Ok, so I decided to do a mild system back in January to give me a little power and clarity to the cars toons. I original bought Navone locks, a 4 channel cadence amp and a two channel Rockford Fosgate amp for the sub. Speakers up front are Image Dynamics 6.5 components and the rears got 6.5 inch Alpine two ways. After spending a good weekend wiring it all in, I just really was never happy with the sound. It sounded "OK" but for what I had, should have blown me away.

After reading up on how dirty our signal was coming out of the factory amp, I decided to make an investment. I bought a Rockford Fosgate 360.2 digital processsor and a brand new four channel Alpine PDX-4.150 (115 watts rms). I took the old 2 channel out and made my cadence amp the sub and center channel amp. I took the Alpine and ran that to the four corners.

After dialing in the potentiometers to the cd track that is playing in the cd player, I hooked up the 360 via bluetooth to the laptop. I let the computer clean the signal and it automatically adjusted my eq to what it was seeing. I haven't really had a chance to dial it in with the computer settings but I was able to play with it a bit.

To all that have not spent the money on something like this, you are missing out on a key component to a sweet sounding system. Everything is well balanced now and when I play certain songs, you can here the clean sound coming from speaker to speaker. You get time delays for each channel so they all hit you at the right time right in the drivers seat......You can eq each channel independently and mute each channel while you're tuning the system. It also gives you a sub anolog dial that you can extra bass to the songs that need it and take it away to songs that just simply have too much.

Well worth the money guys....It was the best 400 bucks I have ever spent and I will never do the locs again because if the signal is dirty coming into the amp, its loud dirty music coming out. Who wants that? Enjoy thre pics!

The new 360



The new Alpine PDX 150



The amp rack I built to hold everything in the corner of the trunk.




The mess of wires I was in the process of cleaning up.



You need some 4 gauge power to a 4 way distribution box...



Mounted the 360 on the back side of the amp rack so you can't see it.




Anyone that has done a system in the car knows, run all the speaker wires on the passenger side and all the power on the drivers side...otherwise enjoy the wine noise when you start the car and rev the engine..

Here is a lot of speaker wire....


The mess before it gets pretty.....



I created a flap on top of the amp rack that you can pull back to see the 360 light and if need be get my hand into the wires...Here is the 360 in bluetooth mode.....



Everything all buttoned up and cleaned up. Look Ma, no wires (on the Alpine at least)



My trunk has the components with my tool box and sub and is fully functional and I did the panels and embroidery myself.....

 

Great Job!
i need to tackle my audio install

 

Good detailed write up. Thanks

Looks good

 

 

hey mmade22,nice setup. The 360 is insanely cool.

Question... What glue did you use to adhear the a-spec badge to the trunk carpet.

I have a single head swf I bought for small quantity orders & would lke to do this on the inside carpets for my TL... then maybe the headrests.

 

looks great, i think you could make it look even cleaner if you make all the carpeting the same color though

 

Wow Jon-that looks outstanding. You are a master at this stuff.

 

glad u like it man

 

Nice! A single head SWF is a good start...I actually made that panel and embroidered it right to the carpet and glued the carpet to the panel so it isn't a patch. Let me know if you need any service on the machine as I know many technicians across the USA.


Agreed!! Just didn't have the time to find the right color material so my local Hobby Lobby materials did the job.

Hey Steven! Thanks man.....I really spent a ton of hours on it. When I'm ready to retire the car, I can take it all out and make it stock again (except the headrest monitors and dvd player in the center arm rest) well most of it! This is the last mod to the car as I am hitting the 200k mark this week. I can't justify any more money spent on a car that could be wiped out on any kind of body damage.

 

Should've waited it out for a month or 2

Since the ms8 is out, the 3sixty will be jumping down in price.

 

Thanks for the information MMade22. Been reading about the 360 but not sure how great the 360 sounds, so it is nice to know another person has good experience with it again. I want to get the 360 for my sound system, will work on the system after I pay off the lease in Aug.

Quick quesiton, I assume you used the signal after the stock amplifer, correct?

Thanks.

 

Always use the signal coming AFTER the amp. The signals coming out of the head unit are just way too weak. I like the 360 but I would love it if they had pre-set settings on it for Rock/Jazz/Rap etc. It's really hard to tune it by ear because of a lot of factors. I am still messing with it but man, I need more time in the day to do this shit. I like how it sounds but im sure a pro can really tune it better than me.

