Stereo Wiring Question

[Steve83]

Steve - what type of connectors are these called?

I don't know that they have a name or PN - just get a JY fuse block, and pull them out as those pics show.

...just run the hot lead from the head unit into the radio location and then add a 15 amp fuse?

Yes, assuming your radio actually needs 15A. If it only needs 4, there's no reason to go larger than a 5A fuse. But never go larger than the WIRES can handle.

If I wanted to run power to a powered sub, where would I connect that?

As Gary mentioned: it depends on the sub's peak current draw.

[Rembrant]

I'm willing to bet the wiring is there.

I stand corrected Pete. I said in this thread (and others) that my radio delete truck had NO wiring provisions for a radio. Well, I did find a radio plug today, tucked away on the glovebox side of dash. It is the power wire for a radio. One yellow wire for IGN on power, and a light blue/red stripe wire for radio illumination. However, there are no speaker wires of any kind. Oddly, the 15amp radio fuse is there as well.

That's all, I was just updating this to correct my previous comments.

Hey Quarterwave, did you ever get a stereo installed in your radio delete truck?

Curious if you installed door speakers.

 

[Gary Lewis]

I'm willing to bet the wiring is there.

I stand corrected Pete. I said in this thread (and others) that my radio delete truck had NO wiring provisions for a radio. Well, I did find a radio plug today, tucked away on the glovebox side of dash. It is the power wire for a radio. One yellow wire for IGN on power, and a light blue/red stripe wire for radio illumination. However, there are no speaker wires of any kind. Oddly, the 15amp radio fuse is there as well.

That's all, I was just updating this to correct my previous comments.

Hey Quarterwave, did you ever get a stereo installed in your radio delete truck?

Curious if you installed door speakers.

Thanks for the clarification.

[Quarterwave]

I'm willing to bet the wiring is there.

I stand corrected Pete. I said in this thread (and others) that my radio delete truck had NO wiring provisions for a radio. Well, I did find a radio plug today, tucked away on the glovebox side of dash. It is the power wire for a radio. One yellow wire for IGN on power, and a light blue/red stripe wire for radio illumination. However, there are no speaker wires of any kind. Oddly, the 15amp radio fuse is there as well.

That's all, I was just updating this to correct my previous comments.

Hey Quarterwave, did you ever get a stereo installed in your radio delete truck?

Curious if you installed door speakers.

Hi Rembrandt,

Yes!

In short - yes, I added door speakers.

Here is a rundown of what needed to happen:

1) I pulled all of the interior out as the headliner was sagging and I wanted to fix that. So, everything came out and while I was at it, I cleaned and then Dynamatted the entire interior and re-dyed all of the interior plastic parts (excluding the door cards, as I wasn't sure if the dye would rub off on my arms). It took about 2 hours to pull out all of the trim and seats. It took another days work to wash, clean, prep and dye all of the panels.

Dynamatting the roof, pillars and floors took a leisurely weekend.

I also cut and installed flooring underlay on all of the back sides of the trim panels - which took a few hours. A little longer than I wanted, as the adhesive (3M Super 77) did not stick to the carpet padding!!! So, I used some duct tape to keep it in place.

2) Next, I ran a power wire from the battery for a powered subwoofer, by cutting a small access hole in the little grommet in the firewall near the passenger side foot well.

3) Ran that cable along the passenger side door sill and up along the rear of the cabin where the floor meets the rear panel.

4) Unbolted all seat belts (45 size Torx bolt) and cleaned them.

5) Measured and cut the ground wire, added a 10ga ring connector (cut into a "Y" to accommodate the larger bolt), heat shrinked it all, and used the passenger-side rear seat bolt as the ground for the subwoofer.

6) Ran the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal leads along the driver side sill.

7) Once all the lengths were determined, I taped everything down with aluminum tape (same used for the joint seams in the Dynamat) and duct tape. I also cut small access holes in the carpet, to pull the wires through for the sub connections.

