Audio Upgrade
 

Ok, I will be upgrading my Audio System soon, but I am not sure how to go about doing this. I have the Shaker 500, and I know that there is some sort of amplifier built in for the door subs. Now, here is my question. I am changing the head unit and front and rear speakers, but if I leave the door subs alone, will they still work like before? Additionally, what size are these subs just incase I decided to replace them, and if I do decided to replace them, will the new door subs work with the factory amp, or will I have to upgrade that to? Would a component system be better for this task?

Here's my shopping cart with Crutchfield so far:

• Pioneer AVIC-F900BT (head unit)
• PAC Ford Radio Replacement Interface (not sure what exactly this is doing for me)
• Pioneer CD-IU230V (iPod hookup for head unit)
• Polk Audio MMC5250 Component System (front)
• Polk Audio db571 (rear)

What do you guys think of the shopping list so far? Feel free to give me any ideas. Thanks!

subscribing, i'm in the similar boat.

Firestang,

I will keep you posted. I just bought everything above plus the MTX ThunderForms 12" sub with 200w amp built in for the trunk.

I will take pics and have a detailed install for everyone who is interested. I am going to do this from now for every thing I mod on the Mustang, so I can help others out.

Since your changeing out radio,why not get some after market amps. The factory amps aren't that great.You can leave them in their factory locations,just have to un-hook them,still it's up to you.lol

The MTX ThunderForm box I bought has a built in amp for the sub...that's all I really care about. If the Polk's I put in there sound crappy with the stock amp, I may consider throwing in an aftermarket amp then.

I recently installed a Power Acoustik dvd/navigation head unit on my car which has the Shaker 1000, sound quality wasn't very good at first. I installed new 6x8 Pioneer 3-ways in the doors, that helped a bit, and then played with the equalizer within the head unit and it improved even more. I still get some distortion from the door subs, and the bass could stand to be cleaner, so I plan on getting a pair of passive crossovers for the amp patch cables to clean up the sound going into the amp and see how that does. If that doesn't do anything, I will end up re-wiring the system and replacing the stock amps with cleaner sounding aftermarket, along with new aftermarket subs.

I'm swapping the head unit, installing Polk Audio Component system for the front and rear and the MTX ThunderForm in the trunk, but keeping the factory amps for now. If it sounds crappy, I'm gonna add the add a 4 channel amp or something.

Sounds like a good plan to start with. The Thunderform should do nicely for clean bass in back.

When you change your head unit, you need the harness that adapts the stock subs to the aftermarket head unit. It has a connector that plugs into the stock one and then two patch cables and remote wires on the other end. I'm going to put a pair of passive crossovers inline with those patch cables and see how that does for my sound quality, since right now my head unit is putting a full signal to the subs, not just the bass.

Is this the harness your speaking of? http://www.crutchfield.com/S-vNZtCY2...x?I=127C2RFRD1

I am in a similar situation with my Pioneer. I am not sure where to go from here. I am not sure about any of the wires that have question marks. Any help/suggestions would be appreciated.


C2R-FRD1 __________________________________________________ _DEH-P 7000BT

8pin connector
----Purple RCA----------------------------------------------------- Sub RCA red ?
----Green RCA----------------------------------------------------- Sub RCA white ?

12pin connector
---SWC Output - white/green-------- NOT USED ?
---Antenna - blue------------------- NOT USED ?
---Battery - yellow----------------------------------------------- constant 12v yellow ?
---Ground - black----------------------------------------------- chassis ground black ?

PAC
----illumination - orange/white-------- NOT USED ?
----+12 ACC - red------------------------------------------------- ACC switched red ?
----Amp turn on - blue/white--------- ?
----Reverse light - green------------- NOT USED ?
----VSS - purple--------------------- ?
----Parking Brake - red/white--------- ?
_________________________________Not Used ?------------------- Mute yellow/black
_________________________________Not Used ?------------------- Power Amp blue/white

Also, I figured out a need for the reverse light (rear camera), but why would you need the parking brake?

I'm working on my F90BT install right now. The parking brake is so the HU will disable DVD playback and navigation course changes while you're moving (ie parking brake off). Get around it by going to Avic411.com forum and looking up your particular HU, then doing the hardware bypass (basically moving the yellow/black mute wire and grounding it along with the green parking brake wire). Then you can watch Family Guy while crashing into the guy in front of you. :jester:

I'm wondering about the illumination orange/white one myself, the Ford factory has a ill+ and ill- wire, separate, that respond to the whole dash lighting switch, but don't know how they'd work on the Pioneer. Probably have to splice into the headlight switch, I think.

