Adding an Aftermarket Amp(s)

[IPvFletch]

I did play with my gain and the amp still cuts out when its turned all the way down so maybe it is the signal coming in. The Kicker LOC I am using is very low tech, you are basically connecting RCA connectors to the speaker line. I have used this set up in other cars but it might not be adequate with the newer more advanced Uconnect. I will order the LC2i and let you know if that solves all my problems.

Thanks a lot for the help!!!!!!!

AFAIK you can't do that w/out an LOC.
Or use the high-level inputs on your amp direct from the OEM speaker wires.

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[Sting_NC_USA]

You're most certainly welcome, and yes, you'll definitely need more of a true LOC. You'll be rockin' in no time!

 

[RW Sting Gray]

I have an issue maybe someone can chime in.
Im running my sub from an amp and the LC2i. Everything worked fine for a couple weeks. Then one day, no bass. Turns out it was a bad connection at one of the quick splice taps at the rear speaker wires for signal to LOC. I fixed it, everything was fine. Couple days later, no bass again. I checked the splice locations again, even repalced them all and making sure the wire jacketing was breaking away to expose wire. For the signal wires that tap and run to the LOC, I stripped those back so its for sure a connection in the quick splice. That didnt help. Everything powers on and subwoofer wire connections are fine. Should I assume its the crappy quick splices and just hard wire those connections in? Its very tight at the connection area so maybe somethings not getting a conmection. Unless there’s something faulty in the LOC, that my only guess as to what is causing this.
Any thoughs?

 

[Sting_NC_USA]

I have an issue maybe someone can chime in.
Im running my sub from an amp and the LC2i. Everything worked fine for a couple weeks. Then one day, no bass. Turns out it was a bad connection at one of the quick splice taps at the rear speaker wires for signal to LOC. I fixed it, everything was fine. Couple days later, no bass again. I checked the splice locations again, even repalced them all and making sure the wire jacketing was breaking away to expose wire. For the signal wires that tap and run to the LOC, I stripped those back so its for sure a connection in the quick splice. That didnt help. Everything powers on and subwoofer wire connections are fine. Should I assume its the crappy quick splices and just hard wire those connections in? Its very tight at the connection area so maybe somethings not getting a conmection. Unless there’s something faulty in the LOC, that my only guess as to what is causing this.
Any thoughs?

Definitely could be the splices. A direct, soldered connection would be the best way to test it. I'd also recommend checking your ground wires, ensuring you're tied in to a dedicated ground post for the Jeep. And, while this is rare, check the fuses for the LOC and your amp. I've occasionally run across a fuse that looks OK, but has a hairline or hidden crack in the filament.

Once it's working again, you may benefit by ensuring you've secured all of your gear/wires so that nothing's moving around as your driving/wheeling.

Good luck!

 

[RW Sting Gray]

Definitely could be the splices. A direct, soldered connection would be the best way to test it. I'd also recommend checking your ground wires, ensuring you're tied in to a dedicated ground post for the Jeep. And, while this is rare, check the fuses for the LOC and your amp. I've occasionally run across a fuse that looks OK, but has a hairline or hidden crack in the filament.

Once it's working again, you may benefit by ensuring you've secured all of your gear/wires so that nothing's moving around as your driving/wheeling.

Good luck!

Firstly, thanks Sting for your vast knowledge and help in this thread...
I have checked the 2 fuses on the amo itself. It is a newer Alpine amp as well. Maybe theres a hairline fracture but they did appear normal. The LOC doesnt have a fuse. I checked the grounds and they are grounded to other Jeep ground locations. They are grounded under the plastic runners on each side of the passenger areas. I can check the LOC side tho as I only checked the amp ground. Pardon my ignorance but would the units not power on if the grounds werent secure?
When I checked the speaker wire at the amp terminals, I did get that tiny “thump” from the sub as I touched the wire to the amp terminal. So that tells me its getting a signal to the sub from the amp. I have the remote wire from the LOC to the amp as I didnt feel like running it to anywhere else. When I disconnected that from the loc, the amo goes off so I obviously connected that back to the loc and amo comes on again, so that shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Sting_NC_USA]

