I have an 04 and the subs suck. They're worse than my 02's stock subs. I'd like to hook the stock amp to a speaker box with a single ported 12" that I have sitting in my garage. Anyone know how to remove the stock subs and access the wiring? I'm thinking that removing the subs may allow more bass to flow into the cabin. Thanks!

 

Subscribed....... as I have a JL Audio 8W7 sub and 250/1 amp to go in my STR

 

If someone does tackle this project PLEASE do a DIY step by step with pics! I'm sure alot of people on this site could benefit from such a thing.

 

i did the whole procedure on my cardomain page, with pics


http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3358987/2

 

Any suggestions on a reasonably priced plug and play sub? Nothing special, I dont "bump", just want something better than stock.

 

i put in 2 8" drivers on a plate i made. I used the factory amp. It really needs a bigger amp on it though. You could do 2 Image Dynamics 8" drivers under there, and mate it with about a 300 watt mono amp and be good.

At least thats what i would do without killing the bank account.

 

I think that the infinate baffle is somewhat of the issue with the lack of bass out of this setup. My old 2002 with 2- 6 by 8 woofers in an enclosure under the rear deck hit better than this one. I just get a bunch of rattling when I turn it up.

I hooked up a 12" fusion in a ported box with the stock amp in my 2002 and it hit good enough for me. Much better than stock and way harder than this car(my 2004). BTW, I got the fusion box for $8.53 after tax from the best buy outlet on Overstock.com's auctions. Not a bad investment...

Thanks for the photos. So are the stock subs wired in series at 2.5 ohms each? What type of load can I put on the stock amp? The stock amp is a mono amp right? Anyone know how much power the stock amp puts out?

 

each speaker shows a 2.4-2.5 ohm nominal impedence. i believe the output is mono, however seperate channels. (anything pretty much below 100hz is mono anyway) i can get plenty of output through the rear deck, and yes you would have to trim out some metal and apply sound deadening. or just leave it open and drop an enclosure in there. However i didnt want to take up the little trunks space it has as it is.

 

I did this with help from PHD12volts photo shoot.
Only complication I had, was my rear sunshade, I had to remove both side pillar covers to have enough room to get the package tray out.
I made an MDF oval shaped adapter, which bolted to the existing threaded hardware in the rear deck, and mounte two 6.5" HERTZ coaxials there driven by the sub output of my 5 channel amp.
This works pretty good, not thumping huge, but pretty accurate - miles ahead of the stock.
Pete

 

so is that alpine amp in the trunk a 5 channel? Can we swap in a larger 5 channel somehow?

 

OK, you really need to replace the Alpine amp with a real amp, however, it receives data from the head unit via fiber optic link, so that means basically you need to change the head unit as well - unless you choose a rear amp which can handle the 'high' level inputs from the factory amp.
All in all, I am not done, but have put a 60Wrmsx4 +150Wrms 5th channel "HERTZ 650" driving the new deck speakers, and the factory subs all from a Kenwood DNX5120 head unit. Several people have been helpful on the forum getting to this point for, I am not finished, but pretty satisfied for now - the alpine speakers in the car driven with a clean amp are reasonable.
One thing, I disconnected a wire to the rear seatbelt retractor which triggered the air bag light. Given that this car has side curtains, I think you should really disconnect the battery while taking the package tray out - I did not, this will prevent the airbag light from triggering by removing wires.
Pete

 

I forgot about the optical... bummer.

Anyone know of a good mono sub amp with an auto sensing turn on and speaker level inputs that won't break the bank?

Or

Is there a trigger wire to the stock amp that we can patch into to turn on the aftermaket amplifier without going all the way to the front of the car to the head unit? All the other stuff is fairly easy (speaker level adapter and amp or amp w/ speaker level inputs).