt amp, you don't need an 00 gauge wiring kit. An 8 gauge kit will work just fine. If you're pushing 3000 watts, an 8 gauge kit won't cut it.

LOC is Line Output Converter. This takes the high level output from the radio (speaker wires) and converts them to a low level input for the amp (RCA connectors). The basic ones are purely a physical format conversion. The nice ones boost the signal to a uniform voltage and may give you some form of crossover or gain control as well. Many amps have high level inputs though, which means you can run speaker wires straight to the amp.

Your FRS might have RCA outputs on the back of the radio, which means that you don't need a LOC. You can run RCA cables direct from your radio to your amp in order to pass signal. This is good because it's a uniform voltage (2 or 4 volts) instead of varying with the audio signal, and because you don't have to tap off of an existing speaker's wire to get audio signal. So all of the craziness I did with the Metra harnesses then becomes unnecessary. You can fish a single wire back with the RCAs for remote turn-on at the same time.

That's really it. Account for power, ground, signal, and remote turn-on, and your amp will work. Wire the speaker correctly to the amp, and the speaker will work. And then you can make noise to your heart's content.

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

Do you know basic wiring theory? I'd imagine so, if you've ever worked on your house. It's very similar, just use crimps or solder instead of wire nuts.

Your power wire (don't lick this!) needs to have a fuse within 15 inches of the battery terminal. There's a big gasket right behind the battery that you can fish the wire through to get it inside the car. From there just peel up the edge of the carpet and feed the wire all the way back to your amp. Your ground wire needs to be as short as possible; I routed mine to one of the screws holding the door amp down. Just get some sandpaper and buff the paint off right around the screw hole so the ground will make better contact. Your power and ground wires need to be the same size.

Any amp wiring kit that you buy will have all the fuses, wiring, and connectors that you need. Size your wiring kit off the size of the amp you buy. If you have a 200 watt amp, you don't need an 00 gauge wiring kit. An 8 gauge kit will work just fine. If you're pushing 3000 watts, an 8 gauge kit won't cut it.

LOC is Line Output Converter. This takes the high level output from the radio (speaker wires) and converts them to a low level input for the amp (RCA connectors). The basic ones are purely a physical format conversion. The nice ones boost the signal to a uniform voltage and may give you some form of crossover or gain control as well. Many amps have high level inputs though, which means you can run speaker wires straight to the amp.

Your FRS might have RCA outputs on the back of the radio, which means that you don't need a LOC. You can run RCA cables direct from your radio to your amp in order to pass signal. This is good because it's a uniform voltage (2 or 4 volts) instead of varying with the audio signal, and because you don't have to tap off of an existing speaker's wire to get audio signal. So all of the craziness I did with the Metra harnesses then becomes unnecessary. You can fish a single wire back with the RCAs for remote turn-on at the same time.

That's really it. Account for power, ground, signal, and remote turn-on, and your amp will work. Wire the speaker correctly to the amp, and the speaker will work. And then you can make noise to your heart's content.

OK that is easier than I thought. Car sound systems was never my strong point.

[gramicci101]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

OK that is easier than I thought. Car sound systems was never my strong point.

Just throwing a sub or two in is easy, especially if you're fine with a universal box and your radio has RCA outputs. The difficulty comes when you're doing 3+ subs, big power, custom boxes, or you want an OEM look. As with everything, the devil is in the details. A setup like mine or like one of the powered subs I linked is straightforward with very few curveballs thrown in.

[Chimera]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

Just throwing a sub or two in is easy, especially if you're fine with a universal box and your radio has RCA outputs. The difficulty comes when you're doing 3+ subs, big power, custom boxes, or you want an OEM look. As with everything, the devil is in the details. A setup like mine or like one of the powered subs I linked is straightforward with very few curveballs thrown in.

Once the hardware is in you get a chance to go down the wonderful path of how do I set my crossovers? �� have fun!

Gram how's yours setup?

[gramicci101]

Originally Posted by Chimera

Once the hardware is in you get a chance to go down the wonderful path of how do I set my crossovers? �� have fun!

Gram how's yours setup?