Firstly, thanks Sting for your vast knowledge and help in this thread...
I have checked the 2 fuses on the amo itself. It is a newer Alpine amp as well. Maybe theres a hairline fracture but they did appear normal. The LOC doesnt have a fuse. I checked the grounds and they are grounded to other Jeep ground locations. They are grounded under the plastic runners on each side of the passenger areas. I can check the LOC side tho as I only checked the amp ground. Pardon my ignorance but would the units not power on if the grounds werent secure?
When I checked the speaker wire at the amp terminals, I did get that tiny “thump” from the sub as I touched the wire to the amp terminal. So that tells me its getting a signal to the sub from the amp. I have the remote wire from the LOC to the amp as I didnt feel like running it to anywhere else. When I disconnected that from the loc, the amo goes off so I obviously connected that back to the loc and amo comes on again, so that shouldn't be an issue.

Weak grounding points can indeed create issues. A weak ground will allow enough power for things to turn on, but sometimes not enough to exceed the tolerances the device has. If this were the issue, you'd see the amp and/or the LOC turning off and on. It doesn't sound like that's the case.

If memory serves, the LC2i has a few switches and knobs on it. Try toggling the switches and rotating the knobs (returning them back to their original positions) to see if there may be a dead spot on the switch terminals or potentiometers. I had an amp recently that developed a little corrosion on the gain knob. Rotating it back and forth brought it back to life.

Last thing I can think of is to check the molex type plugs on both your amp and LOC. If loose, or dislodged, you'll lose connectivity.

I'm assuming you're amp's power wire is going directly to the battery. If it's not, it really needs to, as the draw of an aftermarket amp could cause issues/imbalances with the Jeep's electronics/UConnect system.

You'll get it worked out!

 

[RW Sting Gray]

Weak grounding points can indeed create issues. A weak ground will allow enough power for things to turn on, but sometimes not enough to exceed the tolerances the device has. If this were the issue, you'd see the amp and/or the LOC turning off and on. It doesn't sound like that's the case.

If memory serves, the LC2i has a few switches and knobs on it. Try toggling the switches and rotating the knobs (returning them back to their original positions) to see if there may be a dead spot on the switch terminals or potentiometers. I had an amp recently that developed a little corrosion on the gain knob. Rotating it back and forth brought it back to life.

Last think I can think of is to check the molex type plugs on both your amp and LOC. If loose, or dislodged, you'll lose connectivity.

I'm assuming you're amp's power wire is going directly to the battery. If it's not, it really needs to, as the draw of an aftermarket amp could cause issues/imbalances with the Jeep's electronics/UConnect system.

You'll get it worked out!

Ya amp power is running to battery with big ass fuse by the battery. Ill mess with it this morning and report back. thanks for the help!

 

[IPvFletch]

Yeah get a voltmeter and check your amp power + ground (you can leave the amp hooked up and probe at its terminals) and also check the voltage (use AC mode) of your stereo inputs into the amp - you can do this on RCAs or on high-level speaker wire type inputs.

If it's not a connection issue, it could be the amp overheating and going into protect mode (usually flashes or clicks when this happens), or else the subwoofer motor can be heating up and delamination of the coil could cause a break in the wiring, but then you'd also be getting really crappy sound output if this were the case..

 

[Fkerks71]

AFAIK you can't do that w/out an LOC.
Or use the high-level inputs on your amp direct from the OEM speaker wires.

I ordered and just installed the LC2i and it solved my amp problem. Come to find out the Uconnect system would reduce bass at around 20 on my volume and when it did that the amp would go into protect mode because of the fluctuating signal. The LC2i solved the issue and also improved the signal quality and overall sound of my bass. Thank you for your posts, i would have lost my mind trying to figure it out on my own.

