How would you wire my car?

[bump465]

I have a harman kardon system in my car that just isnt cutting it. I plan on doing a factory integration with the existing factory amp.

The problem is there are just so many speakers i dont even know where to start.

I was planning on buying an audiocontrol lc7i and some 6 channel amp or should i buy 2 4 channels? what speakers should i wire to which channels?

As a side note i have removed the factory subwoofer and am using an audiocontrol lc2i.

heres a link to my speaker layout.

Harman Kardon Mercedes GL-Class - Technical Details

Click to read more...

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

you have conflicting statements.

you said you plan on doing factory integration with the factory amp. if so, you don't need any external amplification.

you have a factory front 3-way, mono center, rear 2-way, rear fill, and a sub. if you try to re-use the factory speakers with aftermarket amps you'll need to build passive crossovers for them.

there aren't any processors that can handle that many speakers ran full active (except maybe several linked PXA-H900 @ $2,500 each). there are 13 factory speakers + a factory sub.

without adequate amplification and processing, you won't improve on the factory system.

a typical upgrade would be as follows:

4 channel #1 :

power the front door 3-way with a single 4 channel amp. mid and tweet together with a passive crossover between them.

4 channel #2 :

bridge two channels to the center.

run rear door woofer and tweeter with a passive crossover between them.

ditch rear fill

ditch factory sub.

you could use a MiniDSP 2x4, one on each 4 channel amp, for processing capability.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

another option is to ditch the factory center. run the front 3-way full active and the rears with a passive in a 2-way. that would use a pair of 4 channel amps as well and two MiniDSP 2x4.

if you want to take it up one step further, a pair of 6 channel or three 4 channel. three MiniDSP 2x4.

6 channel #1 :

center bridged

front tweeters in stereo

front mids in stereo

6 channel #2 :

front woofers in stereo

rear door tweeters in stereo

rear door woofers in stereo

 

[bump465]

removing the head unit of vehicle is a big deal, i need 3 convertors to turn fiber optics back to electricity and they dont come cheap. I want to avoid this route for now.

I planned on removing all the speakers and adding onto the factory speaker wires and running them back to a LOC (audiocontrol 7). From what i saw this model can handle 400w rms per channel and convert the signal to a safe rca output. So i will be directly connecting my factory amp to the LOC to give a signal to my aftermarket amp.

To clairify are you saying that I should wire all 3 speakers (tweet, mid, woofer) in the front to a single channel and depend on the passive filters? I thought i would have to wire all the mids to one channel for a frequency and all the tweets to another channel and same with the 6.5 woofers.

I have already removed the factory sub and used the wires to give a signal to LOC lci2 to power my bass amp.

I plan to put aftermarket speakers in but i havent decided on which ones yet. I havent decided how many speakers i was gonna be able to run or how i was gonna power them yet.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

gotcha, you have 14 channels to sum, you need more than a single LC7i that only accepts 6 channels.

you will need a summing loc per location - one summing loc for the front, one summing loc for the rear, one loc for the center, one loc for the sub (could share loc with the center, non-summing), and ditch the rear (unless you want it, then a stereo loc). you want to maintain fader, balance, and maybe the Logic 7 processing.

summing for all front three-way speakers is required to feed a signal to the front and requires 6 channels of summing. JL Audio Cleansweep would be better than the AudioControl for the speakers. LC2i is fine for the sub.

your aftermarket 3-way will come with a passive crossover you can use, or you can run active or bi-amp, whatever you get for amps and speakers will decide that.

i hope your budget is in excess of $4k and you have a hundred hours or so planned for the install. That's what it will take to outperform the factory system with your plans.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

I'd consider Hertz HSK speakers (can be 2-way or 3-way) for the various locations. Hybrid Audio is another good choice (if you run active). some members on here can help you with CDT ES speakers (with or without crossovers)

amp choice depends on budget and if you want to run active or passive. Arc Audio, Audison, JL Audio, Zed, Mosconi, are all good choices.

 

[bump465]

Do i really have that many channels on the factory amp? I figured that there would be small crossovers on the front speakers.

I do not believe I have 14 channels, I have 14 speakers but that includes the sub which is removed and i do not plan on removing the center dashboard speaker. So that leaves 12 channels.

If i am wiring the woofer,mid, and tweet together with passive crossovers then they will be on the same channel. If i do this on all speakers i only have 6 channels to power.

i dont understand why you say i would need a different loc for each location in my car when i can independently wire the 6 channels to the loc.

I believe the 860 watts the system boasts is musical peak. I had 4 kicker ks on 300 watts that were at least 2 or 3 times louder.

Idk how much i want to spend yet this is just a dream in development. I dont care for spending extra on hardly noticeable sound quaility features. I just want high power handling that doesnt sound terrible.

 

[bump465]

Was thinking of looking for some 200rms x 6 channel amp or maybe more practicly a 2 channel and a 4 channel

After i reread your first post about wiring the front stage i release i would have 8 channels if i wired the woofers independently each to their own channel

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

Yes, I expect that system to have active crossovers and separate amp channels for each speaker. That is why i expect you have to sum the front 6 outputs independently. You can look at the factory amp wiring harness for the output and quickly determine if there are enough wires for active or passive crossovers.

If they are passive up front, and in rear, then you are correct you only need the LC7i.

But don't assume, investigate.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[bump465]

Alright thanks youve helped quite a bit already. I know you posted a few recommended brands but what can you suggest for high listening power that is reasonably priced?