Hey Guys,

So I'm putting a new system in my TSX soon and I wanted to tell everyone what I was planning on doing before I went ahead and did it so that I can avoid any stupid decisions.

The system:

Speakers:
Renaissance 6.2 Component system up front
( http://www.renaudio.com/carstereo/systems.htm )

Renaissance Integras on rear deck
( http://www.renaudio.com/carstereo/integras.htm )

Renaissance 10" Prototype sub

Amps:
Audison 400x1 amp for the fronts and rear deck
200W Cheap sub amp

Wiring:
Mercman's adapter
Kimber Kable speaker wires ( http://www.kimber.com )

Questions:
1) If I am running 100W per channel to the front speakers, should I definitely upgrade the factory wires or would I be okay without new wires?

2) What (nonobvious) tools should I pick up to make my life easier?

3) I am considering mounting the new tweeters on the little plastic piece in the corner of the front windows. The one that hides the side mirror wires. Has anybody done this? The factory tweeters seem impossible to get out, and also impossible to run new wire to if I run new wires.

4) For cable routes, I am planning on running mercman's cable straight down the middle of the car into the trunk. Should I run the front speaker cables down the middle also and then branch out to the sides near the head unit, or should I run the speaker wires along the sides of the car, starting from the back?

5) Should I not run the amp power wire anywhere near the speaker cables? I don't know if it causes interference with DC power.

6) Dynamat?

I am pretty experienced with mechanical work on my car, and with home audio/video. So hopefully tackling this install myself wont be too bad . But I'm definitely going to have lots of questions throughout the process. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Also, what do you guys think of my speaker/amp setup?

 

Oh and I forgot the most important question...will the 6s fit in the cutouts on the front doors or do I need to go down the the 5s?

6s http://www.renaudio.com/carstereo/WR-6.htm

5s http://www.renaudio.com/carstereo/WR-5.htm

 

You won’t have any problems with the factory wires with a 100watt amp.
The factory tweeters are easy, just fashion a tool (a small flat blade with a hook in the end) and pry them out. The wires drop right down to the bottom of the dash, a piece of cake. I used a small xacto knife (cut the handle down) to trim the plastic slag from the tweeter hole.

OK to run the speaker wires and the balanced audio lines together. Run the power on the passenger side (I used the factory grommet and others drilled a new hole).

You will have to fashion or buy spacer rings for the doors.

Check out the FAQ for options for the TSX audio system and speaker install info.

jeff

 

Adding to the removal of the factory tweets....I used a dentist's tool and it worked great. You could also probably use a paper clip...just pry them up and they'll pop out. hth

I have another thread with some pictures of my install if you want to check them out.

 

i'm doubting the fitment of the tweeter there, there's not much clearance behind that thing

 

How would the tweeters sound there? I know it's a cleaner look, but wouldn't they sound better mounted somewhere down on the door towards to other speaker?

 

Would be more on axis on the panel by the mirror, but i have no idea how he's gonna get that thing in there, there's not much free space behind it.

why not stock location?, just pop the cover off, replace tweeter, and hot glue so it's not loose

 

I was going to surface mount the tweeters there. If you check out the link you will see they come in a nice black housing that would fit quite nicely there. I also think they may sound better there, and it would be easy to stick the crossovers in the doors.

I still dont understand where to put the crossovers if I use the factory wires though. And mercman its 100W per channel, not total. You still think factory wires are okay?

 

I put one xover in the passenger kick panel and the other in the console where the factory amp was located. You can put both xovers there if you want. 100watts is about 5amps at 4 ohms so the factory wires will be fine. If you want to run new you will have to drill for the driver’s door since the door wiring on that side uses a bulkhead connector.

jeff

 

Jay, I did check out your threads, very helpful. Also thanks for your helpful PM.

I guess I'm pretty sold on using the Crutchfield Harness. The wires I was going to use cost $400 for the amount I needed, so it'd be nice not to need them. And I can always upgrade in the future.