 

[robmoz]

I just completed my install of all new speakers, amplifier, and powered sub. Thanks to Sting and everyone else who contributed to this thread. I also wanted to pass along a solution to an issue I had that I haven’t seen addressed here or elsewhere.

Quick overview of the install first. I started with replacing both the dash and sound bar 3.5” speakers with Kicker 77KICK25AB and adding a Kicker 11HS8 Hideaway 8” powered subwoofer in the cargo bin. That was initially going to be all I was going to do, but I still wasn’t happy with the sound I was getting so I decided to swap out the other speakers and add an amplifier. I replaced the front kick 4” panel speakers with Kicker 43CSC44. As noted elsewhere, that sucked to do. However, in the end I’m really glad I did it. I also replaced the sound bar 4” speakers with 5.25” Kicker 43CSC54. Upsizing was a bit of a pain, but really not that bad. My one tip there is to enlarge the hole towards the back of the vehicle as there is some frame towards the front that you will want to avoid hitting with the back of the speaker magnet.

I then installed a Kicker IQ500.4 amp under the passenger seat. It accepts speaker level inputs and includes a DSP / equalizer that is programmable through USB with a PC app. There is also an add-on module that allows you to control it via Bluetooth with your phone, but it is not worth the money at all in my opinion. The amp itself is a really good deal at $450 considering it allows you to avoid buying a separate LOC and/or DSP. It is not the most powerful (65W RMS per channel), but it suits my needs perfectly. I used the Axxess AX-DSP-CH5 harness to break the speaker wires out of the back of the head unit so that I didn’t have to cut into the factory wiring and also to avoid having to work in the dash. It was much easier to build my cabling and do my splices and soldering on a bench that trying to do it in the dash. Worth $30 in my opinion. Interestingly, the harness I got came with resistors installed and provided as a separate parallel plug in pig tail harness that you could either plug in or not. The instructions even noted I would need it on most Chrysler vehicles to trick the head unit. I was pretty happy thinking I wasn’t going to have to solder in resistors. However, they were definitely not power resistors (probably standard ¼ W) and I measured them at around 80 ohms. I was skeptical, but I foolishly thought it might work. As you might guess, it did not and I did not get any sound.

I snipped the resistors off the harness and soldered in the 47 ohm 5W resistors recommended here. I got sound out of three speakers but not the left rear. I checked all my connections and verified that my speaker out connections were all good and they were. I went through many cycles of this, restarting the radio each time. I actually got them all working one time but then next restart had none working, so crap. I strongly suspected I had a hairy edge problem where the radio was detecting the load sometimes and not others. I figured I probably needed a lower resistance than 47 ohms since the radio is looking for 4 ohm speakers, so maybe the 47 ohms was a bit high. I understand that value was probably chosen because it seems to work most of the time and the higher resistance will draw less current, but for some reason they did not work for my radio.

I spliced another set of 47 ohm 5W resistors in parallel on the amp end of my cabling. I did it there because it was easier to get to (didn’t have to remove the radio again) and also to dissipate any heat in two places rather than all concentrated in one are. This gave me an effective resistance of 24 ohms and, voila, the head unit happily gives me sound on all channels consistently.

My last tip is for mounting the amp. The one I used is pretty compact and fits really nicely under the seat. It doesn’t really even affect foot room in the back. I didn’t want to block the air vent under the seat and I also wanted to mount the amp as far forward as possible. I built a shelf out of a piece of lexan and attached it to the floor through one inch standoffs. That allowed me to mount the amp on the shelf, partially on top of the vent and allowed the vent to still have a channel for air flow under the amp.

The system sounds fantastic, although I probably will play around more with my EQ settings. In hindsight, the only thing I would have done differently is go with a 5 channel amp like the Kicker IQ1000.5 and putting in a 10” unpowered sub instead. That said, I’m getting what I want from my system and am really happy with the result. Hope something in here helps someone and thanks again to everyone who contributed!