8) For the door speakers, I had to drill holes in the doors for the speaker wire and also in the cabin shell just where the kick panels are.

9) These were hard to drill - and the drilling location for the doors were a PITA to access, so I used multiple bits to step up the size of each hole.

10) I installed some rubber boots to prevent wire chafing and ran the speaker wire through to each door.

11) I crimped and heat-shrunk speaker connections on each speaker wire.

12) The factory holes for the speakers did not line up with those of the speakers I bought (6.5" Polk Audio), so I used a small bit to make those holes, mocked up the speaker to confirm fitment, hooked up the wires to each terminal (noting which ones were positive/negative) and installed the speakers. It's a neat, snug fit.

13) Used electrical tape and tie downs to essentially make a wiring loom, which contained the left side speaker wire, the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal lead and snaked them up and under the dash (over the steering column etc...).

14) I affixed and connected the subwoofer volume controller and cable onto the front/rear brake bias controller that I have on my truck, which is located just to the left of the steering column, at the bottom of the dash.

15) Once the other wires were routed out through the stereo bezel opening, I ran and snaked the passenger side speaker wire through the dash and out through the stereo bezel opening.

16) I then grabbed the harness connector for the stereo and cut, crimped and heat-shrunk all of the relevant connections (front speakers (L/R), power on for sub woofer etc...).

17) As I don't have an exterior antenna, I found out that they now sell digital antennas that can be mounted under the dash. So I picked up one of those and cable tied it to a bracket in the dash that's located off the firewall just towards the drivers side in the dash... and ran the antenna cable out of the stereo bezel opening, while tying in the power lead for the antenna into the "power on" lead from the head unit (same wire as the sub-woofer power on wire).

18) For the yellow wire (power wire that controls the memory for the head unit), I ended up tapping that into the power wire coming through the firewall that was supplying power to the sub woofer.

This is important, as the yellow wire was 16 ga whereas the power wire is 10 ga. This presented an issue, as the cable splicers that I use are gauge-specific, and the 16 ga connector would not grab enough of the 10 ga wire to make a good connection.

To remedy this, I exposed the wire in the 10 ga, and manually wrapped the 16 ga wire around that exposed wire, and then sealed it all with electrical tape. I know I should have soldered it in, but it was getting on in the day and I wanted to test the system. Plus, it's right there under the carpet line, so I can come back and clean that up at a later date if needed.

19) To get power to the head unit, I then ran the red power lead into the fuse box - near the drivers side kick panel. My truck didn't have the 15 amp fuse that was required, so I used one of those "fuse-tappers" and bent the connection 90 degrees so that I could run the power lead neatly out of the fuse box and hooked that into a new fuse, and pressed the fuse into the "radio" fuse box location.

20) All wires were then cable tied into the main loom(s) to try and prevent rattles and excessive movement.

21) I then went into the engine bay to cable tie the power lead into some of the existing wires near the A/C freezer/drier, crimped and heat-shrunk a 10 ga, 30 amp in-line fuse, and then crimped on a 10 ga ring connector and heat shrunk it.

22) The red 10 ga connector was then added to the positive battery clamp.

23) After turning the ignition key to "Accessories" and powering on the head unit..... SUCCESS!

NOTES:

1) I will admit that my first couple of tries yielded no power to the head unit, which ended up being that yellow "memory" power wire not being connected well enough into the powered lead for the sub woofer. Once I got that sorted out, all was good.

2) I'll also note that I cut all of the cables to really specific lengths - in fear of having too much wiring behind the dash. However, if I did it again, I would give myself some extra cable to work with (maybe 6 to 8 inches). If I need to pull out the head unit, the main harness connector will not permit me to fully pull out the deck, without me having to put a hand up under the dash to wiggle it out. I guess you live and learn.

3) The powered sub did NOT fit under my rear seat without some work (I have a supercab). To create enough clearance, I had to add 3 large nuts (spacers that large were not available where I was looking) along with larger bolts for the rear seat floor mounts. It was not ideal but created the clearance I needed.