So if I understand correctly.
1) I run Mercman's cable to the amp to give it signal
2) I send one output channel to my crossover
3) At the crossover outputs I connect the corresponding tweeter and woofer wires of the Crutchfield harness

Looking at my TSX service manual it seems that a few of the other wires on that 20-pin harness may be useful. One is an "FM Antenna Power Wire" and another is "Ground." You haven't experienced any problems with your FM antenna or anything else after cutting off all of the other wires on the harness?

 

I'm still wondering what you guys think about Dynamat. Should I do the whole door? Just the speaker hole? The trunk?

Also, does anybody know if those 6s will fit in the speaker holes? They have a 3" voice coil. The dimensions are:
Diameter 160mm (6.3")
Depth 70mm (2.8")
Mounting Depth 62mm (2.4")
Cutout 137mm (5.4")


Should I get T-taps with my own wires or should I just get adapter harnesses to attach the speakers?

Thanks everyone

 

Oh and another question, sorry...

Is a 10 gauge power wire fine for running a 400x4 amp and a 200x1 amp? That's what I have right now.

 

Can somebody help me out with speaker spacers? I have read the DIYs but I don't think I have the proper tools to make them. Will these spacers work?

http://www.millionbuy.com/aihsb518.html

Or is there anybody on the board that would be willing to have me pay them to custom-fab some for me?

My speaker dimensions are above

 

http://www.rockfordfosgate.com/rftec...alculator.asp#

 

Hey Madman...ok, I bought those spacers only to find out that the inside dimensions of my Focal 165v2s speakers would not fit in them, rendering the spacers completely useless. I'm not sure of the exact sizes of my speakers but I want to say that they were 5.54" when these spacers give yoau 5" hole. This led me to make my own spacers as you can see from the pictures in my other posts. If you can't, I can email them to you. This was the most time consuming part of my project as I assumed the spacers would work and when they didn't, I had to stop everything and rethink what to do. As far as dynamat, this is my first car that I've actually used it in, and just a 10x10 piece behind each front door woofer. I really don't know if it does that much or not, but thought I'd give it a try. Unless you're going to competitions, etc, I don't really see a need for putting it all over the place, but some people swear by it. Also, some people swear by $500 interconnect wires, but I never understood why. And finally for 10AWG wire for 2 fairly powerful amps....That sounds to me to be too small. I'm sure it will work, but you might not be getting the current you want to your amps. I am using 4AWG to a junction block that splits it into 2x 10AWG (I think...could be 8) to feed each amp. As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions...jlj

 

Ah, good call. As you can see above, the "cutout" size for my speakers is 5.4"

I guess I'm going to have to make some custom spacers then.

Should the overall height of the spacer be 1 1/8" regardless of the speaker?

Also, is using a router to cut them a bad idea?

 

Hey, just figured I'd give an update for anybody that's keeping track of this project other than me.

I now have all of the wires run. I'm using a 4 awg wire for the amps now, and I ran Mercman's cable and the crutchfield harness also. Now I just have to grab my tone generator and find out where those various leads on the Crutchfield harness go.

Today I'm going to take the doors off and start thinking about some Dynamat and sound deadening material. I ordered some MDF spacers from a website that Jay found for me, so hopefully those will be arriving soon.

My buddy is bringing over my speakers and amps on Sunday. Right now I am very unsure of how to route the wires around in the trunk. I want a sub enclosure on the left side (uncald4's) and my amps on the right side. Does anybody have a setup like this?

I don't know how to send the wires (Mercman and Crutchfield) over to the amps. Should I make a small hole in the trunk liner in the back right corner to get the wires through? This seems like the most logical solution to me.

Is there a good way to mount the amps in that corner? Has anybody fastened them to the trunk liner? Will I need to build a custom mount?

I was also considering mounting the amps up on the roof of the trunk, to the left of the Nav disk drive. Has anybody done this? Heat issues?

Also, I'm still looking for suggestions on sound deadening materials if anybody has them.

Thanks!

