Hey guys, this seems to be the most populated 350 forum that I could come across and there seems to be quite a bit of activity in the stereo department. A guy wants me to do some stereo work in his car. I know nothing about these cars, and i'm not a huge fan of working around a factory stereo, especially ones that are all integrated like the bose. I enjoy completely gutting everything and piecing together everything of my choice.

This guy said that he's tired of not having any bass, so he wanted to add some subs to the mix. He has an aftermarket headunit that he could put in the dash if need be, but we'd like to leave it alone to avoid any problems with getting the front stage to function properly.

I've used line out converters in the past, and sometimes they've worked well, and other times they havent worked... at all. If i want to put in an aftermarket amplifier and subs, how am I going to get signal for the amplifier? I haven't taken a look at the car in person, so i'm not sure if its something as simple as the factory amplifier actually having rca cables, or am I going to be forced to use a line out converter.

I'm hoping someone here has done exactly what i'm trying to do, and can point me in the right direction.

Thanks for any help.

 

no love? c'mon, someone here has to have added subs and left everything else alone.

 

Are you sure your friend has the OEM Bose package? If so, it won't be all that simple. My Z didn't have the Bose package so I'm not 100% on this, but I think the rear speakers have high pass filters and are of a crazy ohm variety (like 32 ohms or something) to match up with the Bose amplifer. This will make it difficult to use the rear speaker leads for your subwoofer signal.

If your friend has the OEM Clarion (non Bose) package, then it shouldn't be too hard to use the leads from the rear speakers to feed signal to the amp via line-level inputs on the amp.

 

stock amps arent going to have rca connectors. if the system is the bose then you can connect the line level converter to the actual subwoofer speaker wire coming out of the bose amplifier, that is what i have done in the past on other amplified systems like benz and bmw. i would not suggest running any amp high level as previously mentioned. if the guy wants to keep the stock unit (non-bose system) and wants to replace everything then i would sugget something like the jl cleansweep unit instead of a regular line level converter.

 

I fail to comprehend your hesitance to use line-level inputs on an amp, when you condone using line drivers. All the line-level inputs on an amp are is an integrated line driver.

 

just to clarify, this is an 03 with the bose system, without navigation.

so the easiest way to do this would be to just connect a line converter to the wires going to the factory subwoofer? anyone wanna recommend a line output converter that'll work for this? i'm hesitant to pick any random one, the last time i did that it quit working in 2 days.

thanks for the responses.

 

What amp are you hooking up for the sub?

 

not sure what we're going to use. i should be sitting down with the guy tonight to get some progress going on this project. it'll likely just be your average mono amplifier, but since we're going to be using a line converter, i'll make sure it has a built in low pass to help filter any crap we dont want running through the subs.