I'm happy with it. I knew going in that since I was using the head unit for DSP I would have limited control over frequencies and gain, and really only for the sub. It took a little bit of sitting in the car, listening, running to the trunk to slightly adjust the gain and crossover knobs, sitting back in the car, listening some more, and so on, but I got it pretty well balanced for the volume that I listen at. It's low-passed at 90 Hz. I started at 120, but too much of the non-bass audio was coming through and making the sound muddy.


I would like to filter some of the low frequencies out of my door speakers, but such is life. To get that ability would require more money, more complexity, and more work. It's on my list of things to do, but not very high on that list. I could just throw a passive high pass crossover in the signal path, but I'd rather replace the speakers and put an amp on it, because the amp will have a crossover on it anyways. I may or may not ever get around to that.

[Fred Flintstone]

My simple solution was sound deadening material. You could buy the Sound Skins door kit, it help mine immensely on the base! Or to go even cheaper get the sticky back roof flashing from Lowe's and line the inner and outer skin of the doors. (Note) The Sound Skins comes precut that's what I did...

[pancake]

Originally Posted by gramicci101

Powered subs are a great way to go. The optional Subaru OEM sub is a powered Kicker 10" with a 100 watt amp. I wouldn't get Dual, because that's Walmart quality for Walmart prices, but there are others available.

https://www.crutchfield.com/g_51000/...ml?tp=114&pg=2

From that list, I wouldn't hesitate to get Rockford, Memphis, JL, Alpine, or Kicker. The others are probably just fine; those are just the brands that I like. Focal is too expensive and unnecessarily high quality for car audio.

As long as the amp has high level (speaker wire) inputs, you don't need a LOC. If you don't need a LOC, you can pull the trick with the Metra harnesses and connect straight to the amp's inputs. You'll still need to run power from the battery and ground to a ground point. The remote turn-on will come from the harnesses.

Hi again!

Just a quick question about the harness you made.. You mention that you keep the signal going to the stock amp + door woofers.. Did you just put 2 wires in one end of the crimp connector?

From looking at your pictures, it looks like that's what you did, but just wanted to make sure. I'm thinking that you took the woofer signal from the first metra harness into a crimp connector ---[[=crimp=]]--- ; however, i believe you stuck the amp signal wire into the same connector on one side, to make a 3-way signal like this: ==[[=crimp=]]---.

So one of the wires on the left is the original woofer signal (first metra harness), and the other is the signal wire going from the crimp -> the new amp. Then on the other end is one wire going to the 2nd Metra harness (which then plugs into stock amp).

Sorry if this question/explanation doesn't make sense, hopefully it does.

[gramicci101]

Originally Posted by pancake

Hi again!

Just a quick question about the harness you made.. You mention that you keep the signal going to the stock amp + door woofers.. Did you just put 2 wires in one end of the crimp connector?

From looking at your pictures, it looks like that's what you did, but just wanted to make sure. I'm thinking that you took the woofer signal from the first metra harness into a crimp connector ---[[=crimp=]]--- ; however, i believe you stuck the amp signal wire into the same connector on one side, to make a 3-way signal like this: ==[[=crimp=]]---.

So one of the wires on the left is the original woofer signal (first metra harness), and the other is the signal wire going from the crimp -> the new amp. Then on the other end is one wire going to the 2nd Metra harness (which then plugs into stock amp).

Sorry if this question/explanation doesn't make sense, hopefully it does.

That is exactly what I did. That's how I got the signal for my subwoofer without cutting the signal from my door amp.

[Shinigami301]

These are excellent for bass, in my experience.

[Sonicp9]

I bought a 10 inch Alpine sub with compact box on eBay for 130. Grab a monoblock amp for another 100, get4 gauge wire (I don't believe in anything smaller) and Get the metra kits listed above. Find the guide for repinning the metra harnesses and then plug in to the factory amp in your trunk. Get a line-out converter and tap into the left/right speaker lines using the open ends from the metra harnesses (so you are not cutting anything factory). Then you can connect to your amp with RCA's and it is all in the trunk. You aren't running anything to the deck. Last step (or rather the first for me) is to run a power cable from your battery to the trunk. very easy to do in this car as there is a rubber grommet sealing the firewall directly behind the battery. Squeeze in through that then tuck wire under carpets and plastic pieces. Just remember to properly fuse the power cable near the battery. Also make a ground cable and screw it down to a bolt in your trunk under the carpets.