 

Take a look at starting at post 26 to see how I mounted the amp. You can also see how I ran the wires. It’s not the only way you can do it, but I like it since my car is a lease and I didn’t want to drill any noticeable holes. It also makes it easy for me to pull the amp down to test my gadgets.
https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...=367638&page=2

jeff

 

Mine's not a lease so I'm not too concerned about cutting into things permanently. I think that it will be much easier to tell where to put things once I actually have the amps. For now I think I will probably put the sub amp next to the Navi drive and put the 4ch in that back right corner. However, once I actually have the amps I will play around and see what fits best.

Does anybody have the JL 250/1? That's probably what I'll get because I need balanced inputs and want the remote bass knob

 

I have a JL 300/2 for sale. You can bridge it to be a mono amp, it'll give you a little more power than the 250/1, and as well as leeway for future upgrades, incase you ever want to use them to power components or something

https://acurazine.com/forums/car-parts-sale-361/fs-jl-500-1-jl-300-2-alpine-12-type-r-dual-4-a-381848/

 

I don't know about the new 250/1, but the older one doesn't have the ability to use JL's remote bass knob. I have one, it's mounted on the back of the seat. (the larger side) I have a 300/4 for mids/highs on top on the 250/1. Can't seem to find a pic, so will take one when I get home.

 

Very interesting Bully, I'll make sure the one I'm looking at has a remote knob capability. I am going to do roughly the same power as your system also. I will have the 250/1 and a 400/4. How loud do you feel your system plays? Should I be looking at more watts or do you feel like you've got plenty of power?

And wong, thanks for the info about your amp, but that wouldn't give me the remote bass knob I need. My gf is always asking me to "turn down the bass" on my factory system, so I dont want to be running to the trunk every time she asks once I have my sub in!

 

Usually when I have my mom in the car (she hates it), i just fade the music forward, and wallahhhh. no need to get out the car!

400/4 - do you mean the 300/4 or the 450/4?

If you're doing a 300/4 and a 250/1. Just get the 500/5. It'll give you the 4channels of 75watts and 1 channel on 250 watts. saves ya space (Although I heard the failure rate on those amps are pretty common)

 

I know the 500/1 and 1000/1 have the ability to use the JL remote knob, but not the 250/1 (at least the old one).

I am pretty happy with the volume in my system. But, I am not a bass freak. I listen fairly loud, but overwhelming bass isn't what I am looking for. The system is balanced and realistic and can play at a very high volume. I am running a 10w3 for bass, DLS MS6A's up front, ond just some old fosgate coax's in the rear. I ususally keep it faded way forward and, because of that, I get the sub input from the front pre amp outs and not the rears.

I think my system could use a 500/1 for bass. Not that I need it, but when I used a multimeter to set the input levels as JL recommends, the system wasn't as balanced as I'd like. The bass was much lower than the mids/highs (and I am not a big bass guy). Because I didn't want to turn the 250/1 any higher than recommended, I backed the 300/4 down a bit. System is very balanced now and sounds very good. The only reason I say the 500/1 might be better is that it would allow me to run both amps levels at close to JL recommended optimum.

I am working very late tonight, but will try to snap off a pic tomorrow of my amp mounting.

 

My 400/4 isn't a JL, I'm going with a high-end amp for my 4ch. I am not that picky about the sub amp so I will probably go with the JL, although I'm not thrilled that it's a Class D.

Also, I'm not sure that I understand, are you guys saying that the subs will be somehow linked to the rear speakers? So if you fade off of the rear speakers you also fade off of the sub?

 

The sub amp, in most cases anyway, if there's preouts (which JL amp does) the RCAs from the front:

FR/FL goes to fronts 4 channel amp
RR/RL goes to Sub amp input, from sub amp, a 2ch rca from the sub output to the Rear inputs on the 4 channel sub.

Now your subwoofer amp is linked to the rear channels of the 4channel amp.

Therefore if you fade all to the rear, all you'll get is your rear speakers (if applicable) and your subwoofer, vice versa, fade forward, closer you get to all front the less sound from the rear, and once fully front, you won't have any sound from the rear.

There's my non-professional talk way of explaining it

 

Alright, so what I think you're saying is:
1) The front channel goes directly to the 4ch amp inputs
2) The rear channel goes directly to the sub amp inputs
3) The sub amp outputs go to the 4ch amp inputs

Correct?