4) The subwoofer is not "mounted". I just sits under the rear seat as there just isn't the room to add some carpeted PDF or similar. I'm going to see how it all works out in real driving conditions and will address it if needed.

5) I'm battling with some carpet that is a terrible fit (thanks, LMC!!!) so once I manually sew in some other sections, I'll clean everything up without the front seat in and take some pics.

6) This was a nice challenge and I'm glad that I did it. I hope others can benefit from the write up provided. As my truck has a big cam and aluminum heads, I'm not sure if I'll be able to hear it but I'm hoping that I can!

If anyone needs some help during an install of their own, please contact me and I'll do my best to help!

[Quarterwave]

Hi Rembrandt,

Yes!

In short - yes, I added door speakers.

Here is a rundown of what needed to happen:

1) I pulled all of the interior out as the headliner was sagging and I wanted to fix that. So, everything came out and while I was at it, I cleaned and then Dynamatted the entire interior and re-dyed all of the interior plastic parts (excluding the door cards, as I wasn't sure if the dye would rub off on my arms). It took about 2 hours to pull out all of the trim and seats. It took another days work to wash, clean, prep and dye all of the panels.

Dynamatting the roof, pillars and floors took a leisurely weekend.

I also cut and installed flooring underlay on all of the back sides of the trim panels - which took a few hours. A little longer than I wanted, as the adhesive (3M Super 77) did not stick to the carpet padding!!! So, I used some duct tape to keep it in place.

2) Next, I ran a power wire from the battery for a powered subwoofer, by cutting a small access hole in the little grommet in the firewall near the passenger side foot well.

3) Ran that cable along the passenger side door sill and up along the rear of the cabin where the floor meets the rear panel.

4) Unbolted all seat belts (45 size Torx bolt) and cleaned them.

5) Measured and cut the ground wire, added a 10ga ring connector (cut into a "Y" to accommodate the larger bolt), heat shrinked it all, and used the passenger-side rear seat bolt as the ground for the subwoofer.

6) Ran the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal leads along the driver side sill.

7) Once all the lengths were determined, I taped everything down with aluminum tape (same used for the joint seams in the Dynamat) and duct tape. I also cut small access holes in the carpet, to pull the wires through for the sub connections.

8) For the door speakers, I had to drill holes in the doors for the speaker wire and also in the cabin shell just where the kick panels are.

9) These were hard to drill - and the drilling location for the doors were a PITA to access, so I used multiple bits to step up the size of each hole.

10) I installed some rubber boots to prevent wire chafing and ran the speaker wire through to each door.

11) I crimped and heat-shrunk speaker connections on each speaker wire.

12) The factory holes for the speakers did not line up with those of the speakers I bought (6.5" Polk Audio), so I used a small bit to make those holes, mocked up the speaker to confirm fitment, hooked up the wires to each terminal (noting which ones were positive/negative) and installed the speakers. It's a neat, snug fit.

13) Used electrical tape and tie downs to essentially make a wiring loom, which contained the left side speaker wire, the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal lead and snaked them up and under the dash (over the steering column etc...).

14) I affixed and connected the subwoofer volume controller and cable onto the front/rear brake bias controller that I have on my truck, which is located just to the left of the steering column, at the bottom of the dash.

15) Once the other wires were routed out through the stereo bezel opening, I ran and snaked the passenger side speaker wire through the dash and out through the stereo bezel opening.

16) I then grabbed the harness connector for the stereo and cut, crimped and heat-shrunk all of the relevant connections (front speakers (L/R), power on for sub woofer etc...).

17) As I don't have an exterior antenna, I found out that they now sell digital antennas that can be mounted under the dash. So I picked up one of those and cable tied it to a bracket in the dash that's located off the firewall just towards the drivers side in the dash... and ran the antenna cable out of the stereo bezel opening, while tying in the power lead for the antenna into the "power on" lead from the head unit (same wire as the sub-woofer power on wire).