 

[chr15m]

Didnt see if this already had been answered, but I see there are 4 channels on the factory connector. Are the fronts in parallel?

 

[Sting_NC_USA]

Didnt see if this already had been answered, but I see there are 4 channels on the factory connector. Are the fronts in parallel?

Correct, the wires are simply split to feed the base system's woofer and tweeter on each corner.

 

[JLsport2019]

Will 6.5" speakers fit the Rear sound bar?
The stock 4" are horrible.

I replaced the Rear sound bar with 2x JLaudio c2 4" speakers.
The problem I have is that it produces too much HIGHS (vocals) and no MIDS in my sound. Very noticeable.

Will adding 6.5" speaker in the sound bar help getting MIDS in my music?
Is that hard to do? I'll take your advice and cut towards-the-back

 

[Sting_NC_USA]

Will 6.5" speakers fit the Rear sound bar?
The stock 4" are horrible.

I replaced the Rear sound bar with 2x JLaudio c2 4" speakers.
The problem I have is that it produces too much HIGHS (vocals) amd no MIDS.

Will adding 6.5" speaker in the sound bar help getting MIDS in my music?
Is that hard to do? I'll take your advice and cut towards-the-back

You could probably make 6.5's work, but it would take a ton of cutting, and you'd need to ensure the depth of the 6.5's would allow a flush fit. The issue with the soundbar is that it's walls are thin and air flows throughout the entire soundbar. If you want to maximize your C2's, you might try to create as close to a sealed compartment on each side of the soundbar. I've added sound deadening material and fabricated as close to a sealed environment as I could. It's still just OK.

Short story is that I wouldn't recommend putting too much time/money in the soundbar. Instead, invest in the front channels and try not to rely much on the soundbar for anything other than "fill" effects.

Good luck!

 

[DravenGSX]

I'm getting close to pulling the trigger on something here. I have the Alpine system. Couple of questions:

From the wiring diagram on page 1, it looks like there are 4 channels coming out of the amp? If so, I'm guessing there is some sort of bass blocker on the factory "tweeters" that are fed through the mid-bass speakers? I was hoping to utilize the factory wiring from the aftermarket amp, but I'm starting to think that may not be viable, if there is a capacitor there.

Has anybody used the JL FiX-LSA-4 (https://www.crutchfield.com/p_13698124/JL-Audio-FiX-LSA-4.html?tp=61671&s=0) to handle the load sensing bit? I think I read a comment earlier in this thread that somebody needed two 47 ohm resistors wired in? I'm wondering if the LSA-4 won't be more consistent. It's pricey, but seems like it would make install quite a bit simpler.

I think I'm going to try to fabricate a mount for a 6" speaker in the knee panels. Going to cut the top of the enclosure off, and put a piece of ABS plastic that I cut to fit in its place. If anybody has a line on some used (junk yard maybe?) knee panel enclosures, I'd love to buy a couple to test and play with.

I think I'd like to go with this setup:
Audiofrog G60S with the GS10s mounted in the dash, and the GS60s in the knee panels
Audiofrog GS40s in the sound bar
MB Quart MA1-440.4 marine amplifier under the passenger seat
Fix 86 or LCQi in the dash under the steering wheel (though I have an LC8i from a previous build that would be no cost if the processing isn't as dramatic as I imagine it is)

I'm debating on doing away with the tweeters in the sound bar. I'm not a fan of super bright systems, and I think the GS40s will fill nicely. I could eventually run this as a 3 way active system also, saving a little money on another amp down the road. Any thoughts?

I'm out of my element when it comes to subwoofers. I need more than the factory Alpine, obviously - but it's definitely not my area of expertise. To complicate things a bit, I've removed the carpet in my Jeep and raptor lined the entire thing, so running cable is going to be interesting. I also run without top almost 100% of the time, and without doors as often as possible. So security is a concern on a subwoofer. Definitely open to ideas on this one.

Thanks for reading, and any feedback anybody has!

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