Hey Josh, you don't have to splice into the headlight switch to work the illumination wire of the Pioneer. When I installed my D3, I used the wire that controls the dimming of the "info/setup/reset" buttons in the center stack. Using the wire from these buttons are great, as its close by, you don't have to run wire half-way across the dash, around the steering column, and a pretty easy setup. :nice:

http://www.mustang50magazine.com/tec...enclosure.html

Recently inspired me, only a few hundred short and I'm there :D

Good luck on your system man!

Illumination wire info. Still works great for me.http://forums.bradbarnett.net/showpo...34&postcount=3

Exactly Gary! :nice: Its what my dad helped me with once he asked if the buttons dimmed with the dial on the dash. MUCH easier to work with than the headlight switch. :agree:

I guess I should have updated a while back, but I installed everything I ordered in 1 day. I'm running the AVIC F900BT, the Polks in the door and the rear, MTX loaded box in trunk, rear view camera etc.

It's fricking awesome. The MTX is more than enough bass for this car. I couldn't be more than happy with the Pioneer Head Unit. I recieved the version with the 1st firmware upgrade, but Pioneer released a 2nd firmware upgrade last month, which I have yet to upgrade to yet (my stallion sits in the garage nowadays) which elimates a lot of the quirks and speeds up the boot-up times.

How does everything sound? I'm still tweaking my system to remove the distortion from the front door subs and speakers. The Ford Shaker amps leave much to be desired, unless its possibly my head unit that is making it sound bad.

Thanks guys! Got that done -- much easier than to the headlight switch.

My project has been much larger than I thought it would be. Removed the shaker door sub amps in the driver's footwell yesterday -- major pain in the ***. Wish I hadn't, just wired through them. Now I have to connect the new speaker cable to the wires way up under the dash. :mad:

Just look at what this forum has made me do to my car!! But, couldn't get it done without y'all...

http://i517.photobucket.com/albums/u...g/P1020613.jpg

http://i517.photobucket.com/albums/u...g/P1020611.jpg

http://i517.photobucket.com/albums/u...g/P1020610.jpg

http://i517.photobucket.com/albums/u...g/P1020608.jpg

http://i517.photobucket.com/albums/u...g/P1020607.jpg


Getting there, just have to clean up the wires in the passenger compartment and mount and wire the subs. Will post more pics when I can.

Brother - I feel your pain...trust me!

It will be worth it in the end. I didn't go all out as you did. I don't have any amps or anything...the amp is built into the MTX box I have, but I did have to strip the car down just as you did to conceal the wires and also run the wires for the rear-view camera. I also had to drill a hole through the bumper. (it's actually behind the license plate and goes under the car, and drilled another hole in the spare wheel well, and fished the wire through) It was a major PITA. I can't believe they made that car so hard to work on - audio wise. An on top of it, after 2006, they changed the rear speakers so all 2007+ S197's have a special layer, in which you have to remove the whole back seat! ARGGHHHHH!!!! HAHAHA, oh well, like I said it was worth it.

The only thing that kinda of pissed me off was there was no real way to conceal the microphone and the GPS antenna. I mounted the microphone on the front headliner on top of the driver side sun visor. the wire is tucked into the headliner, runs down the passenger side plastic molding, down into the glove box, behind the HVAC panel and into the radio. Then the GPS antenna I mounted on the top of the rear window. It goes through the back of the headliner, and then the side panels and follows suit with the rest of the wires from the rear-view camera and sub and goes under the sill plate on the passenger side, under the carpet, behind the HVAC control area and into the radio. (i hope all of that made sense LOL)

I did order the conversion kit from Crutchfield which apparently would retain the factory amps and sub from the Shaker 500 to work with the new system, but the subs don't seem to work, as I don't feel them pounding and I don't hear any audio coming from them. It was ALOT of work to do in a span of 6 hours, so when I turned on the car and did a final inspection of the audio and heard that the factory subs/amps weren't working, I just said f it. The sub in the back is plenty.

Once the weather is a little better out and I pull her out for a ride, I will take some pics and vids and update this thread. I will try to get the sound on video, but I doubt it will sound like the "real" thing.

Whew...lot of words there. G'night fellas!

All I know is I don't want to ever run wire from the car body to the doors again. That was teh suck. I'm not even sure how I did it. But the engineer that came up with the harness that's inaccessible to anything larger than a racoon hand should be downsized.