18) For the yellow wire (power wire that controls the memory for the head unit), I ended up tapping that into the power wire coming through the firewall that was supplying power to the sub woofer.

This is important, as the yellow wire was 16 ga whereas the power wire is 10 ga. This presented an issue, as the cable splicers that I use are gauge-specific, and the 16 ga connector would not grab enough of the 10 ga wire to make a good connection.

To remedy this, I exposed the wire in the 10 ga, and manually wrapped the 16 ga wire around that exposed wire, and then sealed it all with electrical tape. I know I should have soldered it in, but it was getting on in the day and I wanted to test the system. Plus, it's right there under the carpet line, so I can come back and clean that up at a later date if needed.

19) To get power to the head unit, I then ran the red power lead into the fuse box - near the drivers side kick panel. My truck didn't have the 15 amp fuse that was required, so I used one of those "fuse-tappers" and bent the connection 90 degrees so that I could run the power lead neatly out of the fuse box and hooked that into a new fuse, and pressed the fuse into the "radio" fuse box location.

20) All wires were then cable tied into the main loom(s) to try and prevent rattles and excessive movement.

21) I then went into the engine bay to cable tie the power lead into some of the existing wires near the A/C freezer/drier, crimped and heat-shrunk a 10 ga, 30 amp in-line fuse, and then crimped on a 10 ga ring connector and heat shrunk it.

22) The red 10 ga connector was then added to the positive battery clamp.

23) After turning the ignition key to "Accessories" and powering on the head unit..... SUCCESS!

NOTES:

1) I will admit that my first couple of tries yielded no power to the head unit, which ended up being that yellow "memory" power wire not being connected well enough into the powered lead for the sub woofer. Once I got that sorted out, all was good.

2) I'll also note that I cut all of the cables to really specific lengths - in fear of having too much wiring behind the dash. However, if I did it again, I would give myself some extra cable to work with (maybe 6 to 8 inches). If I need to pull out the head unit, the main harness connector will not permit me to fully pull out the deck, without me having to put a hand up under the dash to wiggle it out. I guess you live and learn.

3) The powered sub did NOT fit under my rear seat without some work (I have a supercab). To create enough clearance, I had to add 3 large nuts (spacers that large were not available where I was looking) along with larger bolts for the rear seat floor mounts. It was not ideal but created the clearance I needed.

4) The subwoofer is not "mounted". I just sits under the rear seat as there just isn't the room to add some carpeted PDF or similar. I'm going to see how it all works out in real driving conditions and will address it if needed.

5) I'm battling with some carpet that is a terrible fit (thanks, LMC!!!) so once I manually sew in some other sections, I'll clean everything up without the front seat in and take some pics.

6) This was a nice challenge and I'm glad that I did it. I hope others can benefit from the write up provided. As my truck has a big cam and aluminum heads, I'm not sure if I'll be able to hear it but I'm hoping that I can!

If anyone needs some help during an install of their own, please contact me and I'll do my best to help!

Reserved for pics.

[Rembrant]

10) I installed some rubber boots to prevent wire chafing and ran the speaker wire through to each door.

Excellent, info, thanks!

What did you use for the boots?

 

[Gary Lewis]

Hi Rembrandt,

Yes!

In short - yes, I added door speakers.

Here is a rundown of what needed to happen:

1) I pulled all of the interior out as the headliner was sagging and I wanted to fix that. So, everything came out and while I was at it, I cleaned and then Dynamatted the entire interior and re-dyed all of the interior plastic parts (excluding the door cards, as I wasn't sure if the dye would rub off on my arms). It took about 2 hours to pull out all of the trim and seats. It took another days work to wash, clean, prep and dye all of the panels.

Dynamatting the roof, pillars and floors took a leisurely weekend.

I also cut and installed flooring underlay on all of the back sides of the trim panels - which took a few hours. A little longer than I wanted, as the adhesive (3M Super 77) did not stick to the carpet padding!!! So, I used some duct tape to keep it in place.

