Amp Wiring Help

[cyra1ax]

I'm adding an Alpine Power Pack into my WRX because the stock head unit is absolutely shit and the aftermarket just doesn't support the SWC yet. Ideally I would get a Pioneer NEX (4100?) unit and be done with it, but for now the amp seems to be the way to go from what I've read on the forums.

The wiring seems to be mostly straightforward, I've done car audio before. Where I'm getting hung up is trying to figure out whether or not its possible to wire speaker wires to RCA male so I can just plug into the amp? I'm aware of LOC's, however the KTP-445U is capable of taking speaker level inputs(literally just flipping a switch).

If it's not possible, then I'm going to chop off the female RCA's on the Alpine harness as they suggest and directly wire, and keep them so I can re-solder them back on if need be.

[RX-7_TWINTURBO]

Short answer, yes you can
I'd use good quality connectors witch decent gauge wire.
or buy something premade like this. http://www.crutchfield.com/p_136XDCL...LRAIC2-SW.html

In reality though the stock headunit is only going to put out 10W RMS max and that is well within the range of most if not all rca connectors

[cyra1ax]

I ended up getting those connectors, I was actually looking for a cheaper solution but nothing seemed to present itself. There was always the option to cut RCA off a old wire and splice it to speaker wire, but I kept reading conflicting information.

As for head unit output, I think I read over on NASIOC that the output is only something like 3-4 W RMS which explains why it sound like a hot pile of garbage.

Thanks for the help!

[Projek01]

You can get solder on RCA heads from active electronics or the home depot.

Does the car have a OEM amplifier after the head unit? I know a lot of Toyotas (Unrelated) will have an amp for the front component speakers. If you do, makes sure you bypass that with the alpine amp.

If you want a super clean install, get a donor harness from a pick n pull Subaru and also a radio install harness from Canadian tire to make a t-harness. That way its 100% reversible if you decide to run a different setup.

[01RedDX]

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[cyra1ax]

Originally posted by Projek01
You can get solder on RCA heads from active electronics or the home depot.

Does the car have a OEM amplifier after the head unit? I know a lot of Toyotas (Unrelated) will have an amp for the front component speakers. If you do, makes sure you bypass that with the alpine amp.

If you want a super clean install, get a donor harness from a pick n pull Subaru and also a radio install harness from Canadian tire to make a t-harness. That way its 100% reversible if you decide to run a different setup.

From reading about what others have done, there isn't an amplifier after the head unit already. There is however a crossover on the tweeters, but those are on the tweeters themselves. The only thing that may get weird is the factory Kicker subwoofer that I got installed at delivery, from what I've seen on the FSM for installing it, it taps into the front passenger speaker, and there is a dedicated amp on the subwoofer itself.

As for the harness, there's actually a guy that sells Subaru/Toyota/Nissan specific "breakout harnesses" where he includes t-branches and longer speaker wires to accommodate things like adding an amp.

[Projek01]

Originally posted by cyra1ax


From reading about what others have done, there isn't an amplifier after the head unit already. There is however a crossover on the tweeters, but those are on the tweeters themselves. The only thing that may get weird is the factory Kicker subwoofer that I got installed at delivery, from what I've seen on the FSM for installing it, it taps into the front passenger speaker, and there is a dedicated amp on the subwoofer itself.

As for the harness, there's actually a guy that sells Subaru/Toyota/Nissan specific "breakout harnesses" where he includes t-branches and longer speaker wires to accommodate things like adding an amp.

The Kicker sub should be fine. It would be louder because of the preset gain but Id assume the speakers would also get the same boost in volume. Sounds like you have it all figured out