 

yessir. this only applies if your sub amp has preouts, in which case a 250/1 does. a 300/2 would also work =)

 

Oh sorry, just looked it up, 250/1 does not have preouts


300/2 does, as well as 500/1
"Preamp output selection"


but you should still be able to maintain fader capabilities by using a Y cable to split the rear RCA's coming from the HU

female -> 2 female splitter, 2 of them RR and RL

Run a 2ch to your 400/4 and 2ch to your 250/1

 

wong, i would definitely buy that JL off of you based on a couple things.

1) Can you still use the "bass" adjustment knob on the factory head unit with mercman's cable to have a bit of effect on the subwoofer
2) If I am using it as a sub amp (low-pass), can I still output a full range signal to the 4ch amp?

I like that it is a Class A/B amp, and would be interested if it meets those 2 conditions

 

I do have the mercman's cable, but no bass knob;
I don't actually have the bass knob but I believe it can be had for ~20$, I'm not sure if you'll really need it, since you can just fade forward to lower the bass if ever needed. However if you do want to use the bass knob, it should work fine.

You're right, you'll low pass the sub amp, so on on the Amp Filter Controls, switch to LP. To output a full range to the 4ch amp just switch the "output mode" to Full Range

I actually have 2 bass knobs for my sundown amps that i'm not using. I'm not sure if it'll work if plugged into a JL amp? can anyone chime in on this

 

The 300/2 does not seem to be compatible with the remote gain control however you're right I could just fade forward to have roughly the same effect

I'll PM you about the amp

 

Here's some pics of how things are going so far...

mercman's cable and Crutchfield harness




Getting through that 1ft of carpet was the most difficult part!


So here's where I'm at so far. I'm not really sure where to go from here.


This is where I'm considering mounting my sub amp


However I will have to removes this wire. I will lose the ability to put down that side of the back seat using my key from inside of the car. However, I don't think I've ever done that since I got the car, so no harm done!


This is where I plan on mounting the 4ch amp. I can cut a small hole where my fingers are to route the wires and hide them.


I need to find a place for all of these wires...

 

Lookin good

i'll be starting my amp renovation soon. i think i'm gonna use a hole saw and make a few holes where wires can pass thru the floor of the trunk (the piece that you can lift up)

Gonna have all 3 subs laid out in a line across in front of the box
(I barely have space in there as it is already, current amps are mounted behind the box between the seats and the box)

 

So what do you guys think about removing that bar that folds down the seat?

Since my amp power wire only reaches to the roof of the trunk, I suppose I will put a distribution block on the right side of the navi drive. Does that sound like a good idea? Any better ideas?

 

They definitely changed the 250/1. Mine has Pre-Outs and no Remote bass control port, the v2 is the exact opposite. The way mine is run (with mercman harness) if rears from stock nav unit to rears on 300/4, fronts to the 250/1 then out of that to the fronts on the 300/4. I did that so the bass remained consistent in relation to the front speaker levels as I faded forward. (i did not want to use the fader as a bass level control as mentioned earlier in the thread by another poster)

 

Hmm...that's interesting that they changed it bully.

Has anybody just used a "Y cable" to split the signal to two amps instead of using preamp outs? I don't see any real downside to that, and since my amps are probably going to be about 3ft away from eachother it may save me some wiring if I do it with a "Y cable"

 

Yes, put a distro block where it ends, and make sure to put the amps in a good place, don't compromise their positions due to wire lengths, extend the wires if necessary. It looks like you're close, just keep going. When I did mine, I ran ALL wires down the 2 sides of the car, not even up the middle. So you've already got a leg up on my install. Keep going!

 

Max,
You can use a “Y” cable just keep it short. It is better to use the pre-outs if you have them. I won’t bore you with the details.

jeff

 

thanks jeff, I'll keep that in mind. By the way the cable you made for me looks amazing! I can't wait to get my amps Sunday and hook everything up.

What is your opinion of using a class D sub amp?