2) Next, I ran a power wire from the battery for a powered subwoofer, by cutting a small access hole in the little grommet in the firewall near the passenger side foot well.

3) Ran that cable along the passenger side door sill and up along the rear of the cabin where the floor meets the rear panel.

4) Unbolted all seat belts (45 size Torx bolt) and cleaned them.

5) Measured and cut the ground wire, added a 10ga ring connector (cut into a "Y" to accommodate the larger bolt), heat shrinked it all, and used the passenger-side rear seat bolt as the ground for the subwoofer.

6) Ran the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal leads along the driver side sill.

7) Once all the lengths were determined, I taped everything down with aluminum tape (same used for the joint seams in the Dynamat) and duct tape. I also cut small access holes in the carpet, to pull the wires through for the sub connections.

8) For the door speakers, I had to drill holes in the doors for the speaker wire and also in the cabin shell just where the kick panels are.

9) These were hard to drill - and the drilling location for the doors were a PITA to access, so I used multiple bits to step up the size of each hole.

10) I installed some rubber boots to prevent wire chafing and ran the speaker wire through to each door.

11) I crimped and heat-shrunk speaker connections on each speaker wire.

12) The factory holes for the speakers did not line up with those of the speakers I bought (6.5" Polk Audio), so I used a small bit to make those holes, mocked up the speaker to confirm fitment, hooked up the wires to each terminal (noting which ones were positive/negative) and installed the speakers. It's a neat, snug fit.

13) Used electrical tape and tie downs to essentially make a wiring loom, which contained the left side speaker wire, the subwoofer level control lead, the subwoofer power-on lead and the Red/White signal lead and snaked them up and under the dash (over the steering column etc...).

14) I affixed and connected the subwoofer volume controller and cable onto the front/rear brake bias controller that I have on my truck, which is located just to the left of the steering column, at the bottom of the dash.

15) Once the other wires were routed out through the stereo bezel opening, I ran and snaked the passenger side speaker wire through the dash and out through the stereo bezel opening.

16) I then grabbed the harness connector for the stereo and cut, crimped and heat-shrunk all of the relevant connections (front speakers (L/R), power on for sub woofer etc...).

17) As I don't have an exterior antenna, I found out that they now sell digital antennas that can be mounted under the dash. So I picked up one of those and cable tied it to a bracket in the dash that's located off the firewall just towards the drivers side in the dash... and ran the antenna cable out of the stereo bezel opening, while tying in the power lead for the antenna into the "power on" lead from the head unit (same wire as the sub-woofer power on wire).

18) For the yellow wire (power wire that controls the memory for the head unit), I ended up tapping that into the power wire coming through the firewall that was supplying power to the sub woofer.

This is important, as the yellow wire was 16 ga whereas the power wire is 10 ga. This presented an issue, as the cable splicers that I use are gauge-specific, and the 16 ga connector would not grab enough of the 10 ga wire to make a good connection.

To remedy this, I exposed the wire in the 10 ga, and manually wrapped the 16 ga wire around that exposed wire, and then sealed it all with electrical tape. I know I should have soldered it in, but it was getting on in the day and I wanted to test the system. Plus, it's right there under the carpet line, so I can come back and clean that up at a later date if needed.

19) To get power to the head unit, I then ran the red power lead into the fuse box - near the drivers side kick panel. My truck didn't have the 15 amp fuse that was required, so I used one of those "fuse-tappers" and bent the connection 90 degrees so that I could run the power lead neatly out of the fuse box and hooked that into a new fuse, and pressed the fuse into the "radio" fuse box location.

20) All wires were then cable tied into the main loom(s) to try and prevent rattles and excessive movement.

21) I then went into the engine bay to cable tie the power lead into some of the existing wires near the A/C freezer/drier, crimped and heat-shrunk a 10 ga, 30 amp in-line fuse, and then crimped on a 10 ga ring connector and heat shrunk it.

22) The red 10 ga connector was then added to the positive battery clamp.

