14 replies to this topic

[robin]

hear is a guide for installing a pioneer sun into a vx220 the sub sits on the shelf behind the passanger seat. hope this helps.

[robin]

run the cable under the sill on the passanger side i taped this together to make it easier. the sill is stuck down a bit but pull the sill gently and you can feed the cable underneath.

[robin]

pic

[robin]

from sill the cable runs up under dash

[robin]

i cable tied the wires to the thick bunch of cables wraped in black. to save messing i got a screwdriver and made a hole in the black rubber seal that this larger cable runs through. just be carefull but its the easiest way and its water tight.

[robin]

then with the bonnet open if you look where the water bottle is there is a plastic cover near the window, under that you will see the rubber seal with the thick cable soming through it and hopefull all going well you should too have your cable there. you will need to pull this through to reach the battery under the water bottle.

[robin]

last but least is to conect it to the live of the battery, i have used inline fuses when doing this a secondary backup (please be carefull when conecting to the battery!) i then cable ties the cable to tidie it up. for the earth i conected the earth to the seat runner on the passanger seat. any questions or more pictures please pm me.

[madasahatter]

Just to add - I have the same sub. and did the same thing I couldn't get a very good earth on the passenger seat, so although the sub was working it was lacking punch. I have now hardwired the earth to the battery terminal as well, and the sound in my case was much improved. Good guide though

[robin]

i put a u conector on the earth cable undid the seat bolt and put it back on, seemed to work but both are easy to do.

[leeline99]

Hi Robin, Great step by step guide. How come you are running 2 +ve wires (red & Yellow) from the battery? Where did you pick up the earth? Does the sub autopower off with the head unit, wouldn't this require another wire? Cheers Lee

[robin]

think yellow is ment to go to hifi but sub powers off with the way i have mine it had three cables one to hifi and two to battery,might of changed on newer ones but hifi bloke said that it would be fine so i just ran both to power, eart is to either battery or car bodywork(seat in my case)

[leeline99]

I'm sure I read somewhere that You should keep earth wire as short as possible.

Can't remember the reason why though ...

Any ideas?
Heres a good how to link its American, but I'm sure we'll be able to work it out.

It mentions keeping the ground wire as short as possible too!

Also, another tip, don't run the RCA/Phono wires next to the power wires.

[leeline99]

Heres why you need to keep you ground wire short!!!! Sorry its a bit technical The metal chassis and body of the car serves as a ground. If the battery and alternator are under the bonnet, and an amplifier is connected to the body at the boot area, it is highly likely that the ground potential may be just a few millivolts off from what it would be at the front or middle section of the same car body. Allthough theoretically, the car's metal has little or no resistance, and it should not matter where grounds are connected for amplifiers, radio, battery and alternator, the metal in the car does have resistance, and there is a potential difference from the front of the car, where the battery is, to the middle of the car, where the radio is, and the back of the car, where most amplifiers are situated. The small difference in electrical potential is sufficient to allow noise to intrude at undesirable levels. Differences of as little as 1/5 volt, can create noise problems. To treat this problem, make sure that the amplifiers have a good ground first. Use the same gauge wires for the grounds as for the + power. If you have 2 or more amplifiers, DO NOT wire the ground terminal of one amp to the other and then from there to ground as this also promotes noise. Tightly ground each amplifier independently to a clean metal part of the car body. So now you know

[robin]

all well and good but i find that running the power and phone fine im not a ICE buffin using hundread pound conection leads etc coz with the sports exhaust fitted anything over 60mph you wouldnt be able to tell if its good or bad. i wouldnt read into things too much! used to work in a tv/hifi shop and fitted some 25 pounds per/m cable to some b+w speakers and you really couldnt tell the difference to that and the 3ppm cable. was using a good amp and cd player too.

[Jim Mitch]

One other thing - just be careful when routing the wire past the wiper motor. I had a new wiper motor installed and the garage didnt ensure that the power cable to the battery was clear. Result was that the cable fouled the motor and jammed it. Is going to cost in the region of £70 to clear the motor and fit a new cable. I shall be making an approach to the relevent dealer...