Mike got it backwards. The best thing on the day was my meeting him. He's a funny, caring guy. He even helped me collect $10,000 a customer owed my store. Mike put on his best Chicago Muscle face and there was no question the customer was going to give me his credit card number.
Mike even picked up the check for breakfast.
Thanks again, Mike. Be assured we'll say in contact.
Here are the install instructions for Mike's Mod:
I'm assuming we are doing this on a factory deck. With an aftermarket deck, the install would be even easier. I'm also assuming we're installing the amp under the driver's seat. The wire runs would be the shortest. Add an extra 5' onto the power wire runs if it is going under the passenger's seat.
Parts needed:
basic stereo amp, 20-30 watts RMS per channel
10' - 8 gauge wire, red
10' - 8 gauge wire, black
10' - stereo RCA cable
10' - primary wire (22 gauge single conductor wire)
20' - speaker wire
female inline RCA jack, solder type
Y connector, 1 male to 2 female RCAs
2 - ring terminals to hook up power and ground to the battery
inline fuse holder and fuse, 5 amps bigger than the one in your new sub amp
misc. wire ties and split loom to dress wires
solder, soldering iron, wire cutters, black tape, crimp caps, other basic tools
six pack of beer (or iced tea - Mike doesn't drink
)
Before you start, make sure you have the
radio code for your factory radio. We are going to disconnect it from power in the next step. It would be a shame to do this whole install and not be able to turn your radio back on.
Disconnect the positive wire from the battery.
Remove the head unit from the dash.
Remove the subwoofer cover and the factory sub (four screws)
Remove the driver's seat. You may also want to remove part of the floor. For Mike's car, we just snaked the wires under the floor and didn't remove it.
Have a beer or iced tea. You've earned it.
Run your RCA cable and primary wire from the deck to the space under the driver's seat where the amp will go.
The subwoofer output on the factory deck is on its own 8 pin plug. There are three wires, two signal and one shield. We aren't hooking up the shield but the wire will be shielded from the amp end so that's OK. The wires you want are red with a blue stripe (sub positive) and red with a white stripe (sub negative). Cut all three wires that connect to this plug, leaving as long a pigtail as you can. You'll need the wire. Solder the female RCA connector onto the red/blue and red/white wires. Plug the female RCA connector into the Y adapter. Plug the other end of the Y adapter into the RCA cable that runs to the amp. Use some black tape to tape these plugs together so they won't jiggle lose.
The primary wire needs to hook up into the yellow wire with a green stripe that comes out of the deck. This wire is located on the deck's main plug with all the speaker connections. Splice the primary wire into this yellow wire with green stripe. You need this for amp turn on. Either crimp or solder your three wires together (the yellow/green that goes to the plug, the yellow/green that goes to the car and the primary wire).
Plug everything back into the deck and put the head unit back into the dash. Don't screw anything down until we make sure it works.
From the battery, run the 8 gauge red and black wires
through the firewall to under the driver's seat. Mount your in-line fuse holder somewhere close to the battery. This is your line of last defense if everything frells up. Hook the fuse holder up to the red wire so that the power passes through it. Using ring terminals, hook up the red and black wires to the positive and negative battery connectors. DO NOT RE-HOOK UP THE BATTERY YET.
Run two lengths of speaker wire from the driver's seat to behind the subwoofer. Cut off the plug that goes into the factory sub, again leaving a long pigtail. Hook the pigtail wires to your two speaker wire runs using crimp caps or solder. Here's your color code:
brown: subwoofer voice coil 1 positive
red: subwoofer voice coil 1 negative
blue: subwoofer voice coil 2 positive
grey/black: subwoofer voice coil 2 negative
Put the sub back into the car.
OK - you should have all of your wires run. The power wire and ground are coming from the battery. The RCA and turn-on wires are coming from the deck. The speaker wires are run to the sub. It's time to hook up the amp.
So, what are you waiting for? Hook up the amplifier. Leave some slack on your wires and don't mount down the amp unless you are absolutely sure you are perfect in every way. Even then, don't mount down the amp.
Make sure the switches on the amp are correct. You want it in stereo, not bridged mono. This way each channel of the amp will see a 4 ohm load and will run happily all day long, staying nice and cool. As Mike reminded me, heat kills amplifiers. If the amp has a sub crossover, you probably want it off, but this could vary. I am assuming here that the sub crossover in the factory system is built into the deck. Using a second one on the amp will give you ugly phase shifts and is just asking for trouble. If when this mod is completed, you here voices coming from the subwoofer, turn on the crossover on the amp. You don't want voices coming from your sub. The gain pots on the amp should be at maximum at this point.
Put the seat back into the car, remembering to re-hook up the airbag if you have one. Note: do not put the key in the ignition without the seat in the car and the airbag hooked up. Othewise you will have to
re-set the airbag indicator.
Attach the positive battery wire to the battery.
Start the car. Turn on the car stereo. Everything works, right? Of course it does. If not, troubleshoot. Do you have power coming to the amp? Are the gain pots turned up on the amp and all switches on it in the correct position? Is the turn-on wire hooked up correctly? This old amp that's been sitting in a closet for the past dozen years does work, right?
RIGHT?
Assuming you have bass, adjust the gain pot(s) on the amp to get the subwoofer balanced with the mains. The sub setting on the deck should be at zero when you do this.
Using a CD, sit back and enjoy your bass for a song or two. Have a beer.
You have one more thing to do, either today or sometime later. You have to check phase on the subwoofer. After adding an amp, you have a 50/50 chance of the sub being in phase with the mains. You don't know. Get a CD that has good mid-bass: bass guitar, drums or pipe organ. Play it on your system. Turn off the stereo. Unless you are lucky and your amp has a phase switch, you'll neet to flip the speaker wires. Swap the positive and negative speaker wires for both speakers so that the two positive wires now go into the amp's negative jacks and the two negative wires are hooked up to the positive terminals. You want the sub hooked up backwards from the way it was before. If the amp's connectors are color coded, the positive speaker wires now go to the black terminals, with the negative wires to the red ones.
Listen to the system again. Changing nothing else, if the system has more bass now, the wiring is correct. If it has less, change the wires back to the way they were initially. Whichever way has the most bass is the correct way. Leave it wired up this way.
This may be easier to hear down the road, a week or two later after you've been listening to the system, getting used to your new, powerful bass. If after becoming acclimated to the sound, you swap these wires, you'll hear the difference within a couple of songs. Again, the way with the most bass is the correct way. When you have it hooked up right, the subwoofer and your door speakers are working in together instead of against each other. Bass cancels when the phase is incorrect. It reinforces when it's right.
Mount down the amp. You may have to take the seat back out to do this. If you do, remember to un-hook the battery again.
Put your car back together. Check your
driver's window up/down function. Have one more beer. You've just completed Mike's Mod.