23) After turning the ignition key to "Accessories" and powering on the head unit..... SUCCESS!

NOTES:

1) I will admit that my first couple of tries yielded no power to the head unit, which ended up being that yellow "memory" power wire not being connected well enough into the powered lead for the sub woofer. Once I got that sorted out, all was good.

2) I'll also note that I cut all of the cables to really specific lengths - in fear of having too much wiring behind the dash. However, if I did it again, I would give myself some extra cable to work with (maybe 6 to 8 inches). If I need to pull out the head unit, the main harness connector will not permit me to fully pull out the deck, without me having to put a hand up under the dash to wiggle it out. I guess you live and learn.

3) The powered sub did NOT fit under my rear seat without some work (I have a supercab). To create enough clearance, I had to add 3 large nuts (spacers that large were not available where I was looking) along with larger bolts for the rear seat floor mounts. It was not ideal but created the clearance I needed.

4) The subwoofer is not "mounted". I just sits under the rear seat as there just isn't the room to add some carpeted PDF or similar. I'm going to see how it all works out in real driving conditions and will address it if needed.

5) I'm battling with some carpet that is a terrible fit (thanks, LMC!!!) so once I manually sew in some other sections, I'll clean everything up without the front seat in and take some pics.

6) This was a nice challenge and I'm glad that I did it. I hope others can benefit from the write up provided. As my truck has a big cam and aluminum heads, I'm not sure if I'll be able to hear it but I'm hoping that I can!

If anyone needs some help during an install of their own, please contact me and I'll do my best to help!

Good write up. Thanks!

How does it sound?

[Rembrant]

17) As I don't have an exterior antenna, I found out that they now sell digital antennas that can be mounted under the dash. So I picked up one of those and cable tied it to a bracket in the dash that's located off the firewall just towards the drivers side in the dash... and ran the antenna cable out of the stereo bezel opening, while tying in the power lead for the antenna into the "power on" lead from the head unit (same wire as the sub-woofer power on wire).

Also interested in this since I also have no antenna. How is this one working out? I see LMC or one of them sells an under dash "hidden" antenna like that. What brand/model did you use? And how has it been?

I mostly listen to Podcasts these days, so the radio isn't a huge priority for me, but I would still like it to be functional for the odd time that I DO want to use it.

 

[Quarterwave]

17) As I don't have an exterior antenna, I found out that they now sell digital antennas that can be mounted under the dash. So I picked up one of those and cable tied it to a bracket in the dash that's located off the firewall just towards the drivers side in the dash... and ran the antenna cable out of the stereo bezel opening, while tying in the power lead for the antenna into the "power on" lead from the head unit (same wire as the sub-woofer power on wire).

Also interested in this since I also have no antenna. How is this one working out? I see LMC or one of them sells an under dash "hidden" antenna like that. What brand/model did you use? And how has it been?

I mostly listen to Podcasts these days, so the radio isn't a huge priority for me, but I would still like it to be functional for the odd time that I DO want to use it.

So far, it's been great but admittedly, I haven't really driven around town with it, yet.

I bought the brand that is for sale in the LMC online catalog, which is probably the same one that you were checking out. The only issue I found was that they intentionally give you a lot of cable, in case you want to mount if somewhere far away from the head unit (which in most instances, is a good thing).

However, for my installation, that was unnecessary, as the location was only 12-14 inches away from the head unit.

That being said, the head unit I'm using has HD radio and it sounds quite good. Clear and plenty of volume.

I personally prefer to upload content into my phone and then sync the phone to the stereo using Bluetooth.

[Quarterwave]

Good write up. Thanks!

How does it sound?

Sounds great!

I'm using a Kenwood head unit which has a bunch of options for the EQ curves and all that, so I need to play with it some more, but the power is nice and clean, as is the bass.

I had to laugh as when I first turned it all on, I had no bass from the sub after all the work plumbing it in!

That's when I noticed I had the amp volume on zero....