 

I have the 3Sixty.2, overall I like it but I may be upgrading to the JBL MS-8 b/c of lack of tuning skills. Your setup looks good, nice job.

 

very nice! did you tap into the system in the inputs or outputs of the stock amp?

I just installed a system and tapped in to the outputs of the amp and ran them to a MX1 to get front and rear RCA's and RCA's for a sub channel. I have Alpine spx pro 17 mids replacing the stock locations in the front and rear. I must say it sounds like crap. running 125 rms to each location and the sounds is not clear or crisp more like sandy/gritty sounding. should i tap in before the stock amp?

 

I have always been told to take the signal AFTER the amp not before it. I could be wrong with the RCA wires.....I would ask Jason in the other threads on here.

 

I'd go before the amp. The deck has a (pretty) flat unclipped output so you should be good. Only drawback is the peak output is only ~1 volt so you will want an amp that doesn't need a ton of input voltage to sound good. (i.e. don't buy an el cheapo amp or you will have a helluva noise floor.)

 

Thank you for confirming. From what I've been reading taking the signal after the stock amp will work better for the 360.

Sorry, more questions:

1) Did you spend lots of time soldering the 360 signal input wires to the stock
amp output? Or, did you use wire tapping clips?

Most people solder the wires to the stock amp output, based on what i've read. I'm somewhat paranoid with the soldering part because there is always a chance to have noise/buzzing issue if that part isn't done right.

Happy CANADA DAY!

 

Clips were used and no soldering needed. No noise in the system so its all good.

 

Wonderful!!! Good to know that someone has good result with wire tapping clips. Using those will save TONS of time.

Thanks for the info again mmade22!!
Cheers.

 

Actually I'm sorry....I didn't use wire clips. I cut the wires and butt connected them and then electrical taped them together. I think you want to use the blue add in line clips? I think you should be ok but I haven't had any experience with them.

 

If your using wire taps, make sure they cut all the way through. On something like this I would highly suggest against it. Solder everything one time and don't ever worry about it again

 

Agreed but yes I do use a pair of dikes to make sure they are secure and I pull on the wires and then I tape them up and zip tie them together to make sure if the wires get pulled they don't come out. Soldering is good, just didn't have the time when installing it.

 

my first time installing the 3sixty.2 i used wire taps also, couldn't figure out why I was getting this sound, finally figured it out though, it was one of the wire taps, even though it cut all the way through the connection wasn't good. keep on making a popping noise everytime i would hit a bump. glad i fixed it though.

 

What kind of 4 gauge wire did you use?

 

I used Monster cable. It was a great deal online from radio shack. It was a kit....4 gauge 18ft...2 6 ft 8 gauge and the terminal block with grounds and connectors for 30 bucks. The deal of a lifetime and the stuff is high quality. Also came with a inline fuse setup. Look it up on radioshack.com

 

Damn, I cant find it on the site. What speaker wires are you running. What are you running on driver side and passenger side. I want to do my setup next week. Thanks

 

16 gauge all run on the passenger side......All power running on the drivers side....NEVER run the two together unless you like a lot of wine noise. I got the wire kit a while back so I guess its over.

 

So what did this install cost you and what would it have cost to have a shop do it?

 

400 for the 360.2
400 for the alpine amp
250 for the cadence amp
200 for the front speakers
100 for the rear speakers
100 for the amp kit and speaker wires
150 for the used sub and box
way too much time on the install $$$$ Money back in my pocket.

1600 without the labor.....The amount of time it took me to do it right the way I wanted to do it was a good 2 12 hr days so I saved a ton on the labor. I never let anyone else touch my car with any of the work that was ever done to it. If I can't do it myself, I am not going to have it done.

 

Thats always the best way to do it. It always turns out how you like it.

 

You have power wire, remote wire and rca's on driver side?

 

^^^^
As stated in last post......4 gauge main power and my remote run along the drivers side.....Since I tapped into my factory amp (no RCAs until after the 360.2), my speaker wires all run along the passenger side. Electronics 101.....Never run the signal wires along with the power wires unless you like the wine of the engine noise.