how difficult to wire a sub?

[hpcbmw]

I've got a 2005 GT with 6 cd stereo and Nav. My wife wants some "boom" in the stereo. I've got a 10" sub and amp that I took out of my last car. The amp has line in (is that what it's called?) so no need for a line out converter.

 

To wire this up, do I need to pull the stereo out, or can I just tap into a speaker wire? I'm going to mount the sub box in the trunk. It will be easy if I can just tap into one or both rear speaker wires, but I don't know enough about stereos to know if this will work.

 

I realize that it's not going to sound great, keeping the stock stereo, stock speakers, etc, and just adding a sub, but it's all I can afford right now. Plus, my wife just likes it LOUD, she doesn't care if it sounds great.

 

Oh, and another thing - I saw in another post that if you push and hold the "audio" button until you hear a "beep" there is a big difference in sound. Is this legit? What does it do? I tried it, but never heard a beep.

 

Thanks for any input.

[soloz2]

just tap into the rear speaker wires for signal and run a power and ground wire.

 

 

 

The beep is to enable the SRS Wow feature. I believe this is just for 07 plus radios. The stock radio on my 06 did not have this feature. Personally, I don't like SRS, bass boost ect. In a car you need some EQ to try to get a flat frequency response, but I don't use any EQ for my home stereos, or if I do (living room) it's to flaten the response.

[hpcbmw]

Thanks Soloz2. Since I don't have a "power on" wire from the radio, whats the best way to turn on the amp? If i just wire the "power on" wire to the ignition, so it's only on when the key is on, and it will be on whenever the car is on, is this good enough, or should I hook up an on/off switch?

 

Thx!

[soloz2]

Splice off the radio wire on the back of the headunit if your amp won't auto detect a signal.

[hpcbmw]

How can I tell if my amp has auto on? I've got 2 amps to play with. One is a 10year old (or more) Kenwood KAC606 that is already mounted on a sub box with a 10" sub. I used it for two years with a $200 JVC tuner in my 4runner and it worked well (not amazing sound, but good enough for me). If this one won't work, I've also got a Pioneer GM3300t. I'd rather use the Pioneer to power some front speakers in my other car, but if it has auto power on and the Kenwood doesn't, I'll use it instead. I don't want to tear into the stock subie nav stereo (for a amp on power wire) just to put in the sub.

 

The amp was hooked to my 4runner aftermarket JVC stereo via rca cables. I'll be hooking it up in the subie tapping off the rear speaker wires, as suggested in this forum. Will it still get the same sound? The kenwood amp has speaker level inputs,the pioneer doesn't, so I guess I'd have to get a line out converter if I use the pioneer.

 

Thanks for the help, without this forum, this would cost me at least $100 to get a shop to do the install.

[CHUCKmfnNORRIS]

if you dont want to take the factory unit out for the remote turn on lead you can run a wire with a switch. you can tap into the factory speaker wires and use a line output converter like this

 

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_142LOC80/Scosche-LOC80